[Gghc-discuss] Proposed initial purchase - too much?

Thu Mar 31 16:51:22 CDT 2011

Hi all,

So, with this and Brian's emails in mind, combined with keeping an eye on
the budget, here is what I did:

I ordered 3 Arduino Uno kits from Amazon.com. With overnight shipping, they
were cheaper than 2-day shipping them from elsewhere as I have an Amazon
Prime account. They will arrive tomorrow. Cost: $101.82

I also ordered 3 Arduino XBee shields via amazon -- with expedited shipping
they will get here monday. They are a different brand of shield than sold by
SparkFun, and don't need extra headers. They arrive monday. The price was
$79.84 after shipping.

>From Spark Fun I ordered 2 USB XBee explorers. They are sent USPS Priority
Mail, and so should get here Monday. Cost after shipping: 57.09

>From Newark.com I ordered 5 low-power XBees (w/ antenna) for $104 with
shipping. They get here Monday.

Total cost of orders: $342.75

I know that it means we won't have robots or wireless immediately, but we
can use the time to get people up to speed on arduino. We can also do some
basic design on the robots and drivetrains over the weekend. Monday we can
get going on wireless stuff.  There is lots to do over the next few days, so
I don't think we need to worry about that.

I'll be at the makerspace open hours tonight if anyone wants to discuss it
further there, perhaps it would be easier than over email.

I also plan on being in the makerspace tomorrow evening, and can be there
variously over the weekend, that just needs to be coordinated with everyone
else.

Regards,
Erich

On Thu, Mar 31, 2011 at 1:19 PM, Samantha Copeland <scope83 at gmail.com>wrote:

> Hi everyone,
>
> I think Brian brings up a good point about everyone not working at the same
> time. In my opinion, the best design teams don't think of things as my part
> your part and there is an understanding that while some things can happen
> parallel not everything can and that at the end of the day its not about
> personal opinions but what is in the best interest of the project and team.
>
> I feel the question should not be When do we get to my part? but How can I
> help with the step we are on now? or even better What can I learn from this
> step that I didn't know before?
>
> I also like the idea of exercising patience with each other and also
> respecting one another's knowledge and lack of knowledge about different
> things. We needs everyones knowledge and parts to be successful.
>
> I realize this is starting to sound like an after school special and there
> will be differences in opinions and debates. The more we debate the better
> our project comes out. In my opinion exploring the different approaches
> makes our end product that much stronger. But the way we debate and select
> and approach should not be with egos but rather with understanding. I think
> it would be good to keep in mind that by questioning an approach it is not
> questioning a person's knowledge base or saying I know more than you. There
> are may ways to accomplish most of these tasks. I feel the reason we choose
> to take one approach over another should not be because one person is right
> and the other is wrong. It should be what is in the best interest of the
> project. It should be we chose to do this because it allowed our project to
> go further not we chose this because he was wrong and I was right. Its good
> to keep in mind that questioning and critiquing is not challenging its
> discussing and exploring.
>
> As we move forward I feel all of this is good to keep in mind. The goal is
> to push one another to learn more and encourage each other not break each
> other down. We should work  Like we are a team or something :)
>
> Just my humble opinions,
> Sam
>
> On Thu, Mar 31, 2011 at 11:22 AM, Brian Duggan <bcdugga at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I think there's agreement. Jonathan said that Erich's parts list is
>> fine, if not everything he would like to see this weekend. Of course the
>> list should include any extra XBee hardware that Jonathan caught.
>>
>> I understand that this does not get us everything we need for the first
>> robot milestone, but Erich is right that there will be plenty to work on
>> this weekend.
>>
>> It sucks that we can't accommodate everyone's precise interests in the
>> first round of purchasing. I think the real stress right now is that we
>> have an incredible range of skill levels and interests in our
>> engineering group. It's going to be impossible to satisfy everyone's
>> exact desires all the time. Some of us will have to wait sometimes while
>> others play and learn, and some of us will have to do our best to keep
>> up with the the more experienced folk. If we continue to exercise
>> patience with each other, even in the face of deadlines, we can use
>> these differences to our advantage. We're like a team or something :)
>>
>> Let's go ahead and get the currently proposed parts ordered. There
>> should be *something* for everyone to do this weekend, even if it's not
>> exactly what we wanted to do right away. You *will* get to do those
>> things! Thanks for playing ball. Our project will be stronger for it.
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Brian
>>
>> On 3/31/11 10:57 AM, makerspace.derekdagit at spamgourmet.com wrote:
>> >> The tl;dr here is I won't order anything until someone else chimes in,
>> >> as there seem to be some pretty big differences of opinion here.
>> >
>> > I will defer the decision to you guys.  I haven't seen any plan so far
>> > that I'd object to.  (I'm more worried about time than money, anyway.)
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > _______________________________________________
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>> > Gghc-discuss at lists.chambana.net
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>>
>> --
>> Brian Duggan
>> Technical Projects Developer
>> UC Independent Media Center
>> http://www.ucimc.org | 631 223 8442
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>
>
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