Life is sweeter than jewish wine

Neurotic Programming, final documentation

watch my Neurotic programming video documentation here

Neurotic Programming

Neurotic programming has been a long time in the working, but i finally got it right. All that is left now is to work out the presentation, get the video playing on my small television, build a smaller bread board and i’m all done with my first microcontroller piece. What you’ll see below is the diagram that i made for it when i first planned it, the schematic for the wiring and a video documenting how it works.

Update on N.P.

I’ve been working hard on my Neurotic Programming. This past week I had crits for it in both my tutorial class and my programming class and I feel like I have a pretty clear direction for it and that my technical skills just need to catch up. This weekend when Jeanne’s boyfriend Jake was in the studio and asked me what I was working on I described to him (with some expertise) the premise of my program and how it relates with the electronics that i was working with. I hadn’t realized at the moment and Jeanne pointed out to me the next day how impressive our progress has been thus far with these concepts and that she noticed it when i described my project. The first couple of tutorial classes we both felt really lost in making sense of any of it. Well, anyway, this is what i’ve got: I opened up my coffee machine, sawed off some unesecessary part and installed a servo inside of it. Attached to the servo is a small wire rod that connects to the inside of the on/off switch. when the servo is connected to my arduino board it runs through a forward/backward motion that switches the switch on and off. The next step is to synchronize it with my program which will be reading the Woody Allen text and converting that into the commands for the on/off. While i’ve worked out most of the program that converts the text to binary code it will be quite an ordeal to synchronize it manually to match the movie. The more desirable option is to convert the actual audio directly from the video. Which i am told is not entirely too difficult, it only requires that i learn MAX/MSP. Argh! So this week, i’m hoping to finish up the actual appliance and then dedicate myself entirely to the programming aspect (once i’ve made up my mind on which program to use).
When i spoke to Sarah this weekend i was frustratingly working out some issues with the servo and she commented that in the process of making my neurotic programming machine i am giving myself a neurosis. Yes, i think that may be true.

Diagram for the Existential Robot

Neurotic Programming

Neurotic Programming
Project Proposal
Nathaniel Katz

Concept Description
Neuroticism can be paralyzing. A simple yes or no decision, layered with neuroticism becomes a mental exercise that is both terrifying and innately human. A program performs a function, whether complex or simple; it’s either a 1 or a 0. In Neurotic Programming I take the text of Woody Allen, the master of neuroticism, and program it to convert the text to a set of binary numbers. These binary numbers will then be interpreted for the very simple function of on and off on a switch. Through this interpretation, the program will operate a coffee maker, which will be in a continuous state of on and off, a continuous state of neuroticism. By the end of the text a pot of coffee may or may not be brewed.

Technical Description
The piece will consist of a computer, two small monitors, an Arduino board and a hacked coffee maker installed within the shell of an old personal computer. One monitor will display the interpreted binary number from the Woody Allen text while the other monitor will show a scene from a Woody Allen movie. The coffee maker will be connected to the computer via the Arduino board and will operate based on the on/off commands being sent from the computer program.

The Existential Robot

Project Proposal
Nathaniel Katz

The Existential Robot:
A robotic installation that uses the collected works of Jean Paul Sartre to explore issues of productivity and the function of robots in contemporary culture.

The installation consists of a robot and a corresponding computer monitor that will document the processing of the robot. The robot will be programmed with the collected works of Jean Paul Sartre. The program will process through the works of Sartre continuously hundreds of times per minute looking for cues for activity and/or data to process, however each time will return with the inaction associated with the existential condition.

Robots are designed with the idea of productivity, ease and processing. In industry, science and medicine as well as in fictionalized imaginings of robots they are always performing tasks that are too difficult, exact or lengthy for humans. This work challenges the robot to contemplate the human condition and is thus rendered inactive.

programming and your mama

back in the day when i was teaching in the bronx, my kids used to love cracking your mama jokes with troy and myself. they would get so dirty and inappropriate, but they would never quite manage to outwit troy or myself. no matter how long some of them would spend thinking up a good comment (and you could tell sometimes that they were waiting for the moment all class) they would almost always end up shrugging and saying “mista, you played me.”
so in memory of those beautiful moments with my kids long ago, and to fulfill my php programming assignment for catharine’s class i made a “your mama” joke randomizer.

check it out

each time you hit the refresh button it will generate a new joke combination. so far there aren’t that many variables, but the internet is an endless source of your mama punchlines.