Lego Raspberry Pi Cases

I purchased a Raspberry Pi last year, and inspired by a girl in Britain who assembled her own Pi case, I spent way too much time making my own Lego case:



I made it so it could be mounted on the wall. Additionally, the left side opens to expose the GPIO pins, although I doubt you could fit something on them without having to remove pieces from the case.



Here's a full slide show with more angles, showing how the Pi fits and the parts of the case that move.

Raspberry Pi Case 1:

A friend of mine also has a Pi, but he was using a plastic food container for its housing. I simply could not stand for this, so I created another case for him:



This one doesn't mount on the wall. I think he's just using it on an entertainment center near the cable modem box. Unlike my case, it opens fully, exposing the entire board. I forgot to take a picture of this feature, but you can see the hinges on one of the side photos.

Raspberry Pi Case 2:


Both of these cases use some classic Lego pieces that I received from my cousin when I was a kid. The old-school computer terminals in blue and grey and the pieces with space logos came from this set, and I mixed them with some newer space buttons and circuitry. The glass-like covers are also newer, but have a similar hokey space feel to them.

It was fun putting my old Legos to use again!

My Professional Network, Graphically

A few months ago, I was thinking about my professional network and wondered what it would look like if it were mapped out. It turns out, LinkedIn has a lab project to do just that. I loaded up my profile and a few minutes later, this came out (click for larger version):



Each dot in the above chart represents a person, and each line represents a connection between people. The larger the dot, the closer the relationship. I am at the center, and unique clusters of people become apparent by their interrelationships, and they are grouped together in space.

The lab does not label the clusters, but it does identify the clusters by color, and it allows the user to identify those clusters and name them, as I have done above. Further, you can explore your network by hovering over the individual dots that represent people.

Essentially, five groups arise from my network: Family, Friends, and Educators on the left; Dean Health Plan at the top; CPM Healthgrades at the upper right; the UW Health System, which is composed of the University of Wisconsin Medical Foundation (UWMF), the University of Wisconsin Hospitals and Clinics (UWHC), and the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health (UWSMPH); and finally the SAS Institute at the bottom.

The lab isn't perfectly accurate, but it is pretty good. I checked out a number of individuals and some don't make sense, but most do. As an example, my wife is one of the larger dots on the left, which makes sense, since she also has networked with our friends and family on LinkedIn (although I usually avoid doing so for a number of reasons).

The UW Health cluster is visually split, but there is apparent movement and interrelationship between the organizations. There are some people who traveled between the UW and Dean, one way or another. The same is true between Dean and CPM, with most, I believe coming from Dean to CPM. There are some hubs in each organization, likely managers, project managers, or other people who attended a lot of meetings (I think one of the big dots at Dean was an IT manager who sat in on a lot of projects).

Aside from family and friends, SAS is probably the oddest group. I have some connections, and they seem to be somewhat strong. Before I attended the SAS Global Forum, this chart may have looked quite different, since I made many more connections after the conference. The chart also shows how well-developed my connections were at Dean and the UW, and how I'm still fairly new at CPM. (I bet if I ran this today it would look a bit better developed.)

Of course, charts like these leave out people who aren't on such sites as LinkedIn, but I would think that all the other people would compensate for them when graphed like this. Additionally, I don't have much of a network for old jobs like the ones I had in college, nor have I really networked much with fellow college classmates.

It would be interesting to see what other people's networks look like, especially people who are essentially professional networkers, like HR professionals or recruiters. How do networks in different industries look (mine is mostly health care)? What if you have someone who only networks with family or friends? What does that show? Perhaps different geographic locations you've lived in? How about someone who is a world traveler?

This type of graph is very powerful in that makes you think about the data behind it and ask such questions as I have done. It opens up doors we haven't thought of and inspires curiosity.

An Amended Quote

Today on The Writer's Almanac, Garrison Keillor read a quote by Gustave Flaubert:

"I spent the morning putting in a comma and the afternoon removing it."

I thought this could use some amending for programmers:

I spent the morning putting in a parenthesis and the afternoon removing it.

Or for you SAS programmers:

I spent the morning putting in a semicolon and the afternoon removing it.

How about SQL:

I spent the morning putting in a column and the afternoon removing it.

Or if you write HTML:

I spent the morning putting in an escaped ampersand and the afternoon removing it.

Why not Python:

I spent the morning importing a library and the afternoon removing it.

Essentially, though, these all boil down to:

I spent the morning putting in (an) arbitrary character(s) and the afternoon removing it.

For all you programmers during this holiday season: May your parentheses be matched (your quotes too!), special characters escaped, and code executable on the first run.

Two Special Notes

A few weeks ago we were packing up all our stuff to move to our new house. During this process, I found two notes from former coworkers, delivered on my last day of work at different jobs. Here's the first:





Here's the transcription in case the image does not appear:

Dear Chris —
     I have enjoyed watching you learn and grow over the last couple of years. You have become and excellent analyst — UWMF is lucky to have you. I will miss your superb work, smiling face and Luca stories! Best of luck to you on this exciting step in your career! I wish you, Kyra and Luca much happiness!
     Sincerely,
     [name]

And here's the second:





with the text:

Chris
     I really appreciate the time and dedication and professionalism that you offered to the [organization's] projects and my RA project in particular. You pressed on to make this all possible, and I am grateful. Regrets for the frustrations along the way, but know that your contribution will be remembered.
    All the best with your next personal + professional pursuits! Congrats on the well deserved Scientist position!
    Thank you,
    [name]

I kept both notes because they are very meaningful to me, and I think this highlights how important it is to write hand-written notes of thanks to you colleagues: It can be touching, powerful, and memorable for the recipient, and the writer has earned a relatively permanent place in memory. It's a perfect way to not only show genuine gratitude, but also earn a positive place in the recipient's mind, whether for the purpose of networking, friendship, or simple kindness.

New House

I haven't been posting much lately because we've been looking for, buying, and moving to a new house! Hopefully once things settle down I'll be back to posting as usual. Stay tuned!