Microsoft .Net Gadgeteer is a platform to combine small electronic gadgets and hardware devices to rapidly make compelling interactive prototypes. The devices allow for a variety of user interactions as well as the display of images, the playing of sounds, capturing of pictures, and many more. Have a look at the existing collection of Gadegteer Modules.
The small devices can be connected easily to develop more sophisticated and fully functional designs even in a short period of time. Moreover, they can be programmed (in C#) but also make use of Visual Studio’s programming and debugging tools.
For more information, example projects and tutorials visit the .Net Gadgeteer Website
To get started with Gadgeteer (which will only work on Windows computers) you have to download and install the following softwares:
- Visual Studio C# Express and Visual C# 2010 Express (Free tools to create .NET applications on Windows using Visual C#)
- .NET Micro Framework 4.1 SDK (This SDK must be installed before the Gadgeteer package below)
- GHI NETMF v4.1 and .NET Gadgeteer Package (This installs all the necessary SDKs and components.)
Once you’ve done that you can start making your own prototypes!
Tom Smith and Jonathan Hook will provide additional technical support during the prototyping activities of this workshop. Together with Tom Bartindale, they are organising the .NET Gadgeteer Hack-Fest workshop as part of this year’s Pervasive 2012 conference.