Richard J. Prinz

As everybody knows “Make Backups (more than one!!) of your data!!” nowadays is as important as gaining enough sleep or eating healthy. But sometimes you are completely unprepared. This is exactly what happened to me a few days ago. A hard disk with very important source code for a project I’m currently working on suddenly stops working and the last backup was … some weeks ago.

So what to do? Besides calling me self a jackass I had to find a way to get back the data. After researching prices of some professional data rescue companies I came to the conclusion that trying to recover the data myself (and rewriting the lost source code in case my rescue attempt fails) would be cheaper and faster (project deadline is approaching with rapid steps).

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Using a YubiKey (or other USB security token) to unlock physical things.

While researching locks and lockable storage for a new premise I found lots of LockPicking information about how to hack and break into products from even renowned companies. It’s not only a waste of money buying “high security” products which could be unlocked by just a paper clip like shown in this Video but might also be dangerous.

At the same time I use my YubiKey daily with IT systems and services. So I thought to myself:

“Why not use a YubiKey as a key for physical storage/property?”.

So I started another research, if, how and with how much effort a lock for physical things could be designed which uses a standard USB security token as key.

Fortunately it was easy to design such a lock. The outcome is the “StickLock” (short “SL”) described in this project.

Note: Latest software could be found on GitHub.

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Based on this post which describes controlling a Flight Simulator software with your R/C transmitter the following post describes the other way round: controlling a R/C model from the PC using an Arduino UNO.

The R/C transmitter used in this project is a Walkera Devention DEVO-7.

There are two ways to control a R/C modell from the PC:

1. Using a standard R/C transmitter by using the trainer port most transmitters have (this should also work on older transmitter models). In this case the PC is responsible for providing a PPM signal which contains information’s about all transmitter channels. The PC can produce such a signal using it’s sound card or by using an Arduino connected to the PC via USB.
    

2. By using only the transmitter module which could be found especially in newer 2GHz transmitters. The transmitter module used by the Devo7 is a WK-21201RF which uses a Cypress CYRF6936 wireless USB chip. This module has just 8 pins using standard signals like MISO, MOSI, Reset, CS, VDD, GND (Pinout can be found on Google) and can be directly connected to the Arduino.

This solution uses the DSC trainer port of the Devo7 (so there is no need to open the Devo7) and an Arduino for creating the PPM signal.

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So you have just bought your new very fancy quadcopter? Fine! But I’m pretty sure (unless you are
very talented) after some flights somehow the idea will arise to have the oportunity to train your
flying skills without some (maybee more) hard landings or (worse) crashes.

Here I describe a way to connect nearly every R/C transmitter to your PC using an Arduino UNO
board. Why? Because I bought a quadcopter and hat some hard landings and crashes so I started
training on the PC using a flight simulator controlled by my R/C transmitter.
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