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I mentioned in another blog entry that I was considering doing something with slide rules. I mentioned in yet another entry how I hope to pass on some of newly acquired mathematical knowledge to my grandkids. I'm working on a slide-rule for kids project. Although I didn't use maple in any phase of this project, it was definitely a stepping stone on the path that lead up to it. Below is a picture of one of the prototypes - a very rough prototype. read more about it by clicking the "read more" link below --- At the bottom of this message are a couple of links of pdfs that you can print-out to make your own. Be sure to follow the instructions or the scales won't be accurate. The one has the name of one of my grankids on it, so I also water-marked it. Anyone who wins the "prestiges" maple recognition award here as Jacques and Robert Israel have, are entitled to a copy of the watermarked version, non-watermarked, with the name of a kid replacing the name of my grandson. You guys let me know if you want one. This may be a pipe-dream, but I hope to try and get these things into the school system for kids just starting to learn their multiplication. Those multiplication tables full of numbers are no way to learn anything "well", and looking at static numbers on a calculator is even worse. The pdfs: KidRuleBasic.pdf KidRuleBetter.pdf For those who might be interested, this project is a culmination of my understanding of the C and postscript languages, a little understanding of working with CAD and interpretation of g-code (used for cnc cutting), a little math, a little work with image editing, some wood working experience, and of course a love of the grandkids. For those who think something like this can be done with image editing, I should let you know that I couldn't figure out how to do it that way. I started by trying to do it in just imaging software and found out pretty quickly that wasn't going to work. I then tried using C to create the bitmap file and was then confronted with how to send a file that was about the same size as an amish barn to the printer. Finally I figured out the only way to do it was with postscript. I'm pretty good with C and not so good with postscript, so I essentially, used C to create the postscript for the pdf, which seems to work pretty well. My future plans are to do some screen printed on aluminum ones like the old Pickett rules, and some similar to the old celluloid-on-wood ones. The fancier one shown in "KidRuleBetter.pdf" will be embedded in some fine wood, the lesser one will be made similar to what is shown in the pdf and image above, and I will also make a simple set of sliding scales (non-logarithmic) that just do addtion and subtraction to get the kids started in sliding rules. Also, unless I burn-out somewhere along the way, I may make one with a LCD display that plots as well. Kinda like the same principle as a digital vernier caliper. In my opinion something that gives a lot of visual with the least amount of work such as a slider does compared with keypad entry is just so much easier to deal with.
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