blog/data/2013-05-11-debian-lego.txt

   1 Title: Debian, the Linux distribution of choice for LEGO designers?
   2 Tags: english, debian, robot, lego
   3 Date: 2013-05-11 20:30
   4
   5 <P>In January,
   6 <a href="http://www.hungry.com/~pere/blog/New_IRC_channel_for_LEGO_designers_using_Debian.html">I
   7 announced a</a> new <a href="irc://irc.debian.org/%23debian-lego">IRC
   8 channel #debian-lego</a>, for those of us in the Debian and Linux
   9 community interested in <a href="http://www.lego.com/">LEGO</a>, the
  10 marvellous construction system from Denmark.  We also created
  11 <a href="http://wiki.debian.org/LegoDesigners">a wiki page</a> to have
  12 a place to take notes and write down our plans and hopes.  And several
  13 people showed up to help.  I was very happy to see the effect of my
  14 call.  Since the small start, we have a debtags tag
  15 <a href="http://debtags.debian.net/search/bytag?wl=hardware::hobby:lego">hardware::hobby:lego</a>
  16 tag for LEGO related packages, and now count 10 packages related to
  17 LEGO and <a href="http://mindstorms.lego.com/">Mindstorms</a>:</p>
  18
  19 <p><table>
  20 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/brickos">brickos</a></td><td>alternative OS for LEGO Mindstorms RCX. Supports development in C/C++</td></tr>
  21 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/leocad">leocad</a></td><td>virtual brick CAD software</td></tr>
  22 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/libnxt">libnxt</a></td><td>utility library for talking to the LEGO Mindstorms NX</td></tr>
  23 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/lnpd">lnpd</a></td><td>daemon for LNP communication with BrickOS</td></tr>
  24 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nbc">nbc</a></td><td>compiler for LEGO Mindstorms NXT bricks</td></tr>
  25 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/nqc">nqc</a></td><td>Not Quite C compiler for LEGO Mindstorms RCX</td></tr>
  26 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/python-nxt">python-nxt</a></td><td>python driver/interface/wrapper for the Lego Mindstorms NXT robot</td></tr>
  27 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/python-nxt-filer">python-nxt-filer</a></td><td>simple GUI to manage files on a LEGO Mindstorms NXT</td></tr>
  28 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/scratch">scratch</a></td><td>easy to use programming environment for ages 8 and up</td></tr>
  29 <tr><td><a href="http://packages.qa.debian.org/t2n">t2n</a></td><td>simple command-line tool for Lego NXT</td></tr>
  30 </table></p>
  31
  32 <p>Some of these are available in Wheezy, and all but one are
  33 currently available in Jessie/testing.  leocad is so far only
  34 available in experimental.</p>
  35
  36 <p>If you care about LEGO in Debian, please join us on IRC and help
  37 adding the rest of the great free software tools available on Linux
  38 for LEGO designers.</p>