Read the thoughts and musings of a cultured redneck here
Last year some legend out there built a prop that hung off his roof as if he was stranded hanging in mid-air in an emergency kind of state. Several people tagged me saying I should build one. So this year, I gave it a shot. What you see below is some behind the scenes pics & videos. It's been funny to see neighbors and people driving by stopping, reversing their cars, double-taking, etc. when they think it's a real person up there.
To build this I used a FrightProps Halloween PVC kit that I modified slightly and coupled it with a motor. That's the core of the solution. Beyond that it's just duct tape and bubble wrap to build out the body. Oh and a foam head from Hobby lobby!
Several people tagged me@last year saying I should build this so I gave it my best shot. A few modifications to the @FrightProps kit and we are up and running. pic.twitter.com/Aur2VLkkfq— Clint Patterson (@CBPSC) November 20, 2022
Several people tagged me@last year saying I should build this so I gave it my best shot. A few modifications to the @FrightProps kit and we are up and running. pic.twitter.com/Aur2VLkkfq
The dusk scene is the best! 🤣 pic.twitter.com/5gBv11z3Ly— Clint Patterson (@CBPSC) November 20, 2022
The dusk scene is the best! 🤣 pic.twitter.com/5gBv11z3Ly
This year I made 2 different Halloween IOT props. I used the same or similar techniques from the previous years... Actobotics for building out the structures and support, Particle.io for the IOT controller and software side, and pneumatic powered "mechs" from FrightProps.com for the movement. The new addition this year was adding in a FrightProps "Picoboo" controller to the setup, which brought on great possibilities. Adding this allowed me to add in audio and instantly cut power on and off to multiple outlets. So I turned lights on and off, fans on and off and strobed some strobe lights.
If you're interested in previous years implementations check them out below:
As I bult the devices I posted some behind the scenes FB posts and a tweet..
Some #Halloween #IOT goodness using components from @FrightProps @particle @ServoCity coupled with #DNNCMS and some ghetto code I wrote 🤡 pic.twitter.com/sxdQgZ99NE — Clint Patterson (@CBPSC) September 27, 2022
Some #Halloween #IOT goodness using components from @FrightProps @particle @ServoCity coupled with #DNNCMS and some ghetto code I wrote 🤡 pic.twitter.com/sxdQgZ99NE
Then when Halloween came we were fortunate to have the rain stop and I got some good reactions on the reactions video.
This year I took the same clown head and built a body around it that can move and added in some fog machine love and set it all on a table to troll the kids in our neighborhood.
Here's a behind the scenes video showing the backside in a tweet..
Here’s the final #Halloween #IOT setup completed with components from @particle @FrightProps @ServoCity @arduino & #DNNCMS pic.twitter.com/NJnp2Ai6mr — Clint Patterson (@CBPSC) October 30, 2021
Here’s the final #Halloween #IOT setup completed with components from @particle @FrightProps @ServoCity @arduino & #DNNCMS pic.twitter.com/NJnp2Ai6mr
And here's a video showing the reactions from the kids
Pictured Above: Hurricane 1000 with the top off focusing on the problem part, which was the pump.
Recently I received a brand new Chauvet Hurricane 1000 Fog machine. I opened the box, filled it with fog juice, plugged it in, let it heat up, then all it did was make an odd rattling sound. After a lot of research and tinkering I have fixed it and it's a pretty simple fix. I have posted this page and video in hopes of saving someone some heartache of their machine not functioning on arrival.
And here's a video talking through what I did to get it working
In 2020 I updated the Halloween IOT setup to be a clown in a coffin that was controlled remotely from my site. We had a great time with it.
I was recently contacted by long time DNN'er and Solo Coder podcast creator, Aderson Oliveira, about an interview for his podcast. It was like many of my speaking engagements... someone's tight on speakers or had a recent cancellation and I get to stand in as a stunt double.
It was good to connect and talk with Aderson. After recording the podcast Aderson shared some insight based on our conversation which has made me reflect differently on some things so it was a win/win.
Thanks to Aderson for having me and check Out the podcast below or on the SoloCoder website
The solution consulting team at Simpplr has given tons of demos over the past few years. These demos have all centered around one main topic - employee engagement. While old-school and out-dated intranets are still easily found in the wild, modern intranets that drive employee engagement for distributed, agile, and mobile workforces are alive and well. And those aren’t my words - those are the words of analyst firms like Gartner & Forrester!
Trends in the Questions Asked on Demos Over time, our team has noticed trends emerging from the questions asked by organizations who are looking to drive engagement in today’s modern era. These questions provide insight into the top internal engagement challenges that leaders are looking to solve. So let’s look at the top 5 questions we get asked on demos...
The Top 5 Questions We Get Asked on Demos
In Today’s Modern Workforce Engagement Matters Now More than Ever The questions I’ve just outlined are frequently asked on demos and they reveal what’s important to modern employees. They also relay that leadership understands that ease of use, clear communications, targeted messaging, and driving positive culture are critical factors for success in today’s competitive market.
Luckily for our team, Simpplr makes it really easy to answer these questions and more!
When we moved into the neighborhood everyone told us “Just wait til Halloween”. Well, they were right! Our friend up the street, Jay Ziobrowski, is super passionate about Halloween and turns his garage, driveway, and entire front yard into a magical haunted house that’s free to kids in the neighborhood. After doing this for several years, everyone in the neighborhood and surrounding area knows about this and the result is that our street gets blocked off by cops and is absolutely flooded during Halloween. It’s non-stop action from 4:30 to somewhere around 10pm and it’s a really fun time.
After running out of candy in the first 2 hours on year 1 we knew we needed to step it up in following years. So, each year I’ve tried to contribute to the energy and excitement on our street by creating some type of Particle-based IOT Halloween device. Check out the devices from previous years:
Halloween, a Great Opportunity to Get Kids Involved & Learning IOT! Over the years I’ve had my friend’s kids help me with the setups. That is, since these devices are mobile controlled, I enlist kids to push the button on their mobile phones while I record the reactions of trick-or-treaters from my phone. One of the kids has taken an interest in wanting to know how to build these things, so this year I’ve been working with my friend’s son to both build the devices and teach him along the way. I even gave him a Particle dev kit. It has been a fun project for everyone. I’ve also been overwhelming him with text messages and videos as I make incremental progress on each device. Now he’s using Particle at his school for his science project!
Here are some pics from when we first got started…
Compressed Air, The Key to Speed & The Key to Scaring People! After doing this for a few years I realized that HOA’s don’t like fire breathing pumpkins and that the best way to scare people is by using compressed air in some shape, form, or fashion. Geared motors just don’t move fast enough … or … if you do make them move fast enough, they are too dangerous and could potentially hurt someone. So, for the past two years I’ve been using a servo to press the button on an air hose to blow air out and move some spooky object toward trick-or-treaters. Nobody gets mad about getting hit with a gust of air!
Last year, right after Halloween, I decided to try something new. I ordered a pneumatic cylinder and solenoid kit from FrightProps. I had no idea how to really make it work, but I wanted to try and low and behold I was able to figure it out. It was way easier than I thought and FrightProps even provided very helpful videos to walk through the hookups for everything. Just a few weeks after last Halloween my mind was already spinning about next year’s Halloween. The pneumatic cylinders with solenoid kits move a lot faster, you can control the speeds, and they use less air. The only negative is that these could potentially be more dangerous. Though, I’m countering the danger by creating physical space around the implementations so that no one will get close enough to be hit or injured. So, I’m happy with the tradeoff and will take extra precaution in the initial setups.
Here's a picture of the solenoid kit from Fright Props
Quick Show of the Headless Clown & Trash Can “Slimer” in Action
The (Main) Parts There are a lot of parts used in these devices. Of course, you must have wires, wifi, power, and all the normal things you would anticipate. However, I’m going to just list the main items below. If you have questions about other parts or want to build your own, just submit an email to me through this website and I can connect with you and help you with the smaller details. That said, here is the basis for both IOT Halloween devices:
The Build One thing to note is that these devices are using the exact same principles, concepts, and code to make them work. At a high level the solenoids just need to be hit with a 12-volt current to make the pneumatic cylinder fire. To bring the pneumatic cylinder back in, simply turn off the power.
To do this we are using a relay that can be controlled by a Particle microcontroller, a Photon. The relay essentially breaks the circuit of the 12 volts going to the solenoid. Then, whenever we call the cloud web service endpoint in the Particle cloud, it invokes a function in the microcontroller which sends the relay a signal. The relay then completes the circuit which allows the 12 volts to flow to the solenoid which consequently causes the cylinder to fire. We let it fire for a specified period of time (say .200 of a second) then we cut power which causes the head to go back in. We control the speed going both in and out via the speed control valves on the solenoids. So, if you had to draw one negative of the solenoid it would be that you can’t programmatically control the speed.
The Slimer in the Trashcan implementation is such that the cylinder needs to be stabilized yet, due to the Slimer mask and body we couldn’t have any support mechanisms coming from the sides to stabilize the cylinder. Since the Slimer ghost must move up and down vertically we need to allow it room to do so. What this means is that the cylinder needed to be stabilized from the bottom. The cylinders I ordered are threaded at the bottom with 3/8 of an inch thread. This happened to match to some steel plumbing pipes that you can find at your local Lowes or Home Depot. So, I bought a few pieces to connect and make it stand up on its own. After that I added in weighted sandbags to keep the cylinder from wobbling whenever it fires. I attached velcro to the solenoid and breadboard and have the parts sticking to the inside of the trashcan walls. You will see these in the build pics below.
The Headless Clown implementation uses actobotics for its internal structure. Actobotics are awesome and are basically like metal legos that you can easily configure however you would like and mount anything you want to them. I’ve mounted the cylinder, hoses, and breadboard setup to it. I stuck the actobotics down into 2 bales of hay for stabilization.
Here are some pics from the build out(s):
The Code The code to make this work is very simple. I have identical code running on both devices to make these things work. The only thing that is different is the device id!
In Particle – I’ve written a simple program that creates a cloud function which invokes a function on the Photon and all that function does is write a pin from low to high… that’s it! What we’ve done is inject a relay into the circuit of the solenoid which allows us to use some logic to complete or short the circuit.
Here’s the firmware (code) that I’m using for the Particle Photons:
On the Web – I’ve written a basic jQuery AJAX function to call these web API (services) when buttons are clicked. Maybe jQuery is not cool anymore, but it’s pretty simple to implement so it works for me!
Here’s the code I’m using to make an HTTP Post request when a button is clicked. And if you’re worried about me showing you my access token below, no worries… I’ve already recycled it!
Structural & Electrical Video Walkthrough In this section I aim to give you a structural overview of the devices. Both devices use pneumatic cylinders but are being stabilized in different ways.
Code Video Walkthrough In this section I walk you through the setup of the devices and the code that I’m using to make them work. The whole point here is… if I can do this, then you can too!
The Halloween Reactions In my area we currently have an 80% chance of rain on Halloween night so I'm not sure if we'll have any trick-or-treaters at all. I guess we'll see. If the weather cooperates, I will update this page after Halloween with a video showing reactions we get from trick-or-treaters and their parents. Stay tuned for the hopeful post-Halloween-video update!
I first bumped into DNN around 2005 while working at a local university in the Charlotte area. At that time, I had no idea what DNN or open source was or the impact it would play in the next decade and beyond of my life. Since then I’ve met awesome and generous people, ended up in places I never expected to go, made a lot of friends, and have learned a lot along the way. The DNN platform and community have definitely impacted my life.
Around 2 years ago I was contacted with the challenge of re-engaging with, empowering, and reinvigorating the DNN Community. This happened as the acquisition occurred. Of course, these were all things I wanted to see happen and to get to be a part of it was even better. And while there may have been some bumps in the road, we have come a long way since then.
We’ve Made Great Progress and We’re Just Getting Started Since re-joining DNN Corp 19 months ago as Ecosystem Manager, the DNN Community has made great strides. DNN Corp leadership followed through on the promise to empower the community and we’ve seen the community undergo an exercise in self-organization and take complete ownership of the source code. We’ve joined the .NET Foundation which ensures the code base will always remain open source and the community now drives the roadmap for the platform. Further reinforcing the progress and contrasting from years past, DNN TAG leadership now has “owner” rights to the DNN platform GitHub repo and can build releases at will.
Outside of the code, the MVP Program was turned over to, and MVPs were elected by, the community. Community members are also running the annual DNN Website Awards Competition. And as of this past week’s DNN-Connect conference in Switzerland, the community has launched its own site, DnnCommunity.org. And last but not least, the documentation center was turned over to the community and DNNDocs.com is now live and in preview mode.
We have indeed come a long way and made great progress since the acquisition. I’ve tried my best to meet the challenge of re-engaging with and empowering the community. Hopefully I’ve played a small role in bringing on some of the positive change in the community. It’s been great to watch the community respond, take initiative, and step up. We still have a way to go and I look forward to continuing to be a part of the journey with the community.
Transitioning Back to DNN Community I will now return to full time community member as I recently accepted a new role and will be transitioning out of DNN Corp. Moving forward, although I’ll no longer be at DNN Corp, I’ll still be active in the DNN Community. That is, I’ll still be involved with DNN Association, DNN Summit, the DNN Docs team, the Charlotte-based Southern Fried DNN User Group, .NET Foundation activities, and you’ll see me online as well!
Next Steps I’m excited to have accepted a role as Senior Solutions Consultant at Simpplr. Simpplr is a SaaS based intranet solution with a lot of similarities to DNN. If you are looking for a modern intranet, that is indeed simple to use, feel free to reach out!
Oddly enough, the US-based Simpplr office is located in San Francisco not too far from the old DNN Corp offices. So, I’ll be riding down El Camino Real again soon and for any old DNN’ers let’s connect when I’m in town.
As a sales engineer, I do a lot of online presentations for clients, prospects, colleagues and partners. When conducted well, online presentations and demos can be very effective sales tools. We strive to make our demos interactive.
The sales rep and sales engineer work together like a well-oiled machine throughout the demo. We encourage interaction and strive to be most efficient and effective as possible within the given timeframe.
Each presentation follows the same schedule. There are things to do before the demo, during the demo, then after the demo. In this post, I’ll share 32 tips to help you rock your online presentations.
Preparation is an obvious step. I mention it as a reminder that attendees are giving you their time, and their time is valuable. Be respectful of their time by thoroughly preparing and providing value to them. Ultimately a demo is like anything else in life: if you put your time and energy into it, then it will turn out well!
Agreeing on the agenda beforehand helps set expectations, reduces wasted time on the demo, and ensures that we only review functionality in which demo attendees are most interested. Since there is generally an hour or so for the demo, we need to make sure we hit the mark given the allotted time. By agreeing on the agenda beforehand, we drastically increase the productivity of the demo.
I learned this one the hard way. I had a webinar to present with a few hundred people waiting on me and as soon as I was made the “Presenter” my machine’s memory overloaded and I got the blue screen of death as my computer crashed. I had been working in numerous programs before the demo and apparently had nearly maxed out my memory and making the presenter passed the tipping point resulting in a few hundred people waiting awkwardly on me to reconnect. Now I restart my computer before demos so that my memory is not used up.
At some point, the presenter role will be passed to you. When his happens, the software (GoToMeeting, Join.me, or whatever you use) will ask you which screen you want to share. If you have a multi-monitor setup, this can become challenging if the monitors aren’t numbered or have similar names. Knowing your monitors names beforehand can reduce missteps. You don’t want to accidentally share to the wrong screen!
Be sure to reduce the number of potential distractions. Ever been on a demo and as soon as the leader shares their screen, you see their desktop icons and you start looking at all their files to see what they’re interested in? You are not alone, as everyone does it (admit it!).
In order to remove this distraction, be sure to hide your desktop icons or demo from a monitor that doesn’t have any application or document icons on the background. With fewer things to look at, your attendees will be more focused on what you show them.
Along the lines of removing distractions, you should turn off all pop-ups that occur on the screen from which you are presenting. The last thing you want is a sales person to send you a Skype message cracking a joke and have it show up during the demo. If you do leave Skype (or any messaging application) on, be sure you know the monitor on which the pop-ups occur.
Everyone knows it, but I’m still listing it here. Mute cell phones so that while you’re presenting there is not a constant vibration happening anytime someone emails or calls you.
If you use the same environment over and over, your browser’s cache can become corrupted. Browsers often try to remember passwords, cache content, cache URL paths, etc. and these cached items can sometimes trip you up. I usually clear my cache before each demo to ensure everything is fresh.
Just when you think you’re getting in the groove you will get a “tickle in your throat” and get choked up. You’re going to be talking a lot and a glass of water can save you in long-winded demos and in the moments that you may need to wet the whistle.
I always have a backup environment prepared should something go wrong with the primary environment. This takes more time up front, but it’s worth it. Having that backup environment can be worth its weight in gold.
Have a back-up plan for getting online. Yes, it only happens once in a blue moon, but what if you are scheduled to give a demo on that particular blue moon? Having a My-Fi or hotspot is well worth the investment.
Before the demo, try to find out who will be attending, so that you can speak the right language to them. You don’t want to talk about server architecture if you are demoing to the marketing team; you don’t want to talk to the server guys about lead generation. Tailor your story based on our audience.
This won’t apply to all of you, but I demo websites and online communities. I make sure I have my site up and loaded in memory by the time they make me the presenter. I don’t want any time wasted on something to load up. So I keep my site “warm” just minutes before the demo so that the site is up and ready to rock by the time I get controls.
Some sites load URL’s from third party services, such as Google Fonts, Facebook, and Twitter. In my demo sites, I try to remove these external calls, so that if Facebook is having a bad day, it won’t affect my load time on the demo. There are scenarios where you have to rely on these external calls, but reduce them as much as you can.
During the introduction, attendees will tell you new information. In some cases the information shared during the intro can drastically alter what you present.
Listening and waiting to talk are two entirely different things. By listening, you can pick up things that may alter your demo. You can also pick up on personality traits, the mood in the room, and social queues that may help you better connect with the demo attendees. Listening carefully can help you establish better rapport with demo attendees throughout the demo.
We like to do a roll call during the intro of a demo as well. It never fails that there is someone in the room that we didn’t anticipate being there. It may be some manager, marketer, or developer who just happened to have another meeting cancel and was able to attend, but usually there is somebody either there or not there that we didn’t expect. This again helps us to more accurately hone in the demo. If all of a sudden the CEO shows up on the demo, then we’ll be sure to add in the value proposition and benefits of each feature as executives don’t necessarily like to know the nuts and bolts, but ask the “why’s” and the “what results can we get” or “what does this help us do” type questions. Taking roll call will help you be on point with your delivery.
I ask the question early on as to whether or not the attendees have a “hard stop.”. This helps me know whether or not we can get long-winded with explanations or if we need to be very mindful of the time. Attendees may have an extra 10 to 15 minutes at the end and when that happens we know that we have more time for questions. Finding out the exact ending time of the demo early on can help you better manage time.
One thing I strive for is smooth transitions throughout the demo. Whether it’s transitioning from one subject to the next, transitioning from me talking to the attendees talking, or the transition of the “passing of the presenter role,” we want everything to flow as smooth as silk. I ensure that our sales reps know how to pass the presenter in the meeting software we use.
I also tell them to pass the presenter as they are finishing up their last few points. This gives me time to get the presenter role and share the correct monitor. Otherwise, there is an awkward pause where everyone waits on me to get the presenter controls.
People present in different ways and that’s a good thing. Some like questions and interactivity and some don’t. Whatever your style is, set the tone early so that demo attendees know how to act and what to expect. I encourage questions, interruptions, and interactivity, so I put that fact out there very early on in the demo. Setting the tone will eliminate any guessing on the part of your attendees.
I encourage questions during the “Setting the Tone” stage because I want attendees to feel comfortable asking questions. At the same time, each question equals an interruption. The more questions there are and the more disruptions there are, the less smooth the demo goes. Over time, you will begin to see where similar questions get asked. After you denote a trend in the same question being asked then just go ahead and answer the question before it gets asked. This will help things flow more smoothly. So, again, while I encourage questions, I hope to give such a thorough presentation that I remove questions just before they get asked!
On some occasions, there will be an attendee who is determined to get you hung up on some very minor technical detail. In these situations, it is your job to control the demo and not let the train de-rail. When these scenarios happen, it’s good to schedule these topics as “follow up” topics so that you can get your demo back on track.
Ever listen to a very dry presenter and wanted to be somewhere else? Don’t be that presenter! When appropriate, I like to inject humor. I crack jokes on the sales guys or on my own Southern accent. Your attendees will relax and build a stronger rapport and maybe even remember you more as a result.
Oh the echo, ooo… ooo… ooo… You know the echo that I’m talking about! We’ve all been on meetings where one person is using their speakers and their microphone picks up on the sound from the speakers which creates an echo effect. The person usually denies that it’s them, it makes things awkward, and then you have to recover and make things un-awkward again.
So what can you do about this? One option is to mute your participants. You can see which participant is making the noise and then mute them. In some meeting software, you can mute all attendees.
You may have heard of the “Power of the Pause” before. If we are presenting a demo and the attendees are not very lively, then I will show a feature and then ask them what they thought about that feature. Sometimes these pauses seem like an eternity and I just let the awkwardness hang until someone responds. While it seems like a long time on my end, I know that attendees may be in a meeting room with the phone on mute and they may be talking to each other or going around the room seeing if anyone has a question.
When I first started giving demos I was scared to death of not knowing something. Though, not knowing something is perfectly fine. If someone asks you a very technical question there is nothing wrong with saying “Hey, I don’t know that answer, let me check with our engineers and then we’ll get back to you.” Admitting that you don’t know something lets the attendees know that you are human, builds credibility, and it also gives you something to follow up on. Following up continues the conversation and gives you another touch point with the lead.
Just as I’m doing here in this blog post, tell a linear story. Build on top of things you’ve already covered. Telling a sequential or linear story makes it easy for attendees to follow you and better consume the information you are presenting to them.
There will come a time when you have to present or demo something that is complex in nature. When this happens it’s best to try to describe these via multiple concepts. Sometimes people refer to concepts differently so using multiple descriptions can help ensure clarity and that everyone understands and is on the same page.
As you get close to the end of the demo, be sure to check on the clock. If you have a hard stop, you may have to cut a feature set short so that you can leave time for questions. Q&A is critical to the demo because there are some people who will remain quiet until everything is over and then they speak up. We want to ensure that we give those people ample time to voice their thoughts because they can provide great insight.
This is a chance for you to get vital information about the demo. Attendees’ comments can be key indicators as to the demo’s effectiveness and whether or not the lead is ready to move forward.
After the demo is over, we work hard to solidify next steps so we can keep the process moving forward. Identify any “deliverables” that you need to follow up on. Often times these deliverables are PDF documents, blog links, or videos. Summarize the set of deliverables and let attendees know when they can expect them.
Once you’ve established those deliverables be sure to follow up in a timely manner. This will help you keep the process moving forward while things are fresh on the demo attendee’s minds.
The reason we conduct demos is to progress a sale forward. If the demo is effective then the lead will want to continue the conversation. Ultimately the demo is a reflection of the presenter and the organization they represent. By fine tuning the process of a demo you can better move your deals forward! I hope these tips have given you some insight into things you can do to have your demos and presentations at their best.
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