Chip / circuit programming

[Alkamist]

Hi guys not sure what to call the topic but im a keen programmer and wondered if there was any kits or just something that will get me on my way to be able to program hardware and some tutorials etc to get me on my way to learning how to.  I imagine i would have to brush up on assembly or something.  So any suggestions or help would be appreciated thanks  :D

[digip]

Do you mean somehting like this: http://zorinco.com/

My boss is a programmer who makes things at home with little serial connected boards and chips for things like timers for his pool pump and hot tub. He showed me a website once where he gets all his parts and instructions on how to program the boards, but I can't remember the name of the site.

I'll ask him when I see him and pass along the links. Its a little more anvanced than some of the stuff you get at radio shack to build small electronics, but if your a good programmer and know how to interface with a serial port or emulated usb to serial port then there are tons of small little kits out there for programmable microcontrollers to make small robots and devices to do almost anything.

I think one of the sites he showed me was: http://www.parallax.com/

[Alkamist]

thanks for that reply, yes this is definitively on lines of what i want. I remember at school we had to program the computer to interface with little lego models i remember mine was a green house and when the temp got to a certain point the vents would open until the temp dropped then they would shut. The other links from your boss would be fantastic, thanks alot.