The Vision: Originally developed to extend the reach of physical computing, this project evolved into a community platform for hacking and animating electronic teddy bears. The framework provided makers with the tools to transform simple toys into complex robotic characters. The project gained significant traction, eventually serving as the foundational hardware for a series of Ars Technica articles on physical computing and AI integration.

The Engineering: To enable complex behaviors that exceeded the memory limits of a standard microcontroller, I architected a hybrid control system separating the "brain" from the "brawn." This required designing a robust, custom serial communication protocol to ensure synchronized data transfer between the two distinct computing environments.

C# Control Plane: I developed a desktop application in C# (.NET) to handle the heavy lifting—user interface, complex math, and logic sequencing. This application serialized high-level commands into efficient byte packets transmitted over USB.

Embedded Execution: On the hardware side, I wrote efficient C++ firmware for the Arduino to act as a deterministic receiver. It parsed the incoming data packets and managed the low-level GPIO pin switching and sensor polling, ensuring that the physical actuation remained responsive despite the latency inherent in serial communication.