Making 1,750 programmable PCB badges for Canada's biggest hackathon
Summary
Nick Ficara chronicles turning Hack the North's badge concept into 1,750 programmable PCB badges, detailing EVT, DVT, and production validation, as well as supply-chain and manufacturing hurdles. The piece shares candid lessons on design decisions, risk management, and open-source hardware practices that enabled a scalable hardware project at a major hackathon.