CES ShowStoppers: Hackaball programmable toy
Hackaball, a children's toy designed to create an interest in programming, started life as a Kickstarter in 2015, and the company behind it is ready to start shipping product in March.
The device itself is relatively straightforward, consisting of a rubberized sheath wrapped around a durable outer shell, inside of which is a miniature computer complete with gyroscope, accelerometer, vibration motor, multicolor LEDs and a speaker. It's what kids can do with Hackaball that makes it different.
With the Hackaball app, available on iOS or OS X, kids (or adults) can roll their own software by selecting from a preset selection of input and output commands, device configurations and more. Games can be created from scratch directly on an iPad, then sent to Hackaball for execution.
