Michael J. Miller [Bio]

Michael J. Miller is in his Junior year working toward a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Engineering (with Minors in Math and Physics) at Milwaukee School of Engineering in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. His customer-focused attitude has led him successfully into various service-industry jobs, but recently this people-centered characteristic has combined with his strong passion for designing technology-based solutions to customers' needs in his 2006-2008 internship at Direct Supply, the nation's leading healthcare equipment and e-commerce supplier, where he is currently working with a small, diverse team to write the software to customize, generate and send all financial invoices, statements and letters to Direct Supply's entire network of customers. This project has a strong focus on reinventing the format of the current documents by observing how they are actually being used and providing the most useful information in the most intuitive interface possible.

When not at work, a variety of projects have engaged Mike's passion for designing and producing gadgets/products/experiences that improve people's quality of life (or just make them smile). The rest of this page contains some of the projects Mike has completed in the past few years. Click on the pictures to enlarge them.

	.: SuperDoku SuperDoku is a personal project designed around the idea of bringing sudoku (an immensely popular Japanese puzzle game often published in newspapers) to handheld Windows Mobile (Pocket PC) devices with an aesthetic and intuitive user interface. Human Factors research was conducted before beginning development on SuperDoku. Many of the features were inspired by the way people intuitively work with paper sudoku grids (small "pencil marks" in the corners of each square to keep track of possible solutions, the ability to draw freely on the screen, etc.). Other features were inspired by those who've said "I WISH my paper sudoku puzzles could...", such as giving intelligent hints and having a skinnable interface (colors, symbols, even ancient hieroglyphics can be used instead of just numbers). SuperDoku has gotten very positive reviews and development continues on a new version that will add the most requested features, such as high-resolution support and a game timer. Version 1.1 can be downloaded here and the new version is slated for an open-source release this summer.
	.: K'NEX Grandfather Clock This working pendulum-and-weight-powered grandfather clock stands 5 and a half feet tall and was made entirely of K'NEX pieces, pennies for weights, and strings for winding. It was developed in 2005 purely for the fun and challenge involved. It keeps accurate time for about an hour on one winding (the K'NEX pieces are not strong enough to support the additional weight required for longer run-time). Click on the picture to the left to enlarge it, or view a video showing the operation of the internal anchor and escapement mechanism. Also, a technical report describes the entire device in detail.
	.: Interactive Map Another experiment in Human Factors Engineering, this interactive map was developed in C# for Direct Supply in 2007 to allow users to easily associate states with manufacturer ship-points by selecting the desired states then clicking the required point. This time-saving solution replaces the awkward text-list based interface that the company used previously.
	.: MIPS Microcontroller Taking cues from the work done by John L. Hennessy at Stanford University in the early 1980's, this multi-cycle MIPS Microcontroller was designed in the circuit simulation software Quartus II in 2008 as a combination of VHDL and circuit schematic diagrams. It demonstrated functionally complete MIPS architecture, with most of the core instructions implemented. Click on the picture for the full high-level schematic, or click here to download the source code.
	.: Eiffel Tower At 4 feet tall, this just-for-fun project was a 1:265 scale model of the Eiffel Tower made of 470 coins (mostly quarters). The colored clips are from a construction kit called CoinStruction. The pieces can be seen more easily in the enlarged picture. Built from scratch in 2007, the project took about 15 hours of design, strength-testing and building time.

.: About Mike