A fairly simple idea I had sometime ago. I wanted to simulate mechanisms, robots and odd contraptions.

I made this little applet, and challenged most people I know to build a contraption which leaves the screen area. Any results were hard to replicate, but I challange anybody willing to give it a try.

How to use it:
P – pause / play
[space] – toggle gravity
[left click] – adds ball
[right click] – adds fixed ball
s – change connector type
+/- – change timer
1/2/3 – change ball friction

click on 2 balls to connect them

The 3 text boxes change
delay to piston activation
the growth /shrink percentages
piston starting direction +/-1
speed factor

Also I’d like to thankJeffrey Traer Bernstein for making the physics library and Brendan Berg for making the interfascia GUI library for Processing.