Engineer & maker

Eric Manno

I build electronics and the software that runs them: custom computers, competition robots, animatronics. Selected work is below.

Work

Systems

NEXUS

August 2026 - Present

Multi-host agent runtime on my own Linux machines over Tailscale: prototyping bench, live project dashboards, local voice.
Stage tracking In progress

COORDS

September 2025 - Present

UWB mesh that tracks actors and props and steers a moving-head spotlight. NJIT capstone, now a personal theater project; custom boards designed, not fabricated.
Animatronics In progress

Sparks: Animatronic Dragon

September 2023 - Present

Fifteen bus servos, cameras in both eyes, Raspberry Pi 5 control. Being built now.
VLSI

VLSI 1: 32-bit Silicon CMOS Adder-Subtractor

November 2025 - December 2025

Full-custom 32-bit adder-subtractor in 0.25 μm CMOS: 2's complement, serial, 970 transistors. ECE 658.
Hardware + software

DND Synced Stats Tracker

December 2024

I2C player modules on custom PCBs, plus a Python host so the DM can see and edit stats live.
Tooling

Programmable Breadboard

September 2024 - November 2024

Two Arduino Megas simulate nets and export a KiCad netlist. Breadboard to PCB without redrawing the schematic.
Graphics

VGA Graphics Card on Breadboards

April 2023 - May 2023

Character-cell VGA: 8×8 glyphs, 12 KB of RAM, 256-color palette, Pong, and a Python glyph editor.
Stagecraft

Pepper’s Ghost Rose

March 2023 - May 2023

Holographic rose for Beauty and the Beast Jr. — Blender model, Unity animation, polycarbonate reflector, booth control over Wi-Fi.
Computer architecture On hold

Custom 16-bit Computer

August 2022 - On Hold

16-bit architecture from the ISA up: 16 registers, FPGA ALU, stack, interrupt controller, 64 KB of address space.
Robotics

Cruise Control #9889

September 2018 - June 2023

Five years as FTC software engineer: odometry, Pure Pursuit, vision alignment. Four world-championship qualifications.

Eric Manno

Work

NEXUS

COORDS

Sparks: Animatronic Dragon

VLSI 1: 32-bit Silicon CMOS Adder-Subtractor

DND Synced Stats Tracker

Programmable Breadboard

VGA Graphics Card on Breadboards

Pepper’s Ghost Rose

Custom 16-bit Computer

Cruise Control #9889