Folks, this is a guest post from Kerwin Lumpkins who is working on a cool project he put on Kickstarter (there’s a video there too), check it out!! He has built a prototype and would like to have it funded to produce more of these. As we’re always happy to share cool projects made by others as well, here you go 
The Ard-Vark is a basic electronics box that has wifi built in to allow easy remote control through a mobile app, and has the following features:
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Arduino compatible (can use the Arduino IDE as is, based on Leonardo platform)
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USB connection to PC for serial or re-programming
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Mobile app available for download (iPhone/iPad/iPod/Android)
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Built in wifi for wireless remote control (Roving Networks RN-171)
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4 servo motor headers
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2 small DC motor headers
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Built in light sensor
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Built in temperature sensor
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3 analog sensor inputs with ground and 5V power supplied
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3 digital I/O headers with ground and 5V power supplied
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LED
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Speaker
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Can be powered by 9V battery or 9V AC adapter plug
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Mounted in a durable plastic case, cutouts for headers, silkscreen labeling of ports
Tech details of the Ard-Vark Prototype
Figure 1 shows a block diagram of the Ard-Vark prototype. Blocks in green are parts that are exposed on the outside of the case. Blue are parts that are covered up inside the case. For clarity, I didn’t have a block for the level shifting from wifi module to the microcontroller, but those parts can be seen on the front of the circuit board. The numbers show how many lines were needed to implement that function.
Figure 1: Block diagram of the Ard-Vark
For the prototype, I designed a board in EAGLE that would allow me to solder on Sparkfun’s Pro Micro (5V) and RN-XV module that uses the RN-171 module from Roving Networks. If the project is funded, the parts on the Pro Micro board and the RN-171 module will be surface mount soldered onto a single circuit board. This will lower the price.
All pins accessible?: “Will there be headers for all pins on the micro?” – Yes. The Ard-Vark will not load the headers, but I will place the holes on the circuit board. I intend to put the standard Arduino header pattern on the board for those that want to use that as well.
About the Arduino IDE: The pro micro (and hence also the Ard-Vark) is based on the ATMega 32U4 microcontroller, which is supported for the Arduino under the Leonardo model. Arduino has not fully released this yet, but I had no problem using the standard Arduino IDE after making some simple changes in the boards.txt file and downloading Sparkfun’s driver. Look at the Pro Micro page for a tutorial if you’re interested. For the final version, I will write up a manual that has installation instructions, schematics, source code, suggestions for hacking, etc.
The prototype Ard-Vark has a Pro-Micro board with headers that solder onto the main board. The RN-XV module similarly solders onto the main board. Then the main board has header connectors, the AC power plug, 5V regulator (beefy one that can power all 4 servos at once), etc. In photo below, the surface mount 5V regulator is mounted on the bottom side of proto board. You can see rework (yellow tape) where I used a through hole electrolytic cap. I didn’t allow enough room for a SM cap on the top side. So I put the reg and cap on bottom. Final version will fix this little error.
Fig2. Ard-Vark with the back cover removed
Fig. 3 Proto Board top side with servo headers, etc. Speaker is at bottom right.
More rework is evident on the top side of board. I realized that the the power indicator LED was too close to the light sensor (could influence the reading if in a dark room), so I moved the LED to right of the power switch. The yellow tape insulates leads of a through hole resistor. I also had to solder some wires onto the blue LED (just to left of the speaker) since the LED is too far below the hole. Final version will use a through hole LED to solve this. Light sensor (TMP-36 from analog devices) is the TO-92 through hole package part at top right. In the center of the board are surface mount parts that do level shifting for the RN-171 module. It runs at 3.3V while the microcontroller runs at 5V. One more problem I got sick of dealing with.
Finally, not shown is a motor control circuit. I decided after I built this proto board that offering DC motor control built in would be a good feature. Final version will make use of a motor control IC like the L293D. So the motors can only draw at max about 1 Amp. This will be fine for small motors like those used on small mobile robots.
Fig.4 Proto board back side showing the Pro Micro and RN-XV modules from Sparkfun and power plug.
On the bottom side of the board are the two modules from Sparkfun, power plug and (temporarily), the 5V regulator.
A view showing the “front” of the Ard-Vark. Note that this board has the USB micro connector missing. The micro B surface mount connector on the Sparkfun Pro Micro broke off after 10 or so plug/unplugs. I put it back on with super glue, but it came off again (hence the nasty looking mess in the middle). One change I’ll make in final board is to use a mini B through hole connector for improved strength.
The Story of the Ard-Vark (for those that are interested)
I made the Ard-Vark because I frequently like to add motion to projects using servo motors; from animatronics projects at holidays to building something that’s actually useful, to making something to scare co-workers when they sit down in their cubes. I grew tired of re-inventing and building this kind of thing again and again. So I finally designed a circuit board that would allow me to integrate wifi and Arduino controller and servo headers and motor controller and 2 wire motor headers and speaker, etc, all into one design. I also got tired of having projects stop working because exposed copper caused shorts, handwired solder joints came loose from strain, etc so I designed a case. And I got tired of having to power it with a USB cable to a PC, so I designed in a 9V battery and an AC adapter plug. And then I wrote a mobile app to allow me to control it remotely. All of that, I called the Ard-Vark.
Some friends were interested in getting one, so I thought I would list it as a project on kickstarter.com to see if there was enough interest to produce them in quantity to make the price reasonable. If I made one or two of these at a time, it would cost about $120 in parts and 2-3 hours to build and test one. I don’t have time to sit and build these. It just wouldn’t be worth my time. But if I can make several hundred of them at once, it brings the price down to a reasonable $100.
Who would use the Vark?
There are three types of people using things like the Ard-Vark out there today:
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Creative and technically talented folk that DO want to deal with electronics and motor control and highly technical stuff. DIY’selfers, beginning electronics class students, etc.
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Creative people that hate technical stuff but that want to build projects using electronics.
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People that for one reason or another, do not want to fool with building the electronics base and just want to get going on a project.
Group 3 sounds like it’s just group 2 stated in a different way. But I’m in group 3. I’m an electrical and software engineer with over 15 years experience building projects both professionally and for hobby. I’m highly technical.
Group 1 are the do it yourself types. They do this kind of work because they want to learn this stuff and building and soldering and tinkering IS the whole point of what they do. But at some point, Group 1 folk turn into Group 3 folk. Like me. I changed into Group 3 guy after about 7 years. Sometimes, I just want to pick up a box, plug in some servos, turn it on and go. And that’s why I made the Ard-Vark.
Group 2 are becoming more prevalent today. Artists that want to add motion and interactivity to their creations. But they want to concentrate on their creative project, not on learning technical stuff.
This article is written for Group 1 folk that are interested in what is under the hood of the Ard-Vark, viewing it as just another project. The source code will be open and free to use, so the vark can be modifed to work in your project as you want it. The vark is very flexible in that it can provide “it just works” functionality out of the box, but can also be reconfigured.
For our Zurich-based readers, on April 3rd we’ll be attending and giving a talk at the freshly started IoT Zurich meetup, a meetup packed with IoT / WoT talks around cloud services and their place in a Web of Things landscape. Here is an extract of what we’ll talk about (checkout the other talks as well:
Think of a ‘Facebook for Things’ with apps, services and analytics powered by connected objects and their digital profiles. With billions of product and other objects becoming connected, tagged and scannable, there’s a massive opportunity for a company that can provide the trusted engine for exchanging this active object information.
In essence, the talk will be about:
- What is the Web of Things?
- Web of Things: How and Why?
- Problem Statement: Hardware and Cloud Infrastructures for Web-augmented Things
- Web-enabling Devices and Gateways
- Active Digital Identities (ADIs)
- EVRYTHNG as a storage engine
- Problem Solved: Connecting People & Products
- Vision: Every Thing Connected
- Projects and Concrete Example of How and Why ADIs are Useful.
- Using our cloud services and APIs to build your next Internet of Things / Web of Things applications.
Looking forward to seeing many of you guys and gals there. Thanks a lot to our friend Thomas Amberg and Christine Perey for organizing these meetings!
Yes, we know, we promised that this blog wouldn’t turn into the marketing front-end of the company we co-founded (EVRYTHNG for the slower ones…). However, when looking for developers what better place could we reach for than the one where you, our readers who build the WoT on a daily basis, are coming to daily…
So if you like coding Java for the Web? Babbling Javascript/Python/PHP? Have RESTful dreams? Want your fridge to talk to your online toaster about how that toast doesn’t look good? Like Zurich? And read this blog!
Then why not working for us! We are hiring talented backend and frontend devs to implement the Web of Things! Now!
The detailed job ad is online, looking forward to receiving your CVs!
It’s very exciting for us to see all the noise (& reposts) or the ARM® Cortex™-M0+ processor (aka. the “flycatcher”) that was unveiled yesterday. Branded as the world’s most energy-efficient microprocessor it is optimized to deliver high performance (with a 32 bits architecture!) for a very low power consumption, which makes it the ideal chip for intelligent sensors and smart control systems in a broad range of applications. In other words, the ideal chip to power the Web of Things.
It seems to me a great thing, but a chip itself won’t make the IoT a reality, just like one swallow doesn’t make a summer. The greatest impediment here is still a lack of support for more people to start playing around this chip and learn how to use it. In other words, not just an Arduino-like approach, but literally a twine-like approach. Of course, fridges manufacturers now have yet another weapon to significantly augment the user experience of food storage. Obviously consumer electronics, automotive and other industries do have the budget/time/expertise to embed the flycatcher intro their products, but there are reasons it didn’t happen yet, and I doubt it’s purely financial.
I do believe this is not the right way to drive innovation as it doesn’t consider consumer as potential innovators. Most printers & routers today have a micro controller and wireless connectivity, and could easily offer a programmable interface (so that we’re not stuck with the awful Web-based user interfaces those devices have), but somehow they just don’t. And I do believe this is where it all will start: just like most Web-based services today do have a (ideally RESTful) API, our consumer electronics should also offer an API (obviously in addition – not replacement – to the ready-made Web-based UX). This way, the user experience to “average” users of these devices remains identical, but coders and hackers that might (and most often do) have better ideas on how to digitally augment consumer electronics will be able to create custom apps by leveraging, well… the Web to create new, disruptive, intriguing use cases for your printer (or fridge, or car…) the manufacturer didn’t think of. This in turn could lead to an app store for “any” of your electronic products, where you could download and install new apps for your fridge, car, or printer (e.g. “the new york times app that will print every morning at 6am a fresh 1-page of your personalized news stories that you can read on your short ride to work” anyone?).
As a final thought, it’s not a super powerful low-power CPU that is literally going to change the market landscape, but what one does with these chips. This is because we’re not limited by technology itself, but what we do with it. And more importantly: what we allow consumers to do with the products they buy.
What do you think we need for making the internet of things a reality? More importantly, how can we best send the message to manufacturers: “hey, put an API on that machine, coz we need one”?
Just a brief post to announce that the deadline for submitting papers to the 3rd International Workshop on Web of Things has been extended! You now have until March 16th to submit your Web of Things related research work/prototype/demonstrator, more info here: http://www.webofthings.org/wot/2012/
Looking forward to seeing you there! By the way, the organization team is still looking for one more industrial sponsor who would like to give a keynote at the event! Ping us if you are interested!
I know we covered them not so long ago, but our friends from Koubachi finally released their first product a few days back, it’s live finally and available! They have even already covered on Techcrunch and Gizmondo! Great job guys!
For 148$, give your plant a voice and get one of these:
The Web of Things cries for wireless communication! As a consequence, as it is being deployed out there it contributes to a phenomena called electrosmog, understand a cloud of electromagnetic waves that increasingly surrounds us (and the exact effect of that cloud on us is still in the middle of many debates…).
The fascinating part about this cloud is that much like our electricity consumption, we can’t really see it or feel it (well except for electro-sensitive people who say they can). Back in 2007, we started working on a project to make electricity visible the Web way (Energie Visible!), hence trying to make electromagnetic fields visible sounded like a fun challenge.
Ondes Visibles! is an Android + Arduino application that I developed to help people experimenting with and raising their awareness of electromagnetic fields (EMFs). It features tutorials giving you the very basics of EMFs as well as interactive experiments for low (LF) and high (HF) frequencies using home-made sensors. Basically, we plug an LF and HF sensor to an Arduino board. Then, using a USB bridge, we route the measurements to pretty much any Android mobile phone through a USB wire (using the great Microbridge library). and visualize the data in graphs.
But enough tech, let’s have a look at what it is like:
Want to try it out? Simply build it for yourself! Get the sources and instructions on the official project page! Hope you’ll enjoy it at least as much as I enjoyed building it (code contributions are welcomed, fork us on GitHub!).
It is no secret that current trends inspired from the development of the Web 2.0 advocate designing smart things (e.g., wireless sensors nodes or home appliances) as service platforms. Interoperable services are mainly achieved using two different (families of) approaches: WS-* and RESTful Web services. It is also no secret that we, at Webofthings.org are big fans of REST. Hence, one critic that we often get is that our preference for REST is not really founded on data but rather on a guts feeling which basically was … true!
Hence, as part of my Ph.D. Thesis I wanted to discuss this choice and base it on data, first looking at quantitative results (e.g., performances of REST vs WS-*) but then also getting some qualitative data: does REST really makes it easier to build upon smart things? WS-* and REST have previously been compared with respect to performance and features, but no work has been done to elicit the developers’ preferences and programming experiences in an Internet of Things context…
Hence, we conducted a study in which 69 (I promise I did not actually pick the number!) novice developers learned both technologies and implemented mobile phone applications that retrieve sensor data, both through a RESTful and through a WS-* service architecture. The results complement the available technological decision framework when building Internet of Things applications. The results suggest that, indeed, developers find REST easier to learn than WS-* and consider it more suitable for programming smart things (so it is NOT just us ). However, interestingly enough for applications with advanced security and Quality of Service requirements, WS-* Web services are perceived to be better suited.
Actually, we compiled the results in a paper that recently got accepted for Mobiquitous 2012 in Copenhagen. I did not have the chance to present it there (we are kept busy building Evrythng!) but Simon Mayer, our colleague and friend, did a great job presenting it there. Find the slides below:
And the full paper summing up the results which can also be found in greater details in Chapter I of my thesis (from page 90 on).
Convinced? Not? Let us know more about your experience/preference!
Dear readers, today we have an important announcement to make: we both finished our PhDs, so are now officially ‘doctors’ 
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But the important part is that we’ve teamed up with entrepreneurs Niall Murphy (founder of WiFi network The Cloud, acquired by BSkyB last year) and Andy Hobsbawm (founder of Online Magic, which later became Agency.com) to form a very cool venture called EVRYTHNG, that is working in the area of… Web of Things! You bet!! Dom has taken upon the role of Chief Technology Officer, while mine is Chief Product Officer. EVRYTHNG is funded by the awesome Atomico (Skype’s Niklas Zennströms’ investment fund), so Dom and I are super excited to be part of a commercial start-up in the WoT space.
EVRYTHNG wants to organize the world’s objects with an Active Digital Identity (ADI) for every thing. We have a vision of dynamic digital services and experiences connecting people and things — where every product and other physical objects are part of the Web. EVRYTHNG’s engine for Active Digital Identities provides technology, tools and services to create ADI profiles for products and other types of objects. We help manufacturers and developers create brilliant new services, apps and experiences that connect things with people.
Feel free to sign-up for our BETA program and browse through our developer resources to learn about our API. Of course, please let us know what you think.
As you might have noticed, our official domain name is now webofthings.org – we wanted to keep this place separate from a commercial .com space. If you like, it’s our promise to you that we’ll keep the Web of Things site separate and keep posting quality, independent material to keep enriching this community more than ever.
We see WoT evolving into a curated source of useful news about what we (and you!) think are the hottest innovations in WoT/IoT technologies for techies and thinkers, and with the support of EVRYTHNG we’ll be able to setup more hackathons and workshops all around the world. In the longer term, we want to foster a strong global community of researchers, practitioners, and designers, and support open-source projects in that area.
We realize WoT has been online for around three years and we take this opportunity to thank you all for your trust, participation, help, suggestions, or simply readership. The day has come to rethink what it has been and where it should go. Therefore we’d really REALLY like your input on what comes next and what you’d love us to do. Send us an email or post a comment below. If you’re lazy, we added a little poll on the right column on our page – we’d love to hear from you!!
At last! We eventually have a document that vulgarizes the Internet and the Web of Things, oh JOY! I’ll be able to illustrate to mom/sister/grand children (I’ll have to wait a while for that though ) what I’ve been doing for the last 7 years of my life without having them go like: “hmmm oooookayyyyyy”! The one and only problem: the article is in … French. Désolé!
(Source: SVJ)
When Olivier Lascar, from Science et Vie Junior asked if I would be interested in participating to an article about the Internet of Things targeted towards teens I just couldn’t resist, especially since, as a kid, I never missed an issue of the magazine! A couple of interviews hours later and here we go: si vous parlez Français, je suis sûr que vous allez comme moi aimer cet article. It is a savory mix between vulgarization and facts, something that anyone (I believe) can more or less relate to, with plenty of well picked examples. The magazine is still on sale (SVJ 268), so get a printed copy. If you can’t, SVJ provided us with a free PDF version for our readers: L’Internet des Objets, SVJ 268
Remarks and commentaires are very welcome, as comme toujours!
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