Category Archives: Electronics

Beaglebone Coding 101: Using the Serial and Analog Pins

[Updated Jan 25: Correction! There is a 1.8V voltage source on the Beaglebone: Port 9 Pin 32.  Thanks to Koen Kooi for the info.  I've updated the text with this information] This article is my second explaining the fundamentals of … Continue reading

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Beaglebone Coding 101: Blinking an LED

[Updated Jan 22 - various improvements to the Python sample code at the end of the article] In November, Texas Instruments, Digi-Key and the other members of Beagleboard.org, the Beaglebone.  This is a simpler, more hobbyist-friendly little brother to the … Continue reading

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A Pachube Google Gadget: Size Matters

As described in past articles, I use the Pachube online Database/Internet-Of-Things-Thingee to log data from Tweet-A-Watt and various other sensors. (It’s pronounced “Patch-bay”, apparently, but that won’t stop me from my thinking “Pa-Chew-Bee” every time I see the word. Feel … Continue reading

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FEZ XBee Sensor: Hat Trick

As mentioned at the end of my Watching the Watcher article, the Netduino Plant Light project is going to take a sharp turn at this point, losing both the Netduino and the Plant Light.  I’m going to spin off some … Continue reading

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Netduino: Watching the Watcher

Note: This article is an installment in a series about building a plant light controller (and beyond) on the Netduino microcontroller platform.  For previous articles in the series, click here.  It’s been a few months now since the Netduino in this … Continue reading

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Netduino Meets World

[Updated August 6: Added a couple of tips to the section on using minicom to configure the XBee.] [Updated August 7: Added "Windows Weirdness" section with workarounds for problems with pySerial on Windows] Note: This article is an installment in … Continue reading

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A Nimbits Gadget: Programmer’s Show And Tell

Updated June 4: I’ve corrected a couple of things, as marked in blue. Updated Dec 3: I made a small code change to fix the autoscale feature, as marked in green below. In my last post, I gave a user’s … Continue reading

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Netduino: A Little Help From Its Friends

Note: This article is an installment in a series about building a plant light controller (and beyond) on the Netduino microcontroller platform.  For previous articles in the series, click here. If you’ve made the switch to programming with .Net Micro … Continue reading

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Tweet-A-Watt: Beyond the Twitter, Part Deux

This article continues my earlier post about web-based services for monitoring your electricity usage using Tweet-A-Watt. Last time I focused on Pachube – today I’ll explain the process of connecting a Tweet-A-Watt to Nimbits. Nimbits Overview Nimbits has a lot … Continue reading

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Tweet-A-Watt: Beyond the Twitter

As I’ve written before, I really like the idea behind Adafruit’s Tweet-A-Watt project, which uses a modified Kill-A-Watt box and an Xbee transmitter to create an inexpensive home energy monitor. I’ve been running one 24/7 for over a year, and … Continue reading

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