Projects/Space Automation
How to you tell your hackspace is occupied? Alert those in the space to important happenings? Control the all important nerf gun to remotely fire foam darts at the person who just arrived? Welcome to the wonderful world of hackspace automation.
Hardware
So far we have:
- Arduino Diecimila
- Acts as an interface between all the other components and one of the servers at the space, a simple serial protocol is used for the server to be able to send commands to various items, or poll for data.
- Moflash Spectrum 600
- Lights up red, amber or green, flashes, makes a lot of noise. Currently triggers a flashing amber whenever someone mentions curry on the leeds hackspace irc channel.
- RC Servo
- Intended for mounting a webcam, but further servos could be added for controlling other items (nerf gun? laser?). IRC control of this "left a bit, right a bit" was suggested by tamonten.
- TC74 temperature sensor
- Monitors the ambient temperature in the space. Polled by the server every minute and logged to a database.
- PIR
- Regularly polled by the server, changes in state are logged to a database - can be used to determine if the space is occupied or not.
- Laser
- Requested by Mick, webcam can be used for targetting. Everything is better with lasers.
Alerting
The Moflash unit has this problem cracked - it's bright, it's loud, and when over used it's intensely annoying, but look on the bright side, nobody need ever miss out on a curry trip ever again.
Presence Detection
The PIR provides a basic indication of whether the space is occupied - if it was triggered within the last few minutes, then you can be pretty certain that someone is around, and the space is open. It should also be possible to monitor the MAC table on the server to determine who is around, and how busy the space is.
Environmental
We're currently just logging temperature, but other sensors could be added, both internal and external (anyone fancy building a weather station?)
Webcam
Mainly so people can keep an eye on what we're up to, could provide a feed if we want to take part in the Synchronous Global Hackathons. IRC control of this "left a bit, right a bit" was suggested by tamonten - should be easy enough to add to the irc bot.
IRC Bot
Provides a means for people elsewhere to interact with the space, and an essential part of the curry alarm. Written in perl, uses POE::Component::IRC
Daemon
Another lump of perl code, checks a database event queue for commands, and also handles the polling of the sensors connected to the arduino.