IoT Dashboards - Jack Pender, Blog #1

 The Initial Plan:

Upon beginning this project, project leader, Jason, informed us that we would be using Microsoft's micro:bit as the microcontroller to control the USV and its numerous devices. Following this he showed us the Wappsto:bit by Seluxit. This is a breakout board that would allow us to add features such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth etc. However as it is a new product and platform, there was uncertainty of how reliable it would be and given the nature of this project this is of great importance. It was for this reason that it was decided not to use the Wappsto:bit, instead opting for an IoT dashboard platform of our own choosing and connecting via mqtt or something similar.


Wolkabout:

After researching a few different IoT dashboard platforms, we whittled down our list to the best options. We each then took a platform and continued our research into it. The platform I was designated was Wolkabout.


After looking into Wolkabout and it's features, I can conclude that it is a well rounded platform that meets many of the projects needs, however it may not be perfect. In my opinion it can create attractive IoT dashboards, which is important when wanting people to interact with it.

As you can see from the above image, it also has map functionality. However I am still uncertain as to how much can be done with this. I was able to establish a connection from my computer to a demo dashboard I created using mqtt, supplying a temperature gauge with some dummy data. This would lead me to believe it is possible to update waypoints on the map e.g. the location of the USV, but whether or not you could create a route to be taken by the USV remains to be seen.
Wolkabout does have good analogue input and output, as well as digital input and output. These are in the forms of sliders, graphs, gauges, switches etc. Although it has many of our required features for the dashboard design, one feature which I can't find any information on is whether or not it can receive and then play a live camera feed. This will be important in deciding whether or not to use Wolkabout moving forward.
Overall Wolkabout has many of the features that this project requires, but potentially not all. The two that need to be ironed out are how extensive the map functionality is, and whether or not we can stream a live camera feed to the dashboard. These will be the questions I attempt to answer moving forward.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How to: Tello drone to micro bit - Victor Alikberov, Blog#1

Image
1. Introduction. The purpose of this blog is to explain everything that is needed in order to connect tello drone to micro bit. It will cover wiring,  javascript code behind custom created tello extension and how to use this extension to connect and drive tello via microbit. 2. Wiring. Since tello drone creates its own wi-fi hotspot, additional wi-fi module is required in order to establish wireless connection between micro bit and tello. ESP8266 will be used to connect micro bit to tello wi-fi hotspot and also to establsih UDP communications between micro bit and drone. The pinout of the ESP8266 chip is shown below. ESP8266 chip pinout. Receiving port (Rx) is connected to transmitting port of the micro bit (pin 2) and transmitting port (Tx) of the ESP8266 is connected to receiving port of the micro bit (pin 1).  3.3 volts power supply should be provided both to micro bit and ESP8266 chip. Chip enable port is also connected to 3.3v power supply.  ESP8266 plus microbi...
Read more

First USV Test - Jack Pender, Blog #5

Image
Introduction: On the 18 th of March we held our first field test at Killurin Bridge in Wexford. We met there at 10 am, with a plan of finishing up at 2 pm, giving us plenty of time to test each aspect of the project we have been working on. It was great to see the USV on the water for the first time, and it helped to visualise it in the setting that its use is intended for. Testing: The main tests for this first field test were to trial the driving functionality; Manual Drive, Microbit Drive and Cloud Drive. Using the controller, the drive of the USV was successful and it was great to finally see its speed and mobility on the water. With the Manual Drive, controlled by Patryck, going according to plan, this allowed us to test the Microbit Drive, which would be controlled by Adam. Using two Microbits to control the direction and thruster power, Adam completed a successful drive of the USV. This was great to see as it meant that the control of the USV could be friendly to everyone...
Read more

OpenCV To RoboRealm - Jack Pender, Blog #7

Image
Introduction: Developing further on getting the camera feed from the Tello drone to a viewable format, it was decided to try and get the camera feed into RoboRealm. Once the camera feed is in RoboRealm, it can essentially be sent to anywhere from there, in our case Ubidots, but if this were to change we would now have a better starting point. RoboRealm: RoboRealm was created in 2006 to take advantage of lower cost generic computing, a widening range of lower cost imaging devices, an increasing need and usage of vision as a primary sensor device and the desire to come to a solution with an interactive user interface with minimal programming. This made it ideal for this project as it meant that for future iterations it would be quick and simple for someone else to get up and running with. Procedure: Using multiple of the built-in features of RoboRealm I created a programe that would start a screen capture in order to have RoboRealm capture the drone feed. Firstly, within an if ...
Read more