Tag: week 2

Project II: Connectivity and IoT has kicked off. We are beginning to plan and structure our approach to the project as well as brainstorming ideas for the design. So far we have created a function tree and a few sketches of design variations of the smart locker:

[more pictures of locker ideas]

The physical front door of the cabinet will have an OLED screen and a piezo buzzer. We will look into the details of the user interface (buttons, LEDs etc.) after developing the basic functionality and designing the cloud logic.

The physical front door of the cabinet will have an OLED screen and a piezo buzzer. We will look into the details of the user interface (buttons, LEDs etc.) after developing the basic functionality and designing the cloud logic.

Today we are working on designing the cabinet itself. We have decided to build the box using laser cutters, and are using the service makercase.com. We have the following measurements of the box:

height: 30 cm, width: 21 cm & depth: 21 cm

The lock and hardware are mounted on a plate inside the cabinet which also serves to hide the hardware.

We have also signed up for IBM Cloud, and are working on setting up the first course program with NodeRed.

Initially I examined the buzzer on my own. The passive buzzer would make it possible to generate pitching noises while the active buzzer would have a constant tone. With PWM tonegeneration and pitching is somewhat possible but the end result is not as clear. The Active buzzer does show to be louder and it is much easier to program.

The base-function of the active buzzer is easy. Plug it to power and it will generate it’s own oscillating signal. It can now be manipulated with Arduino builtin tone. With the frequency [Hz] and an assigned duration it’s possible to compose melodies. With an appropriate setup we can now proceed to write melodies.