Tinaja Labs

LapPi – Raspberry Pi as laptop

Chris Jefferies — Sun, 04 Nov 2012 18:58:15 +0000

Here’s a really beautiful assembly of a DIY laptop with Raspberry Pi at its core from Instructables. It requires some woodworking skills as well as computer assembly.

http://www.instructables.com/id/LapPi-A-Raspberry-Pi-Netbook/

Filed under: Technology

Raspberry Pi as an Xbee Wireless Sensor Network Gateway

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 03 Sep 2012 06:18:33 +0000

Notes about Raspberry Pi, an ARM based pc about the size of a deck of cards which costs $35. I might use it as a replacement for the Asus WL520 GU wifi modems I’ve been using as an Xbee WSN Gateway.

General References

Home Page: http://www.raspberrypi.org/
Wiki: http://elinux.org/RaspberryPiBoard
Quick Start: http://www.raspberrypi.org/quick-start-guide
Verified Peripherals: http://elinux.org/RPi_VerifiedPeripherals#USB_WiFi_Adapters
http://learn.adafruit.com/downloads/pdf/send-raspberry-pi-data-to-cosm.pdf
OpenWRT for the Raspberry Pi- probably won’t use this as OpenWRT is focused on WiFi functionality.
Raspberry Pi OS Downloads

OS

I started out with the 4G SD Card from Newark that was pre-loaded with wheezy-debian. Now I’m using the distro from Adafruit called Occidentalis v0.2. It includes ssh and other features that makes it easier to confugure.

Copy the image to a 4G SD Card using Win32DiskImager. Basically you download an OS image to a windows machine and copy it to an SD Card. When using WinDiskImager, pay close attention to your read/write actions because it’s possible to overwite the wrong drive.

Before selecting an SD Card, look at the list in Verified Peripherals. Not all SD Cards work the same, and I spent a lot of time trying to launch the OS even though the image copy was successful. If you get to the point where you’ve successfully copied the image but it won’t boot up, cut your losses and try another SD Card.

login as: pi, password: raspberry
I set up a root account and did most of the installation as root

Expanding the partition on the sccard

Once installed, expand the SD Card partition to fill the 4G memory space. The image on the 4G sdcard is 1.8G. This describes how to expand the partition to fill the entire 4G.

https://projects.drogon.net/raspberry-pi/initial-setup1/

SSH

Set up SSH so you can access the Raspberry Pi from a terminal program of via Putty and/or WinSCP.

ssh-keygen -t rsa -C "your_email@youremail.com"

XBee connection

I used the CISECO daughter board kit which costs about $6 which has a GPIO connector and a place to hook up an xbee to the serial port on the GPIO. It derives the 3.3V from the GPIO and it includes an array of through holes for misc prototyping.

XBee Radio PCB daughter board- by CISECO – basically a breakout board for the GPIO connections with access to the serial port and 3.3V.
Getting started with GPIO and PythonThis is the first of two articles showing basic GPIO on the Raspberry-Pi using the prototype area of the Slice of Pi. This covers basic details on the GPIO pins, setting up a Python library to allow access to the GPIO. There is an example circuit to build on the Slice and some code to get the outputs working. This was originally a blog post on Matts blog at http://lwk.mjhosting.co.uk

Serial port on the GPIO connector accessed as: /dev/ttyAMA0
More notes on serial Interfacing: http://lavalink.com/2012/03/raspberry-pi-serial-interfacing/

Raspberry Pi with XBee daughterboard, Slice of Pi

On the Adafruit distro, Occidentalis v0.2, I was having some issues with reading the serial port in my python code. I kept getting erros related to the serial port being in use. Some research got me to this article on the RaspberryPi.org site and this article from Clayton’s Domain. I edited a file, /boot/cmdline.txt, and this is what it came down to (all on one line):

/boot/cmdline.txt
dwc_otg.lpm_enable=0 rpitestmode=1 console=tty1 root=/dev/mmcblk0p2 rootfstype=ext4 rootwait

Install Apache on Raspberry Pi

Eventually I will want to set up a web interface to allow users to edit the gateway config items, like the network protocol and to manage the various sensors, python scripts, etc. For now, I’m just going to manage it it by ssh command line.

http://tinkernut.com/wiki/page/Episode_320
Webmin- “Webmin is a web-based interface for system administration for Unix. Using any modern web browser, you can setup user accounts, Apache, DNS, file sharing and much more. Webmin removes the need to manually edit Unix configuration files like /etc/passwd, and lets you manage a system from the console or remotely.”
Raspcontrol- PHP based Dashboard application. More about status then configuring.

Installing Python components

Rasberry Pi, default linux install, has python already installed.

I needed these modules to allow me to access various web services like Cosm (pachube), Thing Speak, Open.Sen.se, and my own SOAP based service that I wrote in C#.

pyserial

We need some extra libs to run the sensor programs.

Check if python is installed and what version is installed

python -V

Change directory:

cd /home/tinaja/downloads/

WGet the file then unpack it:

wget http://sourceforge.net/projects/pyserial/files/pyserial/2.5/pyserial-2.5.tar.gz/download
tar -zxvf pyserial-2.5.tar.gz

cd pyserial-2.5
python setup.py install

simplejson 2.6.1

simplejson 2.6.1 is compatible with python 2.5.

Change directory:

cd /home/tinaja/downloads/

WGet the file then unpack it:

wget http://pypi.python.org/packages/source/s/simplejson/simplejson-2.6.1.tar.gz
tar -zxvf simplejson-2.6.1.tar.gz

cd simplejson-2.6.1
python setup.py install

suds

The suds libs provide services for SOAP calls.

Need to install python’s setup tools:

apt-get install python-setuptools

Change directory:

cd /home/tinaja/downloads/

wget https://fedorahosted.org/releases/s/u/suds/python-suds-0.4.tar.gz
tar -zxvf python-suds-0.4.tar.gz

cd python-suds-0.4/
python setup.py install

eeml

Used by Cosm (pachube)

http://pypi.python.org/pypi/python-eeml/1.1.0
? git clone git://github.com/petervizi/python-eeml.git

# cd /home/tinaja/downloads/
# wget http://pypi.python.org/packages/source/p/python-eeml/python-eeml-1.2.0.tar.gz
# older version - wget http://pypi.python.org/packages/any/p/python-eeml/python-eeml-1.1.0.linux-i686.tar.gz
# tar python-eeml-1.2.0.tar.gz
# python setup.py install

Source code: https://github.com/petervizi/python-eeml/

Code

I’ve loaded the python code I’m using on GitHub:
https://github.com/TinajaLabs/gateway_raspi

Wifi

The Raspberry Pi can be wifi enabled with a USB based wifi device. The main concern would be with power consumption; the raspberry pi runs off of a 5V (currently 700mA) supply (like a cell phone charger) and a wifi device might strain the load.

http://elinux.org/images/4/4b/Raspberry_Pi_wireless_adapter.pdf

For now (8.26.2012) the wired ethernet configuration works great. It can just plug into a IP provider modem.

To change the boot-up text

Did this to brand the OS as one I set up. Only for show…

edit /etc/moto.tail

The programs included with the Debian GNU/Linux system are free software;
the exact distribution terms for each program are described in the
individual files in /usr/share/doc/*/copyright.

Debian GNU/Linux comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY, to the extent
permitted by applicable law.

Type 'startx' to launch a graphical session

This version, from Adafruit's Occidentalis v0.2, set up by:
 _____ _              _         _          _         
|_   _(_)_ __   __ _ (_) __ _  | |    __ _| |__  ___ 
  | | | | '_ \ / _` || |/ _` | | |   / _` | '_ \/ __|
  | | | | | | | (_| || | (_| | | |__| (_| | |_) \__ \
  |_| |_|_| |_|\__,_|/ |\__,_| |_____\__,_|_.__/|___/
                   |__/ TinajaLabs.com, Summer 2012
-----------------------------------------------------

To set a program to start at boot-up

To automatically run the main python script, allsensors.py, when the computer starts…

Edit /etc/rc.local and add the python line shown below:

#!/bin/sh -e
#
# rc.local
#
# This script is executed at the end of each multiuser runlevel.
# Make sure that the script will "exit 0" on success or any other
# value on error.
#
# In order to enable or disable this script just change the execution
# bits.
#
# By default this script does nothing.

# Print the IP address
_IP=$(hostname -I) || true
if [ "$_IP" ]; then
  printf "My IP address is %s\n" "$_IP"
fi

# add this for Tinaja Labs sensor tracking
python /home/tinaja/allsensors.py &

exit 0

To set up Tomcat Server

At some point I might want to set up a Tomcat server and use it with some Java apps. Later.

http://macgyverdev.blogspot.com/2012/08/raspberry-pi-how-to-get-ssh-and-tomcat.html

Java

JDK for Linux ARM, JRE for Mac OS X: http://www.raspberrypi.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=34&t=14635

To watch the message log file

This allows you to see the system messages generated by the script as it sends various sensor readings to the web services.

cd /var/log/
tail -f messages

To kill the Tinaja python script

Look for the process id of the python script with this command:

ps aux # for a full list
ps aux | grep python  # to see only python processes

Take note of the process id number and issue this command:

kill 9999 # where 9999 is the process id number

That’s all I have for now, hope you found something useful here.

Filed under: Linux, Sensors, Software, Technology, Web Data, xBee

Maker Faire 2012

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 07:08:44 +0000

I just got the confirmation email that I’ve been accepted to have a booth at this year’s Maker Faire. The booth is called A Sense of Things, as it was last year, and is numbered 7443. I hope to visit with all my sensor friends on Saturday and Sunday, May 19th, 20th.

I’ll be showing our latest development on a low cost wireless sensor network designed for the “everyman” or “everywoman” who wants to track things in and around their homes. Please stop by for a visit.

To sign up for the maker Faire: http://makerfaire.com/be-a-maker.csp

Filed under: Appropriate technology, Design, DIY, Energy, Maker, Science, Sensors, xBee

The new Nest Learning Thermostat – $250

Chris Jefferies — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 22:14:29 +0000

A friend sent me a link to this article about the new Nest Thermostat and I got very excited; went to the site to put in my order… rrrrP! (that’s the sound of me hitting the brakes)

$250? Why does cool have to cost so much?

I have been building my own home wireless sensor network for the last 2 years. Temperature, light, hall effect, gas detection, FSRs, the Tweet-a-watt, etc. using XBee modules and a wifi gateway that uses an open source OS (OpenWRT) and Python scripts to send data to web services (like Pachube.com, ThingSpeak, Open.Sen.se). I’ve been studying home energy automation for a couple of years now and I’m beginning to understand the various aspects of what it takes to put together components to collect and communicate meaningful, actionable information.

The Nest Learning Thermostat has some cool features. It learns… and that’s fantastic. As I understand it, you can set the thermostat up or down at different times and it will remember what you set and build a schedule that repeats your preferences. That’s very cool. It has a motion detector to sense the presence of people in the house and turns the system down/off. That’s cool, too. But there are some serious issues that I see over and over in this field.

First off this device costs too much. It should be priced at somewhere below $50 for the thermostat. That would put it at a price point to get it into the homes of many more people. The more consumers use it, the more we can reduce our dependence, as a nation, on foreign sources of energy. That’s a national, heck, a global goal, right?

Next, I don’t see any way to help consumers understand meaningful and detailed results of the savings they create by using the thermostat. They might see an overall drop in their gas or electric bill, but how much can be attributed to the thermostat as opposed to the incandescent bulbs they replaced with CFLs, or by the shading of a porch, or by being more diligent in turning off the entertainment system (including the STB) and vampire loads.

Also, the designers have created a thermostat in a very traditional form. IOW, they’re not “thinking different”. The learning aspect is interesting, but I’d rather just go to my android app, or the web site and just start with a default profile for my region, house size, etc, and adjust to taste. Otherwise, I’ll not look at it again unless there is an exception to the rules, like going on a long weekend vacation.

Similarly, the designers are stuck with the concept that we need a thermostat on the wall and that we would ever want to get up off the couch and go look at it. Why spend the effort in a device that shouldn’t even require a UI. IOW, the phone app or web page should be the preferred UI.

A “think different” approach might have a temperature sensor and a motion detector in each room and these very cheap components can inform the HVAC controls how to adjust for optimum comfort vs cost. The display and controls don’t need to be on a wall in the hallway… That’s as old as the the round Honeywell thermostats people were referencing in the comments on the Wired Magazine article.

I also believe that the display devices that you get with most home automation system, perhaps in the style of elaborate refrigerator magnets with displays, are destined, too soon, for garage sales and Goodwill stores. Let’s extend the devices that we already have for control surfaces, like tablets, smart phones, game consoles. For those who don’t have smart phones in their homes, how about something like a cheap android phone form (w/o the phone functions), music players, remote controls, wifi tether devices; any devices that can support apps.

I believe profit is deserved by all who work but how much is enough? If you look at Chris Anderson’s approach describing how to make a profit on your products (), you would sell at 2.3 times the cost of parts; and that’s a good profit margin. If I did my math right, it looks like the BOM costs about $108.

I suppose they might be adding in some of the costs of running a free web service that stores all the data so clients can see the ongoing history of their thermostat settings correlated to the temperature of their house and the local weather.

Lastly, my impression is that the design isn’t finished. Design doesn’t stop until you’ve optimized the functionality, the design, and the cost. In this era of programmable microcontrollers, arduino shields, MEMS sensors, surface mount components, standard protocols, inexpensive cloud based web services, the Internet of Things… we need to delight consumers by making the products attractive, pervasive, and affiordable… for everybody.

http://nest.com

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2011/10/nest_thermostat

http://blog.ponoko.com/2010/11/16/ten-rules-for-maker-businesses-by-wireds-chris-anderson/

Filed under: Data Acquisition, Design, Energy, Hardware, Sensors, Technology Tagged: sensors, thermostat

Maker Faire Surprise

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 23 May 2011 07:43:25 +0000

On the drive to Maker Faire on Friday, I had a few dark moments wondering if anyone would really care about the work I’ve been doing on wireless sensor networks. I imagine that there are all these sensors struggling to be heard and I’ve been constructing a platform to help facilitate that. But would anyone share that vision? On I drove…

My friend, Terence, helped get us set up with the booth and finally with no hope of getting any internet access (seems it was over-taxed most of the time), we retired to the Friday evening’s beer and paella dinner. We met a lot of wonderfully creative Makers. The Maker Faire is such a wonderful collection of creativity in all it’s myriad forms. It is inspirational and gives me hope. Terence made a good point that Obama should have come to the Maker Faire to see an example of what makes America great.

Well I have to say I was very surprised to see how many people came to our booth to learn about wireless sensor networks. I’m exhausted and my voice is shot but I feel very satisfied to see so much interest in what we have built. Thanks to all who came by the booth. I hope that this experience can be the beginning of an exchange of ideas to make more robust sensor networks that can provide meaning to those who seek to extend what we can know about the world around us. I heard so many great ideas and I hope we can keep the them coming.

Now that the Maker Faire is over, I plan to focus on this web site for the next couple of weeks and get the tutorials in order. I’ve started some of them and have not yet published some others. I promised everyone who I spoke with at the Maker Faire to get these completed and that’s where I’ll be focused. If anyone wants info about any particular part of the platform, sooner than later, please let me know and I’ll be happy to move that to the front of the line.

Thanks to all who came by the booth, to Terence, to my friends who’ve been supporting my efforts to Make my vision, to Aurora for putting up with my project clutter, and thanks to the folks at Maker Faire for putting on a great show.

(the original post about Maker Faire)

Filed under: DIY, Maker, Technology

OSHW – Open Source Hardware

Chris Jefferies — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 00:38:04 +0000

I support the Open Source Hardware Definition v1.0

A cool new logo has been defined for Open Source Hardware (OSHW).

Here are the principles of what is being attempted in open source hardware (from the site):

Open source hardware is hardware whose design is made publicly available so that anyone can study, modify, distribute, make, and sell the design or hardware based on that design. The hardware’s source, the design from which it is made, is available in the preferred format for making modifications to it. Ideally, open source hardware uses readily-available components and materials, standard processes, open infrastructure, unrestricted content, and open-source design tools to maximize the ability of individuals to make and use hardware. Open source hardware gives people the freedom to control their technology while sharing knowledge and encouraging commerce through the open exchange of designs.

Netgear GS605 v2 fix

Chris Jefferies — Sun, 20 Mar 2011 23:41:16 +0000

NetGear GS606 v2 with new capacitors

A few weeks ago we had a serious storm here in the SF Bay area and the power went out for about 5 hours. It took a few days for me to realize that the internet connection was running pretty slow, so I started trying to trace it.

I’m using Comcast IP service and right out of the cable modem I was getting 21Mbps (using the Speakeasy speed test). After the first Netgear gigabit switch the bandwidth dropped to about 3.g Mbps and after the second, it dropped less than 1.0 Mbps. Killin’ me!

So after some Google searching I found that the Netgear GS605 v2 was susceptible to power surges which often happen during or after power outages. The problem is apparently in the poor quality capacitors used. Once replaced, they are back to full force with less than $10 worth of parts and about 20 minutes. Here’s how I replaced the capacitors.

Tools, parts:

Soldering Iron
Solder Sucker
Torx Screwdriver (T8)
2 x 1000 uF 10V, 1 x 470 uF 25V capacitors

Open it up:

On the bottom there are some rubber feet that can be peeled back to reveal tiny torx head screws (from my set I used a T8). Unscrew the 4 screws. The PC board is not secured further, so when you remove the back, you can jiggle the PCB and it will come out as a single unit.

Removing the capacitors:

On the PCB you can see 4 capacitors:

2 x 1000 uF, 10V
1 x 470 uF, 25V
1 x 100uF, 16V (looks like part of the power regulator, I did not replace)

To remove the capacitors, I first tried using one of those solder sucker tools but I think my soldering iron it not getting hot enough. I basically put some side pressure on the exposed post oposite the capacitor side of the PCB and when the solder melted, the capacitor slipped out at an angle. Doing the same on the other post released the capacitor. I removed the 2 1000 uF caps and the 470 uF cap.

Replacing:

I went to Radio Shack and purchased:

2 x 1000 uF, 35V – $1.79 ea.
1 x 470 uF, 35V – $1.49 ea

The replacements from Radio Shack were their generic versions, bigger in size and higher in rated voltage but I wanted to get it done and not wait a few days for an online order.

Because the new capacitors were so large, I had to mount them sideways. on the PCB. This is generally straight forward if you pre-bend the leads. Put the cap in place and with needle nose pliers, pre-bend at the appropriate lengths. The 1000 uF cap closest to the edge needed to be bent with the leads in a slightly overlapping form, but once you get in there it should be obvious. Here’s what it looked like.

NetGear GS606 v2 with new capacitors, close up

Filed under: Computer, HAN, Hardware, Technology, Tutorial

Maker Faire! May 21, 22

Chris Jefferies — Sat, 05 Mar 2011 01:05:10 +0000

There was a call for Makers, I applied and got accepted. So this year, instead of being in the stands, I’ll be out on the field having fun. My booth will be called The Sense of Things, as a play on the concept of The Internet of Things.

I will be showing what I’ve learned in the last year regarding wireless sensor networks.

Short Description: Wireless sensor networks, data acquisition and analysis; a discussion about building wireless sensor networks based on open source software and hardware (OSHW) for use in things like home energy, air quality, and elder care.

Long Description: Exploring sensor networks, data acquisition and displaying data.

This project will demonstrate what I have learned in the last year from others on the internet. Open source software has lead to open source hardware (OSHW) and makes it possible to build wireless sensors, open source wireless gateways, data logging data services and charting applications.

With this kind of system we can monitor things like energy used in a home, indoor/outdoor temperatures, wind speed, dangerous gases, the presence of a person in a room, etc.

We will discuss how various online tutorials and technologies (Tweetawatt, xBee, Asus wifi with OpenWRT, data logger, web services, Pachube, Adafruit, MightyOhm, etc) were used to develop the test system.

Web site: TinajaLabs.Wordpress.com

Please come by for a visit.

Saturday, May 21st – SHOWTIME : 10 a.m. – 8 p.m.
Sunday, May 22nd – SHOWTIME: 10 a.m. – 6 p.m.

Filed under: Art, DIY, Maker

Physical dashboard devices – Eh!

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 07 Feb 2011 23:33:26 +0000

According to this article by Katie Fehrenbacher at Gigaom, the developers of home energy management systems have figured it out that there’s no future in dedicated dashboard devices when you have a marketplace full of iPhones, Android phones, iPads and other tablet devices.

The dedicated dashboard devices would be able to display various conditions of your home energy system, your local weather, etc., and to control devices in the home. But now that we have Android phones and iPads, these new devices can access the web and use either native web pages or specialized apps.

It’s a no brainer. Have a web based system as the default UI and provide specialized apps for hand held controls.

Filed under: Energy, Environment, HAN, Software, Sustainability, Technology, Web Design

Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis (JCAP)

Chris Jefferies — Sun, 06 Feb 2011 20:02:59 +0000

It will be interesting to watch the progress on artificial photosynthesis.

“The Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis (JCAP), to be led by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in partnership with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), will bring together leading researchers in an ambitious effort aimed at simulating nature’s photosynthetic apparatus for practical energy production. The goal of the Hub is to develop an integrated solar energy-to-chemical fuel conversion system and move this system from the bench-top discovery phase to a scale where it can be commercialized.”

Filed under: Energy, Environment, Science, Solar, Technology

Tendril's Hybrid-HAN

Chris Jefferies — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 21:14:16 +0000

Tendril has a post on their blog that talks about an emerging style of energy monitoring connectivity that they are calling a Hybrid-HAN (home area network). It envisions a dual network, one that utilizes a the Utility’s smart meter and a second provided b y the consumer; a wifi router, for example. They figure this is a good thing because it will unburden the smart meter from the growing list of sensors and controls that will become more popular as consumers learn to understand the benefits of monitoring their home environment.

The consumer side of the system uses something called the ZigBee Smart Energy Profile. Not sure about the Smart Energy Profile but Zigbee is a well known low power wireless protocol that I’ve been experimenting with for a low power, inexpensive monitoring system. Each Zigbee (aka xBee) module can transmit or receive signals that cover most residential buildings and costs about $20.

Interestingly the image shows the data from the consumers gateway (basically a specialized router) being fed back to the utility company but I’m not sure that’s the way it will play out.

In the future, data locality will not be so crucial. There are always concerns about this or that silo of data that stands alone and unaccessible from external sites. But as we grow to understand the benefits of shared data, any system will be able to aggregate date from any other system (with proper authentication of course).

Filed under: Design, Energy, HAN, Smart Meter, Sustainability, Technology, Web Data, xBee

WSN: Gas Sensor

Chris Jefferies — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 01:12:43 +0000

Hooking up a gas sensor is more or less the same as with the voltage divider model but it has an extra twist. The MQ Series sensors which I used for gas sensing (average cost= $5) have a heating element to react with the gases they detect. I’ve played with the MQ-2 – General combustible gas, MQ-3 - Alcohol, MQ-4 - Natural gas & Methane, MQ-5 - LPG or Propane, and the MQ-7 - Carbon Monoxide (CO).

For the analog sensing it is the same as the classic voltage divider model (see the notes on the main sensor post). Because I use an XBee analog input to read the sensor output value, the V+ is at 3.3V (which is what the XBee runs on) and the V- is at Gnd.

Here’s the schematic I set up (click to see a larger view):

It might seem more complicated than it needs to be, but basically we have a 5V regulator supply (w/ 7805) for the heater element, a 3.3V regulator supply (MCP1700-3302E/TO; same as the Adafruit XBee Adapter PCB) to power the XBee module, then the MQ series device. I’ve connected the gas sensor output to pin 20 of the XBee module, so we’ll be reading the gas sensor voltage on analog input 0.

Here are my Eagle CAD files for this setup (Schematic, Board)

One thing to note about these sensors is that they are not calibrated to detect specific parts per million, etc. They can also be affected by the ambient temperature and humidity. I’ve used them primarily to know when the gas concentrations are high or low, trending up or down.

Here’s a live sample graph of the data tracked at Pachube.com:

The spikes you might see on the chart are, I am pretty sure, generated by some problem of collection downstream of the sensor and the xbee radio. Hopefully, I’ll get this resolved soon.

Next Post: FSR Sensor
Next Group: Radio:XBee

Filed under: Technology, Tutorial

WSN: Temperature Sensor

Chris Jefferies — Sat, 15 May 2010 23:36:02 +0000

The temperature sensor is based on the TMP36 Low Voltage Temperature Sensors.

My first attempt at creating a wireless temperature sensor was using a TMP36 device from Analog. The TMP36 looks like a transistor because it is in a TO-92 package.

I soldered together an XBee Adapter board from Adafruit then I soldered the TMP36 directly to the adapter board. Using the layout above. I soldered the voltage input pin to the closest VCC trace, the ground to ground (obviouisly) and the Analog Voltage output pin to the AD0 pin.

TMP36 on the XBee adapter

This seems to work fairly well if you only have one input. If you plan to use multiple sensors on the XBee ADC inputs, you’ll need to set up a rail to rail op amp buffer. But that’s for another post.

Here’s a live sample of a TMP36 data stream from my back porch as derived from a chart on Pachube.com:

Large spikes are a known problem with the data collection downstream of the TMP36 and the XBee module. To be fixed soon, I hope.

Next Post: Gas Sensor
Next Group: Radio:XBee

Filed under: Technology, Tutorial

WSN: Tweet-a-Watt

Chris Jefferies — Sat, 01 May 2010 23:24:31 +0000

The Tweet-a-Watt is a wireless power meter based on a commercial device called the Kill A Watt which is hacked to include a wireless XBee radio. It was designed by Limor Fried of Adafruit Industries and she has written up one of the best online tutorials for a kit based project. It collects data from the Kill A Watt from P3 International and with an added XBee radio sends data to a PC and then on to a twitter feed. Hence the name, Tweet-a-Watt, a combination of Twitter’s Tweet and the Kill A Watt power meter.

You can build a Tweet-a-Watt by following the tutorial here.

The basic components:

Kill A Watt Power Meter (P4400)

Everyone should own at least one Kill A Watt. It can tell you the cumulated kilowatt hours (KWh) at the plug load of an appliance, along with the volts, amps, and watts.

With pencil and paper and a little time you can hook this up to the various appliances in your home and look at the meter and simply “do the math”. With the math, and perhaps a spreadsheet program, you can analyse what your appliances draw in watts and learn what to turn off or use less. You can get them online for as little as $17 and at your local hardware store for about $25.
XBee Radio
The Kill-a-Watt starts to become a Tweet-a-Watt with the introduction of an XBee radio. The radio can be hooked up inside the Kill-a-watt and that makes it possible to transmit the readings from the Kill A Watt and send them to a computer for logging and analysis.

The original design of the Tweet-a-Watt project had an XBee radio receiver hooked up to a PC through what is known as an FTDI USB cable; essentially a serial input. There was a python script that would run on the PC and collect the serial input and package the data for delivery to a twitter feed.

During my investigations I saw Limor Fried’s short video about using an Asus Wifi Router instead of a PC to collect and send the sensor data to the internet. If you’re trying to reduce your energy consumption it seems a shame to have to run a PC; even a laptop will draw perhaps 60-90 watts. The Asus wifi router setup can be configured to run the python script and do the same basic job as the PC but it only draws about 4 watts. Much better. See the post about setting up the ASUS WL-520gU.

Next Post: Temperature Sensor
Next Group: Radio XBee

Filed under: Technology, Tutorial

Fun with Google Charts

Chris Jefferies — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 17:32:11 +0000

I was working on some Google Charts and came across this one. Here’s my new business card:

Tinaja Labs Blog


http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?cht=qr&chs=300x300&chl=http://tinajalabs.wordpress.com

As they say, "read 'em and weep".

From the overview of Google's QR codes charts:

"QR codes are a popular type of two-dimensional barcode. They are also known as hardlinks or physical world hyperlinks. QR Codes store up to 4,296 alphanumeric characters of arbitrary text. This text can be anything, for example URL, contact information, a telephone number, even a poem! QR codes can be read by an optical device with the appropriate software. Such devices range from dedicated QR code readers to mobile phones."

Anyone have a laser reader? Here's one:

http://www.quickmark.com.tw/En/basic/index.asp

Here's a sample app to read a QR code from your smartphone:

Knitting QR codes:

Filed under: Software, Technology, Web Data, Web Design

WSN: Sensors

Chris Jefferies — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 06:13:39 +0000

Sensors are the front line components in a wireless sensor network. They move a response from the physical realm into the electrical realm. Each sensor responds to some environmental events and generates a voltage or a digital signal or something that can be measured. There’s a great list of sensors on Wikipedia (hours o’ fun). I am constantly surprised by the seemingly endless list of sensors.

To list some things that can be sensed:

Temperature
Gas, Smoke
Light
Tilt, Acceleration
Proximity
Sound
Distance
Air pressure

Most sensors are what are defined as Passive. Passive sensors react to some environmental stimulus and put out a signal. Active sensors inject something into the environment and then respond to the effects created by the active aspect. Radar is a classic example of an Active Sensor.

Because we’re talking about “wireless” sensors, it’s hard to talk about wiring up the sensors without talking about the radios that make them wireless. We’ll focus on XBee radios but there are others that I’ll describe on the Radios post. On many sites on the internet sensors are shown as hooked up to a microprocessor (which then connects to a radio). I have found that for the sensors I have built so far, none have needed to use a microprocessor. Instead, I’ve connected the sensors directly to an analog input of an XBee. It seems you would need a microprocessor when you need to apply some kind of up front logic to a sensor’s readings.

Voltage Divider

When trying to figure out how to wire up sensors, it helps to have a basic knowledge of electronics. The most prevalent setup in sensor networks seems to be what is called the voltage divider (see the diagram below). There’s a lot of theory about voltage dividers but the basic idea is that you have a voltage at the top (Yin), you have 2 resisters connected inline (R1, R2) to a ground, and you have a voltage out (Vout) where the 2 resisters are joined. The output voltage (Vout) is some value relative to the ratio of R1 and R2.

voltage divider

As an example, you can imagine that R1 is a sensor that varies its resistance with temperature. If Vin is 5VDC then the Vout is going to vary dependent on the variable resistance of R1. Vout would be connected to an input on an XBee (to send wirelessly over a radio) or connected to a microprocessor (like an Arduino) for special handling.

There’s a cool page that shows lots of different circuit layouts for various sensors on the Wiring site (Wiring is kind of like Arduino). On this page you can select circuit types from a popup and some of the selections with display circuits.

Another great resource to get started is on Adafruit Industries’ Tutorial on Sensors which gives an overview of various sensors and how to wire them up.

The Sensors:

Tweet-a-Watt: The Tweet-a-Watt, originally created by Limor Fried (aka: Adafruit) is a modified Kill A Watt with an embedded XBee radio.
Temperature Sensor: It is relatively easy to hook up a temperature sensor to an XBee radio.
Gas Sensor: Hooking up a gas sensor to an XBee radio.
FSR Sensor (Force Sensitive Resistor): Very easy to hook up even if a bit challenging to hook up physically. The FSR responds to pressure applied to its disk and simply changes the resistance based on the amount of pressure.

Next Tutorial Post: Tweet-a-Watt
Next Group Post: Radio XBee

Filed under: Data Acquisition, Sensors, Technology, Tutorial

Wireless Sensor Networks

Chris Jefferies — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 06:55:00 +0000

This is going to be a base post (I’ll make it sticky) to hold the outline of tutorials related to various aspect of wireless sensor networks. From the sensors and radios, to a gateway, to web services, data logging and eventually, charting and analysis. Look at this overview of Wireless Sensor Networks on Wikipedia.

Our interest is in developing a wireless sensor network platform that is inexpensive and simple to use. There is a sweet spot between super high tech and older outdated technology where we believe there exists a meaningful set of technologies that will fit our goals.

XBee, Wifi, Sensors

What we’ve discovered is that we can use radios, like the xBee radios from Digi, with up to 4 sensors hooked up to each one, as our remote sensor boards. We have also discovered that we can transform a wifi router into a tiny, low powered computer running an embedded, open source, operating system called OpenWRT. Many wifi routers have a serial port available on the main pcb inside the device to which we can hook up a coordinating xBee radio; the counterpart to the ones on each sensor board. Then we install a scripting language, Python, into the Linux operating system. Finally, we install python scripts which can be used to collect the data being transmitted from the sensor boards and send that data to web services like Cosm (formerly Pachube), ThingSpeak, Open.sen.se, Paraimpu, etc.

So we have wireless sensor boards sending sensor data to a radio wired into the serial port of a wifi router. The wifi router has been re-flashed with an open source embedded Linux operating system, OpenWRT, and to that we’ve added Python as an easy to use scripting language. We have then added various scripts to bundle the incoming data and send it to the internet for further processing, charting, and so forth.

It is an inexpensive, flexible, easy to use, wireless sensor network platform.

In this ongoing quest to learn more about sensor networks I’ll add links to the Resources Page.

Tutorials:

Here’s a list of notes we’ll be updating with information about how to build you’re own wireless sensor network.

WSN: Sensors: this is where is all begins. The sensor responds to some environmental events and generates a voltage or a digital signal. I’ll be going over a few sensor types that I’ve built; Tweet-a-watt, Temperature, Gas (example of indoor air quality), and a Force Sensitive Resistor (FSR) as an example of Elder Care.
Radio: XBee – Radios allow us to create the wireless part of sensor networks. The XBee radio is very accessible to beginners even if configuration is a bit challenging. I’ll describe the various aspects of XBee radios that I’ve used.
Gateway: Wifi Router – in the original design for the Tweet-a-watt the output from the sensor’s transmitter sent data to an XBee receiver hooked into a PC (via FTDI-USB). The approach I describe uses a low powered (about 4 watts) Asus wi-fi router in place of a PC. I’ll describe using OpenWRT as a replacement OS and adding a USB memory stick to extend the storage memory of the device. I’ll also show how I added python with web service calls in order to send data to the internet.
Client facing site: a site for users to register their gateway devices and manage the sensors associated with each. Also the place to look at the charts and subsequent analysis for the sensor data. This is an MVC web application written in C# and ASP.NET using Visual Studio 2010 Express and SQL Server 2008 Express.

Next: WSN: Sensors

Filed under: Computer, Data Acquisition, DIY, Energy, HAN, Linux, Sensors, Tutorial, Web Data, Web Design, xBee

Earth Hour

Chris Jefferies — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 08:17:59 +0000

Today was Earth Hour day where people from all over the world call for action on climate changing policies by turning out as many lights as possible for at least one hour of the evening. Check out their video:

Visit their site: http://www.myearthhour.org/

Filed under: Energy, Environment, Sustainability, Technology

Bloom Box

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 03:55:24 +0000

Bloom Energy's "Energy Server"

I’m not sure I’m convinced that the Bloom Box, featured on CBS’ 60 Minutes last week, is a reasonable answer to our power issues, but is sounds interesting. And, after 8 years in development and $400m in VC funding and some actual systems in place at Google and Wal-Mart (customers), it seems there’s no looking back for the Bloom Energy’s Bloom Box.

What is the Bloom Box. It is essentially a fuel cell that uses natural gas and special low cost components. The fuel cell itself looks like an 8″ stack of CDs but the power unit, the Bloombox or Energy Server, is about the size of 2 refrigerators; and costs about $700,000-$800,000. Each! The installation at Google’s campus looked like they had about 20-30 units. That’s a good start against the $400m investment.

Of course the outrageous price might be likened to the $10,000 PCs that are now many times more powerful and cost on the order of $500. So what costs hundreds of thousands of dollars now might be a few thousand dollars in, oh, perhaps 20 years?

The promise of a Bloombox is that someday we can have our own Bloombox next to the AC unit on the side of our house and be completely free of the grid; except… we will still need natural gas to power the fuel cell.

Call me cynical, but for now I’m a bit skeptical. We will still need to pay for natural gas (the old fuel), we still need to pay for a bloombox (whenever it comes down to being affordable by people like me), and because of the VC investment, they’re sure to have all the patents locked down. It’s unlikely therefore that we can go buy a knock-off “Boombox”.

I think it’s interesting that they’re calling the box a “Power Server”. Great marketing.

Here’s a flash presentation from Bloom Energy’s site about how the fuel cell works:
http://bloomenergy.com/products/solid-oxide-fuel-cell-animation/

Good Review: blog.mapawatt.com/2010/02/21/bloom-box-an-unveiling-of-the-fuel-cell-future/

Another view: cleantechblog.com/2010/02/saving-cleantech-bloom-town-silicon.html

Filed under: Business, Energy, Sustainability, Technology

The Fuel of Life, ATP?

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 08:23:17 +0000

Perhaps research on how ATP, is broken down in cells might lead to a new energy source.

Researchers determine how ATP, molecule bearing ‘the fuel of life,’ is broken down in cells

March 1, 2010

Researchers at the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center have figured out how ATP is broken down in cells, providing for the first time a clear picture of the key reaction that allows cells in all living things to function and flourish.

http://www.physorg.com/news186584297.html

Filed under: Energy, Technology

Who owns your thermostat?

Chris Jefferies — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 14:34:37 +0000

Once the smart meters have replaced your old analog power meters the next step is access to the appliances in your house allowing your power provider to control when you use those appliances.

Interesting to think about….

Here’s an interesting post on Home Energy:
http://www.homeenergy.org/blog.php?id=30&blog_title=Who_controls_your_thermostat?

Filed under: Design, Energy, Sustainability, Technology

Home Energy Saver – Our Government at Work

Chris Jefferies — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 18:54:20 +0000

Developed for DOE by the Environmental Energy Technologies Division at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory this site is a preliminary test version of a new web-based energy efficiency calculator, designed for residential home energy auditors and inspectors.

http://hes.lbl.gov/ – Consumer version
http://hespro.lbl.gov/ – Professional version

Interestingly, Microsoft has licensed the technology for their energy calculator application known as HOHM.

Apparently they have a service based API. I’m going to research that and see what it looks like.

Filed under: Energy, Software, Technology, Web Data

Computerized Electricity Systems

Chris Jefferies — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 00:34:59 +0000

Computerized Electricity Systems has a software/hardware home energy solution that tracks energy usage in a residential setting. They offer a replacement electrical panel that allows for monitoring of energy usage within the various breakout lines of the house wiring. They also provide a software tool, a portal, for displaying the energy being used.

System prices range from $600-$3000 depending on the options.

C.E.S. System

Posted in Computer, Energy, Environment, Software, Sustainability, Technology

Tenrehte's PICOwatt

Chris Jefferies — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 15:20:54 +0000

Announced at CES 2010, this is a wifi enabled device that sits between a house appliance and the wall socket. It has a small linux based OS and web site so you can access each device via a web interface.

It can monitor the energy use as well as control the device so it does a lot. Sadly, it it said to cost about $80 each.

TOO Expensive. Seems like a low tech Kill-a-Watt ($20) and a spreadsheet would still be more efficient.

News | Tenrehte Technologies, Inc. | USA.

Filed under: Design, Energy, Sustainability, Technology

Energy Dashboards

Chris Jefferies — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 10:06:07 +0000

I’m interested in software development for home energy management systems. The most efficient software delivery platform would take the form of a Dashboard.

The “Dashboard” is a software version of what you see behind the steering wheel of your car. It has taken on the term to mean a software application, often in a web page, that has meters and dials to display, in a meaningful way, various things in the real world; like the weather, volatile stock prices, air quality, traffic, and all manner of things that warrant monitoring.

I’ve been looking at some providers of Home Energy Management Dashboards (and perhaps the energy generated). This is some of what I’ve found:

I first saw the design from Lucid Design Group at the David Brower Center building in Berkeley. It’s an amazing building and their dashboard software shows the status of the buildings various systems. You can see a live demo here: http://buildingdashboard.com/clients/brower/

Lucid Design Group has what they call a “Starter Kit” for commercial and residential use. The basic starter kit for commercial use comes with a single current monitor (requires an electrician to install the hardware) and costs $10,000. I think I read that the residential system goes for $7,500 but I couldn’t find that again.

Greenbox comes from some folks originally involved in the development of Flash technology, so I expect they would use Flash for their Dashboard. Their web site describes the various components of their consumer dashboard; brief overview of your energy usage, daily patterns that affect your electricity usage, categorize your electricity usage, calculates your carbon footprint based upon your energy usage profile, compare your usage anonymously with other homes like yours, etc. They don’t seem to have it finished yet so I don’t know how much it costs. I did sign up to be notified when they’re ready.

Agilewaves has a residential offering and it seems they have the ability to track devices and appliances within the home. They can track electric, gas and water use, temperature/humidity, output from solar PV, performance of solar or geo-thermal water heating, indoor air quality, and provide accurate consumption and carbon footprint information in real-time. They also have an OEM offering.

Again there is no pricing information but you can call them to discuss the istallation.

Tendril has an offering that sits between your utility company and your house, . Their system has a browser based Internet dashboard that enables you to monitor, manage and control the energy consumption and each of the smart devices in your home. However they only sell to the utilities so each page that describes their products has the following:

This product is not currently available in retail stores, please contact your utility to get smart energy in your home today.

Their hardware uses wireless zigbee technology and they have a device that plugs inline to an appliance which makes possible to monitor and possibly switch a specific device on/off. They have display devices that show system energy stats, they have a air conditioning thermostat control and devices to boost the wireless signals and to connect the signal to the internet.

On the site the monitoring functions are promoted to the utility companies as a way to track customer usage and to be able to influence customer usage based on demographics collected about energy use.

As far as I can tell they only have agreements with Reliant in Houston and Tucson Electric Power. You might want to call your utility company and see if they’re working with Tendril.

There are some hardware based monitoring devices that don’t have a web portal but instead show the stats in a small display. Examples of these are DIY Kyoto, Onzo, and The Energy Detective (TED). These are all in the range of about $100 – $200.

Overall the web based portal systems that reflect energy use, energy generation and other home statistics are generally too expensive. The systems that depend on the utility companies’ smart meter offerings have the problem of allowing too much knowledge of the internal, personal energy useage. Too much big brother for my taste.

What we need…

…is a series of inexpensive devices based on the zigbee wireless protocol which relay the energy usage to a modified router (or a simple PC) that then transmits that usage data to a secured web portal. The inline devices should be priced in the range of $10 each for simple data aquisition and $20 each for data and on/off control. These devices should be placed on all significant appliances, light switches, etc. Consumers could then monitor very specific usage within their private, secured web portal and changes made in the portal should be reflected in the devices.

This could thought of as a sort of a mashup between the Kill-A-Watt, Zigbee (think Tweet-A-Watt), X10 appliance modules and a web services portal. Also look at the framework by ioBridge.

For inspiration, check out this site in the Netherlands, bWired.nl.

Please let me hear from you if you know of any other dashboard monitoring systems for residential use.

Posted in Energy, Environment, Solar, Sustainability, Technology, Web Design

Internet Noise and Energy Scammers

Chris Jefferies — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 11:38:27 +0000

I search the Internet for organizations that are focused on energy management. Posts here on the blog reference interesting ideas and get posted on to my twitter account. Occasionally on my twitter account, I get followers purporting to have some information about free energy. Following these links has led to more than a handful of bogus sites, interconnected, that offer some kind of information (books, videos), for a fee, which will help you create your own cheap, or free energy.

These some of the sites I’ve found:

http://www.power4home.com
http://www.freepower4home.com
http://www.earth4energy.com (seems to be the central site, it’s all over the web)
http://www.gstriatum.com/solarenergy
http://www.clean-energy-reviews.com

Here are YouTube videos (which point to of their site,s Earth4Energy):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJUN1CTn1r8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYeynLy6pj8&feature=related

Look at the proliferation of bogus videos on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=earth4energy&search_type=&aq=f

Doing a Google search for one of the people referenced in the sites, Michael Harvey, reveals many sites about scams but these scammers have done their homework. In order to counter the negative sites, they’ve flooded the Internet with positive and/or neutral reviews. Unbelievably, they’ve even got a site that looks like it might be a site about their scams, http://www.earth4energyscam.org, which is actually one of their sites.

I did find a site by a guy named Peter Parsons who has done some comprehensive research on these folks:

http://www.nlcpr.com/Deceptions6.php

Interestingly he also sells a book about how to slash your energy costs so you should even be skeptical of him. His site seems legitimate and he has an interesting blog with meaningful information. This post speaks to the issues I am talking about: http://nlcpr.com/blog/?p=17

The Internet noise by these scammers is spread through what is known as affiliate marketing; not unlike Google AdSense. You’ll also see a lot of Google ads on these sites, so they’re making a bit on click-throughs. More sites means more click-throughs.

With all of the frustration over high energy costs, solar PV being so expensive for example, it is a crying shame that folks like this flood the Internet with scams claiming to provide the answers to cheap/free energy.

Bogus twitter accounts:

Move2Green, GreenEnergy2day, AlternativeERG, homesolarpower6, NaturalEnergyHQ, makecleanenergy, WilburKilroy

Updates, as I find more:

http://enjoydiysolar.com – has a legitimate looking blog, Move to Green Renewable Energy
They post articles on http://ezinearticles.com to give the article some legitimacy but it just points to: http://www.clean-energy-reviews.com/
http://www.diysolarpowersystem.com
http://unplugelectric.com/green-diy-energy-review
http://homemadesolarpower.co.cc/
http://electricityfromwindmills.com/
http://www.residentialsolarpowerblog.com/
http://www.gstriatum.com/solarenergy/
http://www.buildownsolarpanel.com/
http://www.homesolardiy.com – associated with NaturalEnergyHQ twitter account
http://normsgreenenergy.com – following me on twitter, 1.23.2010
http://www.solarenergyeblog.com – random find, 2.3.2010
http://buildyourenergy.blogspot.com – associated with makecleanenergy twitter account, following me on twitter, 2.3.2010
http://RenewableEnergyInsider.com – associated with WilburKilroy twitter account, following me on twitter, 2.3.2010
http://www.ultimatesalessolution.com - perhaps the source of many of these sites – a pitch for an automatic business builder for marketing whatever. This from a twitter account, livinggreen50 – Ramona Goeke (which I blocked and flagged as spam), showing the face of a respectable looking woman who had 4397 followers and was following 4583 twitter accounts. The Bio: Promoting a longer life by being green and using green products. Save our earth for our grandchildren. Home business opportunities. 4.3.2010
http://www.ambigrid.com/ – Finally, you can live *almost* completely self-sufficiently, from renewable energy sources. 07.21.2010

Posted in Energy, Environment, Skepticism, Solar, Sustainability, Technology

Smart phone powered by offset weight

Chris Jefferies — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 21:38:30 +0000

Ulysse Nardin Chairman hybrid smart phone

Remember the old mechanical watches that used to wind up by wrist motion? They utilized an offset weight that spun around inside the watch and slowly but surely kept the watch wound up. Well here’s a cell hone that does the same thing. I’m sure it’s expensive.

What other items could we power this way?

Ref: http://www.uncells.com

Found here: http://blog.longnow.org/2009/09/03/mechanical-cell-phone/

Posted in Design, Energy, Sustainability, Technology

SolarChill – a solar PV refrigerator without battery

Chris Jefferies — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 18:53:04 +0000

Solar Chill

This is a refrigeration unit made primarily for storing vaccines in 3rd world countries where it is difficult to find refrigeration units to keep the vaccines chilled.

SolarChill still costs about $1500 but it is expected that the price will drop as the technology advances.

It works by generating ice in the daytime while solar is available and then using the ice for cooling at night. This means you don’t need a battery to store energy.

It can also run off of other energy sources such as wind or from energy off of the grid.

Can’t wait until we can all have these.

The patent has been made public. Here is a document describing how it works.

http://www.solarchill.org

Posted in Appropriate technology, Energy, Environment, Solar, Sustainability, Technology

Miss it when it's gone – Network Activity Animation

Chris Jefferies — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 19:08:11 +0000

Installed Win7 and noticed the icon in the taskbar that looks like 2 little monitors is gone. Well, not gone, but not animated.

I got used to that little icon and in Vista, it even indicated (with a little earth globe) that there was a connection to the internet.

Every time a page hiccup occurs I always look down there to see if I am actually connected to the internet. If I don’t see the little globe, I start tracking down the problem; wireless to switch to dsl modem, etc.

“You’re gonna miss me when I’m gone…”

Posted in Microsoft, OS, Technology, Windows

Internet Refrigerator

Chris Jefferies — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 09:35:15 +0000

Saw some notes on Marc Cantor’s blog about the internet fridge. The best concept seems to be a fridge from GE that adjusts its settings and reduces power consumption based on pricing signals from the electricity company. However, this depends on smart meter technology, yet to be deployed in most areas (supposed to be deployed in the Bay Area within the next year or so).

The usability features revolve around the idea of the fridge tracking it’s contents via RFID tags and experimental models, which include a computer and RFID sensors, seem to miss the mark, not to mention, drive up the cost of the fridge.

Why would the fridge need an embedded computer? Couldn’t it just be another device hanging off of the home network along with energy sensors, water meters, security cameras, etc.

Posted in Energy, Technology

GreenVolts – Concentrating Photovoltaic

Chris Jefferies — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 14:16:04 +0000

GreenVolts is a company that specializes in concentrating photovoltaic (CPV) systems. They deliver the solution as a 3 kW, two-axis tracker called a CarouSol. Basically it is a module about 20 feet wide that stands about 3 feet high and supports a number of mirrors (the light concentrators) which focus the sunlight onto specialized PV cells.

They focus on utility scale power generation.

Posted in Energy, linkedin, Solar, Technology

Alt Energy – Silver Spring Networks

Chris Jefferies — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 22:48:27 +0000

Silver Spring Networks is a venture-backed company headquartered in Redwood City. They talk up Internet Protocol (IP) connected devices as the main approach to communicating between the software and the monitoring devices.

Their technology seems to be oriented towards Oracle, PHP, Perl, VC++, Java / JBoss, SOAP / Web Services, ASP, IIS, SSL, XML.

Here’s an overview of their infrastructure:

Posted in Energy, linkedin, Technology

Bay Area Companies – Alt Energy Management

Chris Jefferies — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 21:24:04 +0000

I’m looking at companies in the Bay Area that are involved in alternative energy products. My initial search indicates that most companies are involved in commercial buildings and larger projects. Some are installers, most are sales organization.

My interest is to find a local (East Bay) organization that develops software for residential energy monitoring and management. Hopefully I can find some meaningful work.

Posted in Energy, linkedin, Solar, Sustainability, Technology

Dafur Stove

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 26 May 2008 15:12:55 +0000

I love this kind of appropriate technology. It is a wood burning stove that uses aout 1/4 of the wood that the usual “3 stone” fires traditionally use.

They cost about $20 in order to insure they have “value” over scrap metal.

You can read about it here:

http://www.darfurstoves.org/

Artificial Photosynthesis

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 20:03:01 +0000

New solar cell cuts out the middle man, harvests hydrogen from water…

Found through Slashdot.com

This is a post from Live Writer

Chris Jefferies — Sun, 27 Jan 2008 10:23:26 +0000

This is a test of using Live Writer to add a post to a web service…

My Home Theater PC – HTPC

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 20 Jun 2005 02:13:00 +0000

Over the weekend, I put together a Home Theater PC (aka HTPC). Basically it is a PC that emulates a TiVo device where you can record your TV programs into a computer hard drive. Only More!

Mike Green sent a computer that he had retired (PIII-700Mhz, 70G HD, DVD Player) and I added a TV tuner card and video card with video output (to view on a TV) and made the conversion.

The main function is a Personal Video Recorder (PVR). Like a TiVo device, it can record TV programs, schedule recordings, or record all episodes of a TV series. There is a service called Zap2It Labs that offers a free download of the programs offered by our local Comcast cable service. See below for an image of the program guide. It also refreshes a 14 day listing every morning at 3am.

Additionally it can manage audio and video archives, allows you to set up and listen to Internet radio programs, and to play and rip DVDs. There are a number of plugins (more…) available which I will eventually figure out how to implement.

I started out by trying Media Center on the Windows Media Center Edition, but, try as I might to load driver after driver, it simply does not support the remote control that came with the PVR card I had (Hauppauge PVR-150). So I switched over to a free application called GBPVR. It works quite well and the images you see on in the PVR Gallery are from that application.

I have estimated that I will be able to keep about 6000 songs (our entire CD collection) and about 30 hours of video on the current hard disk, but I can expand that later. I’ll also want to get a DVD burner to archive special videos.

So far so good…

Got my GUID workin’

Chris Jefferies — Thu, 12 May 2005 16:56:00 +0000

Here’s my GUID. I have decided that this number will be MY GUID from here on.

In case you don’t know, a GUID is a Global Unique ID. We use it for unique identification in progamming data applications. Whenever you need a unique ID there is a function that you can call that genertates this random number, that supposedly won’t come up again for 700 years. It isn’t perfect, but it is pretty unique.

Google definitions for GUID - WikiPedia definition of GUID

In the future, I suspect we’ll all have some kind of unique ID and I figure I’ll get mine early.

{C7FA509D-40CF-4da3-9FA2-4CBC6B93394E}

Read it and weep!

All Data is Dead

Chris Jefferies — Thu, 05 May 2005 17:50:00 +0000

I was having a conversation with my co-workers yesterday and we were discussing the idea that data, once collected into a database is, by the fact of having been moved from it’s source, suspect and potentially out of date. That’s When Chris Buscovich said,

“All data is dead.”

New computer systems

Chris Jefferies — Sat, 23 Apr 2005 15:20:00 +0000

So I’ve been very bad about blogging lately. I apologize for that and I promise I’ll do better.

The main thing I’ve been dealing with lately is learning some new computer technologies; well, new to me. I have been primarily a Microsoft Windows person as a software designer of business applications developed with Microsoft technologies (Visual FoxPro database applications and lately ASP.NET/C# web applications) that run on Microsoft operating systems.

This new study is in the area of an alternative operating system known as Linux. Linux comes in many flavors but I am using one called Fedora; and the version is known as Fedora Core 3.

I have 2 older computers thast I have installed with Linux, one is a minimal installation of Linux and is operating as a firewall and the other has the full graphical user interface (GUI) that looks and feels much like the Microsoft Windows operating system.

The results of this can be seen on the new web server I installed on the Fedora based computer at: http://www.sparticles.net. It explains a little about the setup I’m working with.

What’s interesting, I think, is that this setup is running on older computers, PII and earlier, that were headed for the garage (or worse) and they are running on totally free software. I’ve installed a blog, a wiki, and a database to store all the content and all are open source.

There’s no magic about this stuff, it has a pretty large large learning curve and the development environments don’t seem to be as sophisticated as those available on Windows. But it has come a long way and deserves some of my attention to keep up with this new appraoch to software development known as ‘Open Source’.

Who’s Looking Down On You?

Chris Jefferies — Sat, 19 Feb 2005 15:55:00 +0000

My friend, Ray Lear, sent me an image of Berkeley from space and I recalled that there is a web server called www.terraserver-usa.com. Click on the image to see an image I downloaded from the web of our house on Stanford Avenue in Kensington just North of Berkeley. You can zoom out and see the surrounding area on this page.

Here are some other locations you might want to visit. See if you can guess where they are.

Location	Longitude (E/W)	Latitude (N/S)
Bellaire	-95.46322	29.71955
California	-122.88421	38.47927
Brenham	-96.46366	30.14890
An Observatory	-110.77179	45.27747
Sixmile Creek	-110.74392	45.23781
Big Mesquite	-102.83257	29.40853
New Jersey	-74.30104	40.70246
Houston	-95.53934	29.78756
La Posada Hotel (more…)	-110.69637	35.02268
Soldier Meadow Hot Springs	-119.22488	41.36079
Black Rock Mystery	-119.19528	40.76147
Lake Catherine & Banner Peak (m ore…)	-119.19128	37.69640

I want my MTV… and my remote… and my iPod… and my TiVo

Chris Jefferies — Wed, 16 Feb 2005 02:14:00 +0000

Christine Rosen talks about what she calls Egocasting. It’s a play on the concept of selective consumption of various media like what an iPod, or TiVo might provide. I’m clearly on the egocasting track and I like it, but she makes some good points against this attitude.

Excerpt:

“What is true of the television set is also true of its most important accessory, the device that forever altered our viewing habits, transformed television programming itself, and, more broadly, redefined our expectations of mastery over our everyday technologies: the remote control. The creation and near-universal adoption of the remote control arguably marks the beginning of the era of the personalization of technology. The remote control shifted power to the individual, and the technologies that have embraced this principle in its wake—the Walkman, the Video Cassette Recorder, Digital Video Recorders such as TiVo, and portable music devices like the iPod—have created a world where the individual’s control over the content, style, and timing of what he consumes is nearly absolute. Retailers and purveyors of entertainment increasingly know our buying history and the vagaries of our unique tastes. As consumers, we expect our television, our music, our movies, and our books “on demand.” We have created and embraced technologies that enable us to make a fetish of our preferences.”

http://www.thenewatlantis.com/archive/7/rosen.htm

Robot Kit – Robovie-M

Chris Jefferies — Fri, 06 Aug 2004 02:08:00 +0000

Here is a link to a page where you can get a robot kit named Robovie-M. It costs $4,500.

Check out these moves (MPEG files):
Getting up from facing down
turn over and get up
Waiving hands
Doing a handstand

Read about it here: http://www.vstone.co.jp/e/rt01e.htm

Blogon 2004 – the conference

Chris Jefferies — Wed, 28 Jul 2004 00:55:00 +0000

On Friday, I attended the BlogOn 2004 conference that was held at the Haas Business School on the UC Berkeley campus.

The morning started with a session titled “Defining Social Media“ which was moderated by Ross Mayfield of SocialText. The panel had some insights that I found interesting. One idea was whether social software is a product, or a feature of other products. In the HR space, it seems that blogs and wikis could be an addition to the portal which enhances corporate communications.

Another idea was that the load of media from digital cameras will fuel a need for blogs as people look to fulfill a need to express themselves with their new media.

Reid Hoffman (CEO of LinkedIn):

“Any large company, if they’re not searching the blogs for what people are saying about their products and organizations, are fools. If you don’t have some kind of blogging strategy — much less response — you need to think about that.“
“Brand value and trust will evolve completely. Individuals will become brands.“

The second session was titled the “The Dark Side of Social Media“. Danah Boyd was the moderator and was philosophical about this subject by thinking of the “Dark Side“ as being like the Dark Side of the Moon or “that which light has not yet been shed upon“. We should be vigilant and watch for the abuses possible in blogs and wikis. Another concept of the dark side was the fear of corporations who may feel that they are losing control of their corporate message. Here are some tidbits about how corporations should deal with social media:

watch and learn – fear shows deeper corporate problems – lack of transparency and flexibility
evolve what you’re doing – Tickle vs LinkedIn – different users, different functions
copyright is dead, long live copyright – copyright to protect creators and encourage distribution
fan fiction – variations on Harry Potter stories by youngsters
corporations start with a deficit of credibility – social media helps build credibility

The final morning session was titled “Business Transparency“. It included a demo of the Microsoft Channel9 site by Jeff Sands and Robert Scoble. It is a forum that includes blogs and wikis and is a mechanism for Microsoft to provide corporate transparency to it’s clients. Channel 9 is the channel used on airplanes for passengers to hear what the pilots are up to; hence the site name. Another form of transparency for the passengers. The second half of the session was about SixApart’s customer relations nightmare that was eventually resolved by the use of blogs (which they market as Movable Type).

The afternoon sessions were about the business of social media and included the tried and true models of user subscriptions vs advertising. There was some discussion about the technologies of RSS news feeds and filtered content, but these discussions seemed to drift into standards issues.

The final closing session was titled “Who’s Investing in Social Media?”. It was a panel of investors who talked about what they find interesting in the social media business. While most of them seemed to say that the social media firms were already in place, there was a ray of hope in an idea that would bring focused information from my friends on a local basis. Some examples were allconsuming.net and weatherbug.com. They also said there was too much money chasing too few companies.

Jumano CAM

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 19 Jul 2004 02:38:00 +0000

The ongoing view out of the living room window. Click on the image for a slightly larger view that refreshes every minute or so.

Update: July 19th, 2004 10am – I futzed w/ the CAM this moring and it stuck on the 8:19am image… DOH!

Update: July 19th, 2004 11pm – re-futzed and fixed!

Laptop is fixed

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 19 Apr 2004 15:29:00 +0000

I’m too sexy for my hat – what do you think about that

Follow-up from prior post about broken computer: The new hinge parts (part # 5D904 hinge kit) arrived today from Dell (ordered on Friday), and so for a total of $17.36 I’m back in business…

A9 Search

Chris Jefferies — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 14:00:00 +0000

http://a9.com

Looks like a combination of Amazon.com and Google search engine. It has a neat interface with collapsible columns on the right and a site info popup (probably based on javascript).

My computer broke…

Chris Jefferies — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 02:02:00 +0000

This morning I went to close the top of my Laptop and the left hinge got stuck and broke. ARGHHHH!

I think I can get another and fix it, but I’m freaking out…

This poor old (in computer years) Inspiron 7500 (P4-700Mhz w/ 512Mb RAM and a 20 mb HD) has served me very well for almost 4 years now and is starting to show it’s age.

Concrete casts new light in dull rooms

Chris Jefferies — Fri, 26 Mar 2004 12:04:00 +0000

Light transmitting concrete is set to go on sale later this year.

The days of dull, grey concrete could be about to end. A Hungarian architect has combined the world’s most popular building material with optical fiber from Schott to create a new type of concrete that transmits light. Read more…

Appropriate Technology: Fridge w/o electricity

Chris Jefferies — Mon, 22 Mar 2004 13:55:00 +0000

I love stories of successful implementation of “appropriate technology“. Here’s a refrigeration device that uses no electricity being set up in northern Nigeria. It is built by placing a clay pot inside a slightly larger pot and filling the gap with sand. By wetting the sand, the evaporative properties create a significant cooling effect (much like the old water bags on the front of jeeps kept water cool). Food that used to last only days, now lasts weeks.

A side issue is that young girls that used to be saddled with the daily duties of retrieving fresh produce for the family, now are increasingly able to attend school.

read about it…