Ed's World

Arduinos are a low-cost microcontroller that can be easily programmed by your computer and a serial lead – no need for expensive programmers.

This page is a list of hardware that I have, what I can do, what I’m planning to do and sample code.

Hardware-wise, I have:

• Freeduino (cheaper Arduino clone) – £17
• Nuelectronics ethernet shield (1/3 of the price of an original one, but harder to use) – £12.50
• Breadboard (from ebay) – £4
• AM Receiver (to listen to Home Easy Remote, and in the future, communicate between arduinos with no ethernet) – £3
• AM Transmitter (to control Home Easy devices, and above) – £4
• 2x BlinkM (very easy colour changing LED – give it a colour and it’ll fade to it, snap to it, randomly change etc.) – £9 each
• Reflectivity sensor (IR emitter and receiver, given to me so no link) – £0
• Thermometer – £2.50
• Home Easy Remote and thee 240V plugs – £19
• Home Easy PIR Motion Detector – £19
• B&Q LED Disco Lights (ripped apart to use the balls as diffusers for ambient lights) – £15
• Official ethernet shield – £33.50 (should have bought a £19.99 one from ebay)
• Arduino components – £7
• 2x ABS box – £1.99 each
• 2.1mm power plug -£0.29

So, currently I have/can do:

• Ambient light (power consumption, and flashes the number of unread emails I have)
• Home easy control (turns on/off various plugs)
• Turn central heating on/off depending on time, temperature and motion and a combination (i.e. I want the house at 18 degrees at 7PM, it’s now 16 degrees, and takes 45mins to warm up to 18, so turn on at 6.15PM)

Controlled by:

• Web interface
• Home Easy remote
• Java program using MQTT to receive data from sensors and home easy devices, MySQL database to store what I want to happen when events are triggered etc.

Shopping List:

• More AM tranmistters/receivers
• More Arduinos!