Jay from thecapacity sent us project details about making his computer aware of him sitting in front of the computer or not by using a temperature sensor and an ioBridge module. He wanted the computer to turn off the screen saver and adjust the volume of his music depending on his presence. Jay sent us a few questions along the way and this caused us to accelerate the release of the Data Feed API. His proof of concept is a beating heart that speeds up when the temperature increases.
Jay took our technology in a new and interesting direction. He successfully bridged his computer to his workspace with ioBridge and his clever desktop and web applications.
For more project details, check out Jay’s posts on his “thecapacity” blog.
We are pleased to announce the ioBridge Data Feed API. Our developers have been putting together the API and documentation to allow you to extend ioBridge technology into your own desktop and web applications. Some of our users have been testing the API and have already created client-side applications with jQuery. For more information, documentation, and sample applications visit www.iobridge.com/technology. We are excited to see what you come up with. Let us know and we will feature the applications and projects right here on our blog.
Here are some quick links to documentation and sample applications to get you started:
We have just released some more iPhone and iPod Touch enhancements for ioBridge’s interface to your IO-204 Monitor and Control Modules. (I wanted to say ioPhone!) Give thanks to the community for making these requests.
Persistent Log In
Even when you navigate away from Safari, you will stay signed in, so your ioBridge Dashboard will be easily accessible. Clear your cookies and sign in again to try out the new feature.
Add to Home Screen
Add ioBridge to your home screen, so you can always have quick access to your dashboard. When you sign in, click “+” at the bottom of the iPhone/iPod Touch and touch, “Add to Home Screen”. Name it what you want and touch “Add”. We also created an iPhone friendly icon for your home screen.
Dashboard
The ioBridge Dashboard is now quite larger and fills the screen when landscape oriented (without having to zoom in and out).
Let us know how this works out for everyone. We have tested and these enhancements make the dashboard very useful.
Posted in Source Code by iobridge
December 20, 2008
The iPod Touch and iPhone have an accelerometer that adjusts the screen orientation (among other things). You can tap into the orientation and execute widgets depending on the orientation of the device by using a simple HTML file with some Javascript. Put an HTML file on a web server that you can get to on your iPod Touch or iPhone.
Part of the Apple Web Kit is the command “onorientationchange”. We will use that to detect the orientation change and call a script called “updateOrientation()”.
Add the following command to the BODY tag:
1
onorientationchange="updateOrientation();"
Place the following function in the HEAD of the document and call certain widgets at the specific orientation angles of 0°, -90°, and 90°. You can call any type of widget adjusting the position of a servo, controlling a digital output, or setting the state of an X10 widget.
Posted on his “I am ShadowLord” blog, a hacker sent in his toaster that twitters when he makes toast . Hans has a setup that use uses the ioBridge IO-204 module and an event created on iobridge.com (which handles the Twitter part). You can follow Hans’ toaster at twitter.com/mytoaster. The circuit is really simple which you can check it out on Instructables.
Social Networking for Your Toaster
Wired, Hack A Day, Make Magazine, and several other new sources have picked up the Twitter Toaster story. Congrats, Hans!
One of our users sent us his “iPhone Aquarium Application”. Pete from WaveJam sent us a YouTube video of his home aquarium which he cannot only watch, he can control his fishcam from his iPhone. He can log in and move his camera, monitor the water temperature, turn on the tank light, control accent lighting of the tank, and open and close a spooky sunken treasure chest (what a cool idea!). “Look out below” and you catch his video of the behind the scenes interactive fishcam project.
Stephen from the iPhone Dog Feeder fame, sent us a video of how to use the x10 controller with the ioBridge module to control lights. He has a lamp setup in his lab that he can control from his Cygnet blog and his ioBridge dashboard.
Here is the YouTube video of the x10 smart board in action:
Andi from Gizmodo wrote a great article about Stephen Myer’s remote dog feeder using the ioBridge hardware and software. Gizmodo is another great source for tech, homebrew gadgets, and all things geek.
Another one of our favorite sites picked up Stephen Myers’ iPhone Dog Treat Dispenser where he can not only keep eye on the dog, but also give the dog a treat while Stephen is away.
