Category Archives: arduino

Decoding the Oregon Scientific Remote Weather Temperature Sensor

A while ago, I bought a set of Oregon Scientific weather station on special. The package came with the clock and temperature display unit (BAR283) and a remote temperature sensor (RTHR328N), which is normally put outside of the house. The remote sensor then regularly sends temperature and humidity wirelessly to the display indoors. It has been a dream of mine to tap into the temperature data sent over the air and log it in database. Fortunately, there are a few tutorials online (jeelabs instructables) online and blog posts of people who have done the exact thing successfully.

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BLEduino for Arduino 1.6

For the past year or so, my BLEduino laid dormant in the cupboard. Yesterday, I decided to break it out for a new project. While I used Arduino 1.0.x for the BLEduino previously, I now have Arduino 1.6. Unfortunately, I discovered that BLEduino isn’t compatible with it – The hardware core files were for 1.0.x only. I tried to use 1.0.6 on my Mac OS X 10.11, but every time I tried uploading a sketch, the following error occurs:


processing.app.SerialException: Error touching serial port '/dev/tty.usbmodem1421'.
at processing.app.Serial.touchPort(Serial.java:123)
at processing.app.debug.AvrdudeUploader.uploadViaBootloader(AvrdudeUploader.java:203)
at processing.app.debug.AvrdudeUploader.uploadUsingPreferences(AvrdudeUploader.java:67)
at processing.app.Sketch.upload(Sketch.java:1666)
at processing.app.Sketch.exportApplet(Sketch.java:1622)
at processing.app.Sketch.exportApplet(Sketch.java:1594)
at processing.app.Editor$DefaultExportHandler.run(Editor.java:2382)
at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:695)
Caused by: gnu.io.UnsupportedCommOperationException: Invalid Parameter
at gnu.io.RXTXPort.setSerialPortParams(RXTXPort.java:171)
at processing.app.Serial.touchPort(Serial.java:113)
... 7 more

A search on the internet seems to indicated that this was a bug in the Arduino IDE, fixed in 1.5 later versions. I decided the only way to resolve this issue is if I port the hardware core files from 1.0 to 1.6. Luckily enough, Arduino wiki provides a handy migration guide. Within half an hour, I got BLEduino working on Arduino 1.6. I’ve posted my changes on GitHub, for anybody interested: BLEduino Arduino 1.6 hardware files. Hopefully, someone finds this useful.

Building an Android phone connected Door Bell with Light Blue Bean’s iBeacon

The Light Blue Bean built by Punch Through Design is a versatile Arduino device with Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) built in. The Bean’s default 3v battery could typically last a month when running a minimal sketch. A door bell button is possibly the simplest arduino device you could possibly build. A press of the button would notify an android device through BLE that someone is at the door. This post will provide an idea on how this could be built using minimal power (on the Bean) and minimal code.

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DHT22 Temperature Sensor with Bleduino

ble

About a year ago I pledged $39 for the Bleduino kickstarter and despite it arriving on my mailbox a few months ago, only today did I have time to start playing around with it. I also got a DHT22 temperature sensor, which I will use with the device. A quick disclaimer, I’m a beginner in Arduino and electronics and would describe my soldering skills as non-existent. Hence you will find no soldering in this post.

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