Category: Tech News
Bluetooth Circuit Playground What!
So anyone who has worked with me knows that I am a huge fan of Adafruit’s Circuit Playground development boards. It has been a huge help in getting people started with programming hardware because you can do so much with it before you even start plugging in other things.
I was so excited when they came out with the CP Express because now I could use Blockly to help even younger hardware developers on their way to making cool things. However, the MicroBit did offer a few more tantalizing options that made me choose it over the CP Express. Now it is hard to compare the two platforms because they both have a lot of value in different ways, but the one thing that stood out about MicroBit was Bluetooth Low Energy. The CP Express has IR communication and that is nice, but it is only line of site and that makes it hard to do projects that would involve networking. So the MicroBit typically would win out with projects that needed wireless communication.
Now with the introduction of CP Bluefruit this issue is solved an so many ways. I could see this coming based on some posts and a demo a few weeks ago on Ask an Engineer, but I was not sure if there would be a price increase with the new BLE support. Well it looks like not only is there no change in price, but the jump from and M0 to M4 Cortex processor makes this thing even more powerful as well.
I am supper excited about the idea of doing IOT workshops where the students get to program the devices that get networked. Basically this makes every CP Bluefruit into a smart light with a host of sensors on them. This could help students design and code puzzles for an escape room project… so many cool things that this can do now that is has BLE.
For now this is an Alpha version of the CP Bluefruit and that means that some hardware may change, but it is working for Arduino IDE and Circuit Python. Hopefully they will have a Blockly option soon as well. Not really time to start getting these for schools yet, but worth testing out as an early adopter and to keep an eye on for the near future.
More Info:
One Step Closer to Plug and Play ESP devices
For those of you that know me, I am kinda big on the ESP8266 WiFi enabled chip for IOT. I do use the Arduino IDE for coding these chips and have integrated aspects of automatic setup much like consumer IOT products use. The one thing that has been tricky is in setting up things like MQTT feeds and even the MQTT credentials on setup. Continue reading One Step Closer to Plug and Play ESP devices
Holy @#$% it’s the White House!
I got an email from the Senior Adviser of Making at the White House. Now it was mentioned to me, by friends at Adafruit, that they would be putting my name in with a list of Makers for the White House to connect with. Still it just hit me as I responded to the email that I am responding to an email from a senior staff member at the frig’n White House!
I have never been in this kind of position before. People normally think I am a crazy man when I go on about how important the Maker movement is to our future. We are the world’s new R&D community and the best of us share information and collaborate with everyone else.
Makers are kicking ass all over the world and I am just glad to be a part of it.