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Fitbit… getting closer!

Post author By Pete Prodoehl
Post date 2011-02-24

Fitbit API

I originally thought the Fitbit looked awesome, but in digging into things, I found a few issues I didn’t like. (See Fitbit Improvements.) While it looks like they’ll never go the route of sending your own data to your own computer without first sending your data to the cloud, their official API is out (in beta) and should at least offer an improvement over the “unofficial” APIs people had been working on.

Over at dev.fitbit.com you can read up on the details, and get some example code (none in Perl yet though!) It’s good for the Fitbit ecosystem, as more applications may come out that make use of the data. If anything, I’d like to see something like what I created for Last.fm in Heard, an application that syncs your data back to your own server from the cloud.

I also noticed that Fitbit got a mention on the Arduino blog, which amuses me for a few reasons. First, if the Fitbit had been more open I probably would have looked more seriously into getting one last year. (Open source hardware would have been awesome, but I can live with closed, though it is interesting that they use the open source Arduino for rapid prototyping.) Second, I actually got into working with the Arduino partly to try to do some of the sleep monitoring functions that the Fitbit does. (Yes, that’s another project I got sidetracked on.)

Depending on how our research funds shake out this year, the Fitbit may still be on our list. As I’ve said before, I’m the type of person who needs to collect data, and analyze it, and chart it out, in order to find more value in it. Meanwhile, I’ll be in the lab working on my Arduino-based sleep monitor…

Tags api, arduino, data, fitbit

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Tracking Cat Food Consumption

Post author By Pete Prodoehl
Post date 2011-02-23

This was 100% my wife’s idea. You see, we have two cats, and because her cat seemed to be losing weight (and because my cat eats like a pig) we were concerned that her cat was not getting any of the food we left out all day long. So when I was told to “Get your time lapse thingy!” I sprung into action and set it up to capture a day’s worth of footage of the cats eating food.

We learned that my cat certainly eats a lot (but doesn’t eat all the food) and my wife’s cat is getting a chance to eat throughout the day, so I’ll call this experiment successful.

Tags cats, food, timelapse, timelapsebot, tlbot, video

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Do Your Job

Post author By Pete Prodoehl
Post date 2011-02-22

We’ve been hearing a lot of people say to other people, “Do your job!”

But what is your job?

Is your job to manufacture widgets, or to sell things, or to serve food, or remove trash, teach others, create laws, clean windows, manage computers?

Or is your job, first and foremost, to be a human being, to help others, to fight injustice, to protect those who can’t fend for themselves?

Sometimes events occur which are of a higher calling than manufacturing widgets or selling things…

When the 9/11 terrorist attacks happened, and people left their work to help others, to aid in rescuing their fellow man, to try to survive, was anyone there yelling at them to get back to work and do their job?

When a school shooting occurs, and lives are in danger, are teachers expected to keep teaching, and act as if nothing is happening?

When a natural disaster strikes (or even, you know, a really bad snowstorm) I find some comfort in knowing people will take time to help out others.

When the shit goes down, I expect my fellow humans to be there for me, just as I would be there for them.

That “every man for himself” crap? That’s not what’s made great things happen. Working together is what makes accomplishing amazing things possible.

Tags help, human, job, work

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Circuit-Bending with the Easy Button

Post author By Pete Prodoehl
Post date 2011-02-21

I’ve had an easy button lying around the house for a few years now, and remembered reading about how “easy” it was to do a little circuit-bending with it, so I finally got around to doing that…

I did a quick search for some details and found this Easy! blog post, read the bit about a 1Meg pot and figured I’d give it a try. I didn’t have a 1Meg pot on hand (I’m sure the Milwaukee Makerspace probably has a boatload of potentiometers and other parts I could have used, but I built this thing at home) so I ended up going to Radio Shack, and while they don’t have breadboards or much other stuff, they do have a few electronic components on hand.

Once you open the Easy Button (screws are under the rubber feet) you can see the main resistor, right under the rubber switch. (It’s in the center in the photo below.)

Take that resistor out and then solder in the wires for the potentiometer. That should be about it for the electrical part of it… (I know, you also see a push-button switch in the top photo, I’ll get to that in a minute.)

Since I tend to just start on these things without any real thought as to how they will be finished—I fly by the seat of my pants a lot—it’s always a learning experience. I had a plan to mount the pot onto the big red button, so I Dremeled the heck out of one of the legs on the bottom side of the button to make it fit, and I then realized it just wouldn’t fit, so I thought I could mount it on the inside plastic housing with a hot glue gun, this worked well, but I took out the piece of metal to do this, and, well the metal piece is what makes the button pop back up, so when I reassembled it, the button didn’t work, as it got stuck. Oh, I also built it wrong, with the button turned 180 degrees, so things didn’t line up, so I Dremeled some more, and that contributed to making the button more useless, even though I tried to put half of the metal shield thing back in. (Hacksawing that thing was a nightmare!)

I had started to document the whole thing with photos, but when it was apparent I did so many things wrong, I abandoned the plan… that said, I’m pretty confident that if I did it again, I’d get it all right the second time. Despite all that, I came up with the idea of putting in the push-button switch, which worked great, as it is much easier to push, and you can use it while twiddling the knob. From the outside you really can’t tell that things didn’t work out the way I planned, so I’ll call that a win.

Here’s a video (Vimeo) of the Easy Button in action… It’s a challenge to get the knob in just the right position, so it’s become a game at our house to see who can get the best sound (or longest bend) out of it.

If you’re totally new to circuit-bending, the Easy Button is a simple project to start with… if you are totally clueless, swing on down to the Milwaukee Makerspace for one of their Electronics and Programming Nights when non-members are welcome, and I’m sure someone there can help you get started.