>> IoT IN ACTION - REMOTE MONITORING MY BUILDING PROJECT

Not happy with the progress of a project and want to keep an eye on things remotely?

I am the type of guy that likes to know how things are progressing on a regular basis and after making the 24+ hour journey from Sweden to Australia to check on the status of my house only to find out that the project was a little more than two months delayed - it was time to put my IoT and programming skills to use. I decided to setup a remote monitoring system.

The shopping list (as pictured above) - should be all I need to make this project:

• sensor point
  • Arduino Yún
  • Logitec C270 USB web camera (720p)
  • Ultra 8Gb micro-SD card

• wireless hot spot
  • BlackBerry Z10
  • pre-paid mobile data micro-SIM

• power supply/charging
  • Waeco 36A 12V battery
  • USB car adapter dual 5V 2.1A
  • Solar Panel (15W, 1A)
  • 5m of twisted coper wire
  • connector 2-pin

I found a cool project on the learn.adafruit.com where a user posted a how-to for building a security solution using an Arduino Yún, a USB web camera and a PIR motion detector - the perfect find for a base point of what I would need to make this project work.

I identified a local distributor of Arduino devices in Perth, Western Australia - specifically Altronics and after dropping by a store I found out they only just got the Arduino Yún in stock to compliment their limited supply in addition to having all the little bits and pieces I needed.

The two main obstacles is the lack of a power source and the lack of an Internet connection to send the sensory information gathered to a web server where I can monitor the progress. The cost of all the equipment is approx $1000 USD; luckily I already had most of the components.

Supplying power is easy - I had a 12V battery lying around and the only thing I needed to obtain was a decent sized solar panel to keep it topped up and a car-adapter to USB plug to power the two devices I will be using; I also needed to get some extra wire and adapters.

For an Internet connection I could have asked the neighbours to see if I could piggy back on their connections but I want to do this in stealth mode so I figured I could use a spare BlackBerry Z10 I had lying around and configure it as a mobile hot spot to connect through.

I will post a follow up blog entry that goes into detail of how I put it all together, outline the specific scripts written and even expose a live website so anyone can check on the progress of my house - I may even connect some sensors to monitor other factors if there is interest.