3D printing, Accessories, GPIO boards, Internet of things, Making, Programming, Software

Does whatever a spider can… Spiderman Twitter monitor using a Raspberry Pi

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Maker and Educator Spencer Organ has recently re-launched his website and can now be found at www.themakercupboard.space. As part of the re-launch, he’s blogged about his latest project – a Spiderman-themed lamp which changes colour when he is mentioned in a Tweet. He’s used the Pimoroni Blinkt for illumination (also available here) and the Twython Python library to communicate with Twitter. Everything’s connected to a Raspberry Pi Zero W for connectivity. A very nice project that shows what you can do with a little bit of programming and some know-how. Take a look at the code and build details here.

Accessories, GPIO boards, Home automation, Raspberry Pi Zero, Security, Sensors

Touchscreen home alarm control panel for Home Assistant and the Raspberry Pi

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Colin O’Dell has taken a Raspberry Pi Zero W, an Adafruit 3.5″ touchscreen, a PIR motion sensor and a 3D-printed enclosure and created a home alarm control panel. The system uses Z-Wave door sensors which send MQTT messages to the Pi via the Home Assistant open-source home automation platform. The PIR sensor is used to only activate the screen when someone is near – thus further reducing the power requirements. It’s an ingenious system and you can read more about it here and see a video below.

Audio, GPIO boards, Making, Music

The revenge of Darth Vader, MP3 player with a Raspberry Pi Zero W

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Dan Aldred took a LEGO mini figure alarm clock in the shape of everyone’s favourite Sith Lord and turned it into an MP3 player. Using a Raspberry Pi Zero W, Pimoroni Speaker pHAT and some buttons, together with some Python code based on PyGame, he went to a great deal of trouble to fit it into the mini figure, cutting out various bits of plastic from the interior.

You can read more and see more photos of the build on his blog. See it in action in the video below:

You can also see a video of parts of the build below:

GPIO boards, Programming, Science, Software, Tutorials

Show tide times on an Inky pHAT using the Raspberry Pi

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London-based educator Giles Booth has taken an Inky pHAT from Pimoroni and placed it on top of his Raspberry Pi. He’s then used screen-scraping software Beautiful Soup to interrogate the MET office website and grab ride times. The script to do this is scheduled every morning and the output is then displayed on the Inky pHAT. Giles does point out that, being a screen-scraper based script, it is reliant on the MET office not changing their website in any way, so consider it a beta until he gets access to a more stable API. Read how he did it here.

Accessories, Crowdfunding

New Kickstarter brings portable power to the Raspberry Pi Zero – Juicebox Zero

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Ryan Moore has been in touch. He and a small team are running a new Kickstarter to fund the Juicebox Zero. The Juicebox is an add-on board for the Raspberry Pi Zero that will power it from a LiPo/LiOn battery source with a JST-PH connector. It will also charge the battery via a microUSB power source. It’s similar to the Adafruit Powerboost 1000C but instead of being a breakout board-style accessory, the Juicebox plugs directly into the GPIO pins of the Zero. It’s a neat solution to make the Zero portable. You can pledge $35 (plus shipping) to get hold of one and this will help the team towards their (ambitious!) $35k target. Check out the Kickstarter here.

UPDATE: Ryan’s been in touch – UK people can now get the Juicebox shipped to them for $5 rather than the $35 previously stated. Just pick the correct pledge-level to take advantage of this offer.