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Kevin Hoyt

Content Keywords with Watson and Python

Content Keywords with Watson and Python

I am always impressed by Python when I have to use it. The community always has great content, and the surface coverage of the language is immense. This allows you to do a whole lot in a very few lines of code. While I generally have to use Python on

Blockchain Vocabulary

Blockchain Vocabulary

Blockchain has gained a lot of attention this year. That is great! It is a fine solution for many problems. If you are a developer however, being asked to make since of what problems blockchain can solve for your business, then you may quickly find yourself in over your head.

Web Bluetooth Bean

Web Bluetooth Bean

Bluetooth has been around for a while now, but it has always been a feature for native applications. The Web Bluetooth specification has been brewing for a while, lived under a flag for some time, and is now starting to land in desktop browsers. I figured it was time to

Tessel Barcode Scanner: Software

Tessel Barcode Scanner: Software

In my previous post, I show how you can connect a barcode scanner to a USB port on the Tessel, and read the scanned values. While that is interesting, what is more interesting is in doing something with that value. In this post we will take a look at finding

Tessel Barcode Scanner: Hardware

Tessel Barcode Scanner: Hardware

In addition to the two module ports on the Tessel [https://tessel.io/], there are also two USB ports. USB, while big and bulky in many IoT projects, can provide a useful access point to hardware. One example used by Tessel is a web camera [https://github.com/tessel/tessel-av]

Tessel I2C Climate

Tessel I2C Climate

The Tessel is expandable in several ways. One of those ways is pre-built modules. And one of those modules is called the "climate" module. This is effectively the Silicon Labs Si7020 temperature and humidity sensor. And for whatever reason, on the Tessel, it is horribly inaccurate. Heat The

Custom Tessel Module

Custom Tessel Module

Not too long ago now, I presented at Windy City Things 2016 in Chicago. Among the IoT boards I showed there was the Tessel. I have written about the Tessel [https://krhoyt.ghost.io/2014/11/19/tessel-to-parse-com/] before [https://krhoyt.ghost.io/2016/09/01/tessel-on-watson-iot/], and how approachable

Tessel on Watson IoT

Tessel on Watson IoT

Do you know JavaScript? Do you like IoT? Lean towards open standards? Then the Tessel should be right up your alley! Tessel is a hardware development platform. It has both Ethernet and 802.11 b/g/n support (and more), and you develop for it using Node.js (or Rust,

Measuring Developer Relations

Measuring Developer Relations

If you are in a developer relations organization, this question will eventually come up. It has likely already come up when the team was first created. And it is a tricky to answer. What is the question? "How do you measure developer relations?" Origins Most businesses seek to

Evangelist, Advocate, Community

Evangelist, Advocate, Community

I have been directly involved in developer relations for almost a decade. Indirectly, for about another five years on top of that. When I first started, there was only the term "evangelist". Over the years, for one reason or another, the term "advocate" has become more

Discovering Beacons (Swift)

Discovering Beacons (Swift)

When it comes to Bluetooth Smart (often called Bluetooth Low Energy, Bluetooth LE, or just BLE), there is a lot for a developer to like. Long battery life, connectivity without crazy pairing processes, and of course the beacon profile. This is a quick overview of how your iOS application can

The 12 Steps of Bluetooth (Swift)

The 12 Steps of Bluetooth (Swift)

There are a lot of tutorials out there for using Bluetooth (Low Energy) on iOS. Many of those are written using Swift. Some of them cover the mechanics of Bluetooth, while others focus on just the code. This post will definitely be of the later variety. Why this post if

Electric Imp on Watson IoT

Electric Imp on Watson IoT

I recently posted about connecting a Particle Photon [https://krhoyt.ghost.io/2016/04/27/particle-photon-on-watson-iot/] and your browser [https://krhoyt.ghost.io/2016/04/28/your-browser-on-watson-iot/] to the Watson IoT Platform [http://www.ibm.com/internet-of-things/]. Both of these systems easily supports publish/subscribe using MQTT. What happens when

Your Browser on Watson IoT

Your Browser on Watson IoT

In my previous [https://krhoyt.ghost.io/2016/04/27/particle-photon-on-watson-iot/] blog post, I connected a Particle Photon [https://www.particle.io/] to Watson IoT [https://console.ng.bluemix.net/catalog/services/internet-of-things-platform/]. At several points during that post I mentioned the subtleties of device connectivity versus application connectivity, but

Particle Photon on Watson IoT

Particle Photon on Watson IoT

IBM has had an IoT platform offering for a while now in various forms. The most recent evolution falls under the Watson brand, and includes device management, and authentication. Marketed as the Watson IoT Platform [https://console.ng.bluemix.net/catalog/services/internet-of-things-platform/], the messaging layer is MQTT supported by

IBM Cube: Software

IBM Cube: Software

When I originally designed the IBM Cube, I really wanted to have Qi wireless charging in the top. The concept was that I could lay my phone on the top of the cube when it needed a charge - utility. When I dropped that feature, the IBM Cube became largely

IBM Cube: Hardware

IBM Cube: Hardware

IBM has a distinctly "executive" feel to it. Long gone are the mandatory ties and corporate theme song (yes, seriously), but that culture is still very much alive and well. While I work remote most of the time, I wanted something with that executive feel on my desk.

Reading Light: Dawn of an Iteration

Reading Light: Dawn of an Iteration

In my last blog post [https://krhoyt.ghost.io/2016/01/04/project-reading-light/], I talked about the origins of a handmade reading light my 11 year-old daughter has been using for years. At the end of that post, there was some "customer feedback" which has now turned into

Reading Light: Origins

Reading Light: Origins

Some time ago (more than a year), my then 9 year-old daughter asked for a reading light. She likes to read before bed, but prefers paper books over digital. You can pick up reading lights in all forms on the cheap, but I saw this as a teachable opportunity. So

WebSocket on Android

WebSocket on Android

In a previous post, I talked about hosting a WebSocket server on IBM Bluemix. With the help of a little Node.js on the server, and a browser in hand, we were able to create a functional chat program. Since WebSocket is an open standard however, we can talk to

Decoupling IoT Rendering

Decoupling IoT Rendering

I recently received a comment from a visitor using one of my Arduino-to-WebSocket examples. They had a requirement for a specific charting library. The problem is that the library could not handle the data rates coming from the Arduino. In this post I break down why that is, and give

WebSocket on IBM Bluemix

WebSocket on IBM Bluemix

As IBM Bluemix can host a variety of language runtimes (PHP, Node.js, Python, Ruby, ASP.NET, to name a few), and most languages have a WebSocket server implementation, you can then in turn run a WebSocket server on IBM Bluemix. In this post I will take a look at

IoT Weather on Android

IoT Weather on Android

In a previous post [http://blog.kevinhoyt.com/2015/08/20/iot-with-cloudant-follow/] I talked about moving from request-response to using the publish-subscribe pattern. This pattern allows our application parts to listen for changes in a decoupled fashion. This works great with the continuous feed feature of IBM Cloudant [http://cloudant.

IBM MobileFirst 7.1 with Android

Branching off Ray Camden's excellent post [http://www.raymondcamden.com/2015/08/17/getting-started-with-mobile-development-and-ibm-mobilefirst-7-1] on getting started with IBM MobileFirst 7.1 [http://www.raymondcamden.com/2015/08/17/getting-started-with-mobile-development-and-ibm-mobilefirst-7-1] , this post will focus on the continuing workflow from an Android perspective. It is assumed that you have

Cloudant Continuous Feed

Cloudant Continuous Feed

Over the past [http://blog.kevinhoyt.com/2015/08/13/weather-on-android/] several [http://blog.kevinhoyt.com/2015/08/13/weather-on-android/] examples [http://blog.kevinhoyt.com/2015/08/18/iot-weather-on-android/], new documents in IBM Cloudant [http://cloudant.com] have been discovered by continuously polling the database. This is not only inefficient