Talking to Littebits in China may not be clear. LittleBits is a company that sells modular electronic components in New York City, where modular electronic components can be joined together for modeling, learning and entertainment. Said wearing, a little similar "electronic version" Lego block.
I got a set of LittleBits, including power, input, output, extension module, including power, input, output, extension, etc., each electronic module classified by different color area, the price of the entire electronic module set is about 100 weeks, follow We usually contact the development board, or the electronic building block toy, etc., this price is not cheap.
According to the classification in the above figure, blue is the power module; pink is an input module; green is an output module; orange is an expansion module, how do these electronic modules? It turns out that the plastic buckle of each module color identifier contains magnetic magnets and signal lines, one side, when the electronic module is combined, only the magnetic properties of the signal line can be connected, otherwise, in design It is very convenient to use the method of unpolarity.
One of the blue power modules is 5V's MicroSB power interface. The circuit is very simple. Basically only one microSB interface holder plus power indicator circuit, however, the price of such a module is 10 US dollars, I don't Know how to express it, another module in the picture below is a 9 ~ 12V DC Jack power interface, and the price is lower than the MicroSB power supply module, but it is also about 6 dollars.
The function of the pink module is the role of the mechanical buttons. It is equivalent to pressing the principles of the on-line, the engineer may dismissive, but this is a toy to children or teenagers, and actually use to entertain the fun. .
The green output module is an LED display, one is a servo motor module.
The LED module circuit is very simple, that is, an LED plus one resistor in series, and a buck is also equipped in the circuit, which is used for 5V to 3.3V (probably) to power the LED.
There is also a mode switch on the servo motor circuit, including two modes: one is a TURN mode, one is a swing mode.
The TURN mode can control the angle of the servo electron rotation by the electronic module of the input, such as inserting a resistor Dimmer similar to the dimming, by current to control the speed, as shown below.
The SWING mode of the servo motor is to control the servo motor to rotate back and forth, which is controlled similar to the wiper on the car.
The orange band network WiFi function module is called CloudBit, a bit like the main control board we usually see, with application processor, memory, WiFi wireless connection function, see other simple small modules to be about 10 US dollars, don't want to think The price of Cloudbit is absolutely inconvenient, and the truth is true, and the official price is nearly 60 US dollars.
Some of the cloudbits? One main application processor, is not a microcontroller; a WiFi adapter, the USB WiFi adapter we usually contact; a mechanical button, that is, it can be customized; a RGB LED
The words on the backbit are the memory cells on the module, including a 64MB SDRAM and an extensible MicroSD card.
The application processor on CloudBit is Freescale (original) I.MX233 application processor, the specific model is MCIMX233DAG4C, the core processor is based on ARM926EJ-S, the maximum frequency is 454 MHz, although it is still the LOGO of Freescale, However, after the large-scale merger of the semiconductor manufacturers in 2016, it is now that Qualcomm has been income.
To put it, the biggest role of CloudBit is to give toys "life", or more intelligent, the original electronic circuit module can produce a lot of intelligent operations, such as adding CloudBit to press the keys. .
Active action detection by pressing the button input, send information to the user's phone via WiFi.
CloudBit access the servo motor front end, we can remotely control the servo motor via the mobile phone, these examples are not the minimum chemical shadow of modern smart equipment smart home.
Said so many, it is better to practice in practice.
LittleBits open source electronic module experience
As mentioned earlier, each electronic module contains three signals, such as the power module, the difference is two power supplies, a ground signal, and the input module of the red button is a power source, one, and one with a button. Connected signal (actually you can also supply a power signal).
Since the official is not a specific circuit schematic, the structure, when the actual measurement of these pin signals, I accidentally use the multimeter table, mainly, I can't play, I thought it was a spring structure, and the results were removed Opens this is a metal shrapnel structure, which exceeds its elasticity, you can't recover, can only say too much. Specifically, the next figure is next to a half-cut magnet.
The simplest, LED's output module is connected to the power module, and the power is on, but it may be clear because the room is also open, this white LED is not very clear.
It is clear that the lights that turn off the room can be seen.
Then further, the LED light is turned off by the input button.
Of course, if the control servo motor is also the same, it will not be demonstrated. Next, it will be a combination of intelligent, that is, the CloudBit Internet of Things module introduced above, as shown in the following figure, the function we need to implement is to press the button, the network of the Internet of Things module passes the cloud image Our phone or email sends a message.
To achieve this process, first require the configuration of the network, this can be set via LittleBits' official website or the APP of the mobile phone, and then you need to use the third-party service ifttt.
Ifttt is a platform service abroad, and domestic friends don't know that it is normal. Ifttt is all called if this thr, if you think, if you, if you, then, then how to do it, similar to the syntax of the C language. If you are embarrassing, for example, you trigger a button and what features will be implemented.
Register a list of LittleBits to define a smart project name, write freely.
Configure CloudBit's WiFi, which has a detailed graphic process in the description page configured, very clear. This configuration is similar to what's a similar operation if you have a smart home product that has been played with many WiFi.
According to the established setting, the last PC or mobile phone is connected to the Cloudbit's WiFi SSID.
It was easy to think that it was easy to do. As a result, it could not find its AP when connecting CloudBit. It is still not possible to install the WiFi USB adapter on the CLOUDBIT. After installing the driver, it can be a wireless network card. According to the normal configuration, find the Cloudbit's AP, then add it to wireless WiFi that can be connected to the Internet, if you do this, this section of the part of the LitteBITS module is completed, then you will make settings on the IFTTT platform. .
Log in to ifttt official website, or to register an account, find the service of the LittleBits module.
Then perform functional settings.
For example, if the IF button triggers "Then" mail mail to me ", you can perform a functional demo after the setting is complete.
We can trigger CloudBit to send the CloudBit to the IFTTT platform implementation message (email).
If you want to imagine, this is not a microcortion of a smart home, such as the realization of the doorbell, or pressing the button to realize the monitoring of home security, it can be said that this set of LittleBits Electronic Module Suite, you can implement some Basic smart home zoom products, of course, this price is not everyone is willing to bear, after all, really smart home series products may not be so expensive.
Littlebits is a gift you should give to children, and for engineers who really want to learn, this suite seems to be worthless, because there is currently not discovered something that can be customized. Basically, relying on the third-party service platform to provide modular functions, we are mostly combined with these features to achieve more entertainment.
Original declaration: This article is originally created by the panel network, declined!
More creative gathered evaluation recommendation:
Winter Review / Demolition Message Fan is an experience? - The light is getting fascinating, give you a cooling.
WiFi intelligent LED bulb lights in life - TP-LINK LB120 experience, dismantling
Our other product:
