Where does the javascript run, anyway?

A beginner's guide to hardware with Javascript.

Transcript

1. Where does the javascript run, anyway? A beginner’s guide to js + hardware C J Silverio @ceejbot
2. Tab Hunter easily located?
3. I never tracked the cat.
4. Then I went to a hack day.
6. That’s a cat about to be tracked.
7. Text Let’s talk microcontrollers. Arduino, Raspberry Pi, Beaglebone, and beyond.
8. Hardware input & output What the Arduino & the Pi have in common: inputs and outputs.
9. Connect to the physical world. Turn lights on & off. Run motors. Fire missiles at nodecopters. !
10. General-purpose I/O aka the GPIO or the “pin”
11. The super power of a microcontroller is the GPIO. The GPIO connects variables in software to physical objects: the power level on a wire is information.
12. Breadboard 101 The + and – columns are connected. The rows are connected. Board +/5V ➜ + Board ground ➜ –
13. Lighting an LED is simple. Power to breadboard resistor from + to long wire on the LED LED short wire to breadboard – – to board GND
14. Software! Decision-making! Now we make the microcontroller do some work.
15. Text Arduino Easy to start with! Lots of GPIO pins.
16. Text Button: a typical circuit power, ground, control signal software on the Arduino to read its state
17. We’re about to get the javascript into it.
18. Johnny-Five to the rescue StandardFirmata sketch ➜ Arduino npm install johnny- five write javascript
19. Async Goodness with Buttons ! var five = require('johnny-five'); var board = new five.Board(); ! board.on('ready', function() { // signal goes into arduino pin 8 var button = new five.Button(8); ! button.on('down', function() { console.log('down'); }); button.on('up', function() { console.log('up'); }); button.on('hold', function() { console.log('holding'); }); });
20. Tethered. :( You need to stay connected to a host capable of running Node.js, which the Arduino is not.
21. Upgrade the microcontroller! Let’s move from the early 80s to the late 90s.
23. You run Linux on these. OMG.
24. Decisions, decisions. Arduino tiny Arduinos Raspberry Pi Beagle cheap cheaper CPU! more CPU! 14 pins size varies 8 pins 65 pins lots of modules features vary great video more memory C++ js tethered C++ any language any language prototyping mobile projects general use, audio-vis CPU-intensive lots of connections
25. Text Cat Tracker uses 2 boards Teensy on the cat, Beaglebone at the cat door
26. Next gen Tessel Espruino Javascript as first-class language
27. Next steps! Go to a hack day! http://nodebots.io Run a hack day!
28. http://node-ardx.org The Arduino experimenter’s guide for Javascript
29. Practical Electronics for Inventors Paul Scherz & Simon Monk
30. Play! Putter around. Buy two of everything because you will melt things sometimes. It’ll be okay.
31. Learn strange new things. USB? Bluetooth? Serial? Radios? Reverse-engineer something!
32. Go forth & build!