Category: IOT

Running octoprint on raspberry pi 4 model b. Part 1

For some time we have a Tevo Tarantula 3d printer. Usually we keep it connected to a desktop computer and while we were printing we didn’t do much on it. However last night while printing a piece that took a long time to print we decided that we should use the computer. Big mistake. Computer hanged ( We assume something related to video card but that remains to be tested), printer hanged so we have to print that piece again.

You can imagine the frustration. Luckily we have several raspberry pi 4 around ( for a Kubernetes cluster project ) and we decided to take one and build a print server.

All good . There is a good tutorial here: https://howchoo.com/g/y2rhnzm3odz/control-your-3d-printer-with-octoprint-and-raspberry-pi

However this tutorial is for Rpi 3 . Rpi 4 is a different kind of beast. First octoprint normal image ( at this point in time ) does not work with Rpi 4 . You need to flash the night build image from here: https://storage.googleapis.com/octoprint/2019-06-24_2019-06-20-octopi-buster-lite-0.17.0.zip

Second rpi4 has wireless . So you need to edit from the start octopi-wpa-supplicant.txt and setup SID and wifi pass .

We managed to do that after 3 flashed of the SD card (due to the fact that we were flashing the wrong image). Now comes the configuration part. But that will be in another post.

TFM IOT – Home automation. Part 1 . Introduction

A project with simple requirements is beautiful . However simple requirements might turn into hard to achieve implementations . This is the case in this home automation project.
Requirement for this project is simple … automate everything
in the house:

  • Lights
  • Shades
  • Music and video
  • Heating / ventilation
  • Air quality
  • Security

What exactly we are trying to achieve :

  • Control any device in the house remotely
  • Monitor and graph all sensors
  • Take action if events are happening in t
    he house
  • Have a secure, simple and  beautiful user interface so anyone can use
  • WIFI everything
  • Take action by using scenarios

So in this article series we will try to come up with a complete solution that will fulfill all requirements. And we will take it one device at a time

TFM IOT Home automation Part 2 – How smart a lamp can be ?

A simple lamp. How much intelligence can we add to a simple lamp  ? Well that depends …

What we can control?

  • We can power on and power off the lamp.

What we can measure?

  • Power consumption
  • Check if the light bulb needs to be replaced

On first iteration we will power on and power off.

The results:

To put things one step forward we need to be have all the controls from all the devices across the house in one single place ( a central hub for the house and be able to control it from anywhere )