Outcome

Intention

This project intended to use simple IoT device to do home hack that is both fun and useful.

Context

I created this device for my roommate. She has a plant at our apartment, but she always forgets to water it. Especially in winter, the soil gets dry pretty quick with the heat on. This device tells her that the plant is thirsty when the soil gets dry.

Bill of parts

- Particle Photon

- Breadboard

- YL-69 Soil Hygrometer Sensor

- Red Led

- White Led

- Switch Button

- 2 Resistors

Product

This device contains a control button, a moist sensor and 2 led lights as outputs. When the control button is switched on, it tells the user that the devices starts working and it gives a feedback of the light up the white led. When the sensor detects the moist level of the soil is below the threshold, it turns on the red led light to let the user, in this case my roommate, know that she should water the plant. 

Precedents & References

About YL-69 soil hydrometer sensor:

 http://acoptex.com/project/179/basics-project-036a-soil-moisture-sensor-yl-69-fc-28-or-hl-69-at-acoptexcom/#sthash.wT3C5Sb3.dpbs

https://randomnerdtutorials.com/guide-for-soil-moisture-sensor-yl-69-or-hl-69-with-the-arduino/

A pool of plant projects:

https://particle.hackster.io/projects/tags/plants

Skills and Codes:

http://diotlabs.daraghbyrne.me

Reflection

When I was working on this project, I found that even making a device to water the plant, a seemingly cliche topic, could encounter a lot of technical challenges and require many decisions to be made. Instead of trying to conquer a lot of technical challenges, I want to achieve the best user experience with the least technical burdens. This requires good technical knowledge and clear mind of the final product during the development. This is something that I want to achieve in the next project.

On top of it, I also found that even many people have worked on similar projects, this is still an interesting area to dig into. There are so many variations and improvements that I can work on to enhance the user experience. For example, I can use a serious of led lights or an ambient display to show the moist level; I can also use a screen to read the precise moist level of the soil on real time. To go one step further, I can let the plant send messages or tweets to let human beings know their status. Or considering incorporate the data forecast to adjust the output. For instance, if it is going to rain soon, even the soil is very dry, it won't inform the owner to water the plant. All in all, I found watering plants is a charming topic to explore using IoT methods. I will try to build on the result of this project to explore more possibilities in the future.