What are you doing with your FEZ Spider?

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My wife surprised me this morning with my very own FEZ Spider! Confronted with a blank slate, I find that my mind is equally devoid of ideas.

What sort of projects are you planning for yours?

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Hi and welcome to the community.
That is the ultimate question and i am sure you are going to get a lot of answers. For me its about learning to code, learning electronics, microcontrolers etc. I have a few projects in mind like a word clock, a HAL 9000 door bell that questions visitors, RFID access to cabinets, ROV & robotics, the list is endless. Work wise I also have a few projects in mind but ive got to get my skill set up to scratch first ;).

There has already been some great work done by many of the members of this forum and there are already user generated modules being created [url]http://www.tinyclr.com/forum/21/4187/[/url] and [url]http://www.tinyclr.com/forum/21/4307/[/url]. You wil find the guys here are a wealth of knowledge and great support. GHI support (yes you Gus) is simply fantastic, i really dont know any other manufacturer that cares as much about supporting customers as GHI.

BTW did your wife order the Spider? If she did she deserves flowers, chocolate or a weekend break in a spa! My wife just rolls her eyes and says “yes dear” when i point out some new shiny shiny that i want ;D

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Now that is a nice surprise! Did you get the kit? So far, I’ve only done some basic stuff to test drive the various modules. Gus suggested somebody do a time lapse movie app using the mjpg encoding in another thread. I will also be using the Spider as the control panel for fleshing out some home automation/monitoring ideas. My particular areas of interest are solar voltaics and aquarium/terrarium control. We have several turtles who need specific lighting/heating conditions that vary with seasons. I’ve prototyped a single tank control with a Panda and now need to come up with the central controller. Perfect app for the Spider.

Have fun!

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In my humble opinion, the Spider is great for prototyping, experimenting or robotics, but there it ends. Building something more permanent like a HA controller i prefer the Cobra, but thats just my idea.

PS. Is your code for the tank control somewhere available?

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@ EriSan500 - In regards to the Spider as more of a prototype tool - I agree. As a card carrying member of the Mad Scientist Inventing Club, I find that most of my apps only ever make it to the prototype stage. The hardware then gets quickly repurposed for the next crazy idea. I don’t have enough FEZes yet to dedicate any one board to a specific purpose full time. Working on that, though!

[edit] code is very basic. Monitoring temp which is triggers a relay when the heat lamp needs to come on. Full spectrum light is also on a relay with a schedule. Temp threshold and schedule is currently hardcoded. Next step is make a nice touch UI on the Spider to adjust parameters for multiple tanks via XBee or similar wireless.

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It was the kit that she got me, it was quite an amazing surprise!

Robotics seem to be an obvious application for the Spider. Does anyone know if anyone is producing motor driver modules (one is visible in some of the Gadgeteer pre-release photos, though I can find no details as to if it’s an H-bridge, servo, etc.) or sensor modules like IR or sonar?

That there is no breadboard module at launch seems to be a bit of a crime IMO :wink: Though one that could be easily rectified… (I’ll save that for the “what modules are you wanting to see” thread)

Please keep the ideas coming!

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http://www.ghielectronics.com/catalog/product/273

Believe me,this is all you need (maybe a couple of them). I am using it for prototyping my modules on a breadboard.