Adafruit builds a WiFi Yún soundboard

Adafruit’s Tony DiCola has put together a detailed tutorial describing how to transform an Atmel-based Arduino Yún (ATmega32u4 MCU) into a soundboard that can be controlled from a webpage over WiFi.

Aside from the Atmel-powered Arduino Yún, key project components include a MicroSD card with 20 megs of available space and a USB audio adapter (or USB speakers).

“Before you get, started you will want to have your Yun connected to your wireless network and be familiar with connecting to the Yún over SSH,” DiCola explained.

The project’s first step? Making sure the MicroSD card is inserted into the Yun and powered on. After connecting to the Yún with SSH, Makers are instructed to install the audio and drivers.

Next up? Installing and configuring the Flask web application framework.

“Once the audio and Flask setup steps are complete, you can install the software for this project,” said DiCola. “While connected to the Yun over SSH, execute commands to download the software and unzip it on the SD card.”

As DiCola notes, Makers can add their own sounds to the soundboard by simply copying MP3 files into the YunSoundboard-master/sounds folder. For Mac or Linux, the scp tool is used to copy files from a PC to the Yun by executing in a terminal. On Windows, Makers will need to install the pscp utility, with the syntax the same as used for the Mac/Linux command, except for the ‘pscp’ command instead of scp.

“Once the sounds are copied over, reload the web page and you should see them added to the list of sounds automatically,” he noted.

According to DiCola, the above-mentioned project is a great example of how to use the Yún’s Linux processor to host a web application and play sounds. Of course, the basic project can be modded or expanded to run on other boards. Makers can also copy their music collection to the device for WiFi controlled boombox, or hook up a PIR motion sensor to the Yun and have the web page alert them if someone is near the device and ready to be pranked.

As we’ve previously discussed on Bits & Pieces, the Atmel-powered Yún has been used in a wide variety of Maker projects that we’ve recently covered, including an electricity monitor, mesh extender platform, high-five camera, Foursquare soap bubble machine, a Gmail (alert) lamp, water heater regulator, smart measuring camera and a security camera.

Interested in learning more about building a WiFi Yún soundboard? You can check out Tony DiCola’s full tutorial on Adafruit here.

Video: Building a smart cocktail shaker

Adafruit’s Tony DiCola has created a smart cocktail shaker capable of dispensing classy drinks with nothing less than accurate precision.

“The smart cocktail shaker is a project to help you easily mix drinks using an Arduino, a load cell from a cheap kitchen scale and an Android application,” DiCola explained in a detailed Adafruit tutorial.

“By measuring the weight of a cocktail shaker, an Arduino can send the amount of poured liquid to an Android application over a USB or bluetooth connection in real time. Making a drink is as easy as following the steps on screen – no more guessing or fumbling with measurements.”

As HackADay’s Brian Benchoff notes, DiCola connected a INA125 instrument amplifier to the load cell, instead of trying to interface with the electronics in the scale.

“[Meanwhile] an [Atmel-based] Arduino Micro (ATmega32u4) measures the weight on the load cell… With the known densities of gin, vermouth and Kahlua, Tony can get a very good idea of how much liquid is in the cocktail shaker.”

On the software side, Tony wrote an Android app for his tablet that communicates with the Arduino via Adafruit’s Bluefruit adapter.

“The app receives the current weight on the load cell, displays the current amount of liquor in the cocktail shaker and provides step-by-step instructions for making any cocktail,” Benchoff added.

Interested in learning more? You can check out Adafruit’s detailed build tutorial here.