TRASENSE MOVEMENT is a smart daily tracker for under $30

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One Shenzhen startup is looking to democratize the wearable industry with its affordable fitness band.

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Unlike other fitness trackers available on the market today that can run anywhere from a $100, a new wearable device from Shenzhen-based startup TRASENSE packs much of the same punch as industry heavyweights but at a mere fraction of the cost.

Priced under $30, the MOVEMENT is a super easy and affordable way to begin dabbling into the quantified-self era. Boasting a sleek, unisex design, the unit comes in black and purple with more colors likely to follow its crowdfunding campaign.

The lightweight device is comprised of a TPSiV bangle and a Polycarbonate/aluminum hybrid case, which houses a Bluetooth Low Energy module, an accelerometer and a custom PCB. The incredibly power efficient piece of hardware boasts a battery life of one to two weeks, while recharging its battery requires just about an hour.

The information collected through the wearable band is transmitted to an accompanying app named LYTICS. Much like those of its competitors, TRASENCE has designed its program to provide all of the data configurations that users have come to expect, including steps taken, calories burned and sleep cycles. What’s more, MOVEMENT is focused on making data more action-oriented, hence its name. For instance, if a user has not been achieving their regular targets, the app will offer up a small tip to help get back on par.

While time will only tell as to how it lives up to the rest of the market, at $23, it’s certainly worth a try. Want one of your own? Head over to its Kickstarter page, where the TRASENCE crew has already surpassed its $12,000 goal in a matter of hours.

Report: Shipments of wearable devices triple as prices get lower

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The wearable market recorded its eighth straight quarter of solid growth, according to a new report by IDC.

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Even in the months leading up to the highly-anticipated release of the Apple Watch, the wearable space continued to show strong growth, IDC has confirmed. In its latest report, the research firm revealed that the worldwide market recorded its eighth consecutive quarter of steady maturation in the first quarter of 2015. During this three-month period, vendors shipped a total of 11.4 million devices — a 200% jump from the 3.8 million wearables shipped that time last year.

“Bucking the post-holiday decline normally associated with the first quarter is a strong sign for the wearables market,” IDC research manager Ramon Llamas said in the report. “It demonstrates growing end-user interest and the vendors’ ability to deliver a diversity of devices and experiences. In addition, demand from emerging markets is on the rise and vendors are eager to meet these new opportunities.”

The top five wearable vendors over the timespan included Fitbit, Xiaomi, Garmin, Samsung and Jawbone, in that order, each of whom have been able to collectively grow their dominance from two-thirds of the market in Q1 2014 to three-quarters Q1 2015. Fitbit’s extensive lineup of bands, such as the Charge, Surge and older Flex models, led the way by capturing just over a third (34.2%) of the space. Not far behind, Xiaomi made up about a quarter (24.6%), driven by the tremendous popularity of its Mi Band, primarily from China.

Meanwhile, Garmin’s health and fitness-focused devices, Samsung’s Gear smartwatches and Jawbone’s UP MOVE and continued demand of UP24 round out the list at 6.1%, 5.3% and 4.4%, respectively. Now with the Apple Watch in the equation, however, IDC expects that the wearables landscape will experience a seismic shift, one in which will “force the competition to up their game in order to stay on the leading edge of the market.”

Without question, helping to spur widespread adoption has been price erosion. As seen with many young forms of technology, gizmos and gadgets become much more affordable over time. In the case of wearables, more than 40% of devices are now priced under $100.

“Despite this price erosion, Apple’s entrance with a product priced at the high end of the spectrum will test consumers’ willingness to pay a premium for a brand or product that is the center of attention,” explained IDC research analyst Jitesh Ubrani.

Want to learn more? Download the entire report here.

Creating realtime IoT dashboards and maps with PubNub

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EON is an open source JavaScript framework for creating beautiful realtime dashboards, charts and maps.

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The realtime publishing and streaming of data is a key component of the Internet of Things, especially when it comes to tracking and monitoring connected devices. We need a way to easily collect, detect, and distribute data as it’s created or changes, and immediately have it be received and acted upon.

There are several great frameworks for bringing data to life: D3.js, C3.js, WebGL, the list goes on. However, the missing component is how to deliver and reflect changes in that data in realtime, a vital requirement of the ever-growing IoT. Whether you’re streaming sensor data to a dashboard, monitoring device(s) health, or tracking a fleet of vehicles on a live-updating map, delivering the data in realtime is essential.

With this in mind, PubNub wanted an easier way to stream data to create beautiful IoT dashboards, charts, and maps. And so, the team built Project EON, an open source Javascript framework. EON not only enables you to build these dashboards and maps, but stream the raw JSON data to them as well.

Let’s check out the details! Then we’ll show you EON in action, using an Atmel MCU (because what’s better than connecting hardware and software?).

Realtime Charts and Dashboards for Connected Devices

The charting and graphing component of EON is based on C3.js, an open source charting library. This allows you to build realtime line, bar, pie, gauge, and donut charts. When new data is streamed, transitions are animated and changes are reflected in realtime — no manual refreshing required!

These charts are especially useful when it comes to monitoring and displaying data from Internet of Things connected devices, and gives you flexibility on how you want to display that data.

EON bar, pie, and gauge charts

IoT use cases include:

• Home automation: Temperature readings, power usage and consumption for individual devices
• Connected car: RPMs, state of fleet of vehicles, analytics on vehicles including gas usage, capacity, or money earned, vehicle telemetry
• Industrial and factory: Oil field sensor readings, brewery analytics (eg. pressure, capacity), factory statistics

Mapping for Connected Vehicles and Wearables

Realtime maps are a staple of any connected transportation application. For applications on the move, you need a way to track movement and current location.

The mapping and geolocation component of EON is based on Mapbox, a series of APIs and tools for building custom maps. Give EON a marker icon (bus, train, plane, person), and a geolocation. When the geolocation is updated, the market animates and travels to the new location.

EON maps for bus systems, aircrafts, and wearables

IoT use cases for live-updating maps include:

• Connected car, fleet management and public transportation: navigation, taxi/rideshare dispatch based on proximity, collect and publish road conditions, hailing and fare calculation for car services, monitor and calculate route and arrival times for public transit
• Wearables: navigation and tracking, fitness applications
• Air and sea: track and monitor location of aircraft and sea craft for consumer travel, freight, and delivery.

In Action: Atmel MCU Realtime Temperature Sensor

So let’s see EON and the Internet of Things working together!

Our demo application is a realtime temperature sensor built using an Atmel | SMART SAM D21 Xplained Pro and a temperature sensor. The concept is fairly simple, we collect the data using the Atmel sensor, and stream it in realtime to a live dashboard, where the temperature data is displayed as it changes.

That streaming and visualization is EON at work. And with some CSS added on, we have something that looks like this:

Just think, this is just a simple demonstration. Imagine having hundreds or even thousands of these sensors spread across a region, all collecting and streaming that data to a single dashboard. Or even a single sensor streaming to hundreds of dashboards, all simultaneously.

The use cases are endless, and it really comes down to collecting data, streaming data, and visualizing that data. And that’s where EON does the work.

To learn more about the Atmel Realtime Temperature Sensor demo, check out our full tutorial and code repository, or watch the video below.

This interactive dress is inspired by autumn trees

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Fall is an interactive garment that mimics nature’s responsive systems. 

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In what would appear to be a costume straight out of a Lady Gaga or Katy Perry music video, Fall is an interactive dress that is inspired by nature’s seasonal occurrence of trees losing their leaves. The brainchild of Birce Özkan, the Maker specifically designed her foliage-colored piece to mimic the b uilt-in system of trees as they shed their leaves as a result of surrounding environmental factors.

“My thesis project was evolved around the questions, What if when the temperature got hot suddenly, our clothes would start to break apart in response? What if they had the skill to behave depending on the surrounding conditions? What if garments had the ability to sense the environment just like living organisms? Those questions let me find the purpose for my thesis,” Özkan explains.

“In the fall, as the days shorten, and the temperature gets colder, the trees, without the light they need to sustain their chlorophyll, shed their leaves to keep their energy to survive for the winter ahead. This process was the inspiration for creating my garment’s mechanism. To prepare for the fall of leaves, trees activate ‘scissor cells’ that split to create a bumping layer that forces the leaves out of place, destabilizing them so that they fall,” the Maker writes.

This process led Özkan to devise her own garment’s mechanism by using light from a simulated environment that would activate the outfit’s embedded Arduino Micro (ATmega32U4), Adafruit Lux Sensor and four servo motors. The lesser the light, the faster the servo motors move, which in turn, causes the leaves to fall. These servos are attached to steel wires, housed inside clear tubes at the back of the dress.

“At the site of each hole, I attached the leaves by melting wax onto steel wires. When there is less light, the servos start to speed up and pull the steel wire. When the thread is pulled sideways, the leaf hits the side of the tube’s hole which breaks the wax. In that way, the mechanism makes leaves fall down,” she adds.

In true DIY fashion (no pun intended), the color palette for the ensemble was made to emulate that of autumn, while its fabric was laser cut into stylized leaf shapes, spray painted and eventually attached to a cotton base.

“I strongly believe that Fall can influence the fashion world to become more dynamic and to increase the way clothes can react to the world around them. I want clothing to have more responsiveness to the environment, so that instead of people always change their clothes, the clothes can sometimes change themselves.”

Want to see Özkan’s work in action? Watch the video below, and head over to the Maker’s official page to discover how she is converging both fashion and technology in an extremely unique way. Hat tip to our friends over at Adafruit for coming across this project!

WellBe will let you know certain people and situations stress you out

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Feeling stressed at work? The WellBe bracelet will tell you to calm down.

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Whether it’s competing with deadlines at work or cramming for an upcoming test, stress can take a toll on the body. Rather than wait for the disrupted sleeping habits, neck pain, upset stomach issues and dizziness to kick in, a New York City startup has devised a wearable solution that seeks to monitor and manage anxiety levels before reaching those dangerous levels.

Dubbed WellBe, the bracelet is designed to track a user’s heart rate, and in combination with a patent-pending algorithm, determine stress and calmness levels based on time, location and people that the wearer encounters throughout your day, like a boss, an in-law or a colleague that just won’t leave you alone.

Crafted from cork, the device is extremely lightweight yet durable enough to withstand everyday use. It works by pairing with an accompanying app to provide a detailed breakdown of an individual’s triggers along with some personalized stress reducing programs — ranging from meditation to guided imagination — to retain a calm state of being.

The app collects the data from the wristband on an hourly basis, and allows users to configure it to send an alert when a certain threshold is exceeded. Beyond that, WellBe visualizes a ‘before and after’ effect of each practiced relaxation mechanism.

What’s nice is that WellBe can be used anywhere and anytime someone may need it, whether that’s an intense meeting in the office, a first date or awaiting test results at doctor’s office. The bracelet can even be employed as a personal life coach as the app includes mental workouts for a variation of seven, 14 and 21 days from professionals in the team’s Mentors Channel.

Sure, wearable heart rate monitors are nothing new. What sets this gadget apart is that it can serve as a well-being coach to help pave the way to a healthier, more relaxed life, not to mention prevent reaching those boiling points. Intrigued? Head over to its Indiegogo campaign, where the WellBe team is currently seeking $100,000. To start, the bracelet will be available in black, dark brown and natural colors, and will ship in December 2015.

ReVault is the world’s first wearable private cloud

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Not just a smartwatch, ReVault lets you back up and access your files on the go.

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We know, we know, another smartwatch? But before you say anything else, this wearable band has a rather unique feature. Not only can it reveal the time, it can impressively act as a wireless storage device that lets you back up your files and open them without ever needing an Internet connection. Think about it, in this day and age of multi-screen use, everyone has data that they want to access to on all of their gadgets. And sure, many of us tend to employ popular services like Dropbox or OneDrive to accomplish this; however, local storage happens to be a bit more secure.

Cognizant of this, one Swedish startup has set out to make the private cloud a little more personal and portable with ReVault. Currently live on Indiegogo, the Atmel | SMART SAM4S powered gizmo is being billed as “the world’s first wearable private cloud” that enables users to securely access and sync all of their files. Instead, the wearable drive connects to a laptop, smartphone or tablet over Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

Not only does ReVault allow wearers to easily carry their most important documents wherever they go at all times, but once connected, it can be set to automatically back up and synchronize those files across all devices via its accompanying app. This application is available on Android, iOS, Windows, Mac OS X and Linux, meaning it should be pretty simple to pair data despite the platforms one may use.

ReVault has been designed with the utmost security in mind, and rightfully so. We are talking about personal and sensitive information here! This was accomplished through AES-256 encryption, as well as two-factor authentication. In other words, only trusted devices and users can connect to the wearable unit.

Aside from safeguarding data, the watch has been created with superior durability to withstand the inevitable bumps and scratches of everyday use. Equipped with a stainless steel and water resistant case, the full-color display is protected with Gorilla Glass 3. A wearer can also choose between a variety of faces, including one for private cloud data, a digital or analog clock, as well as a custom screen built with the ReVault API. Though the battery only lasts for approximately three days, ReVault can be charged using a standard Qi wireless charger — 80% battery life takes roughly an hour, while 100% calls for just about an hour and a half.

ReVault comes in both 32GB and 128GB models. What’s more, for those who aren’t really into the whole “smartwatch thing,” it can be transformed into a necklace or keyring using its chain converter. Is it time to reclaim your data? Then hurry over to its official Indiegogo campaign, where the team is closing in on their $65,000 goal. Shipment is expected to begin in January 2016.

Maker creates a steampunk name badge for the wearable computing era

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A badge even H. G. Wells and Jules Verne would want to wear. 

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With Maker Faire season upon us, we’re bound to see a ‘faire’ share of steampunk projects over the next couple of months — from hat-mounted clocks to wooden 3D printers to slick wristwatches. Given all of the buzz around wearable computing as of late, Maker Rob Reilly decided to do something a little different by creating a pseudo-Victorian name badge.

“I chose a name badge because I attend and speak at quite a few tech conferences and events. Breaking the conversational ice with 8,000 strangers can be a bit daunting. A one-off ‘badge’ might grab people’s curiosity and show off some practical wearable computing vibes at the same time. Also, almost everybody likes steampunk,” Reilly writes.

As fate would have it, the Maker received a 1.8-inch color LCD screen for Christmas, capable of displaying bitmaps at a resolution of 160 x 128 pixels and being easily programmed using a Linux notebook through the Arduino IDE. Driven by an Arduino Pro Mini (ATmega328) soldered to an LCD breakout board, the badge itself features a digital temperature sensor, a battery pack, an integrated micro-SD card, and a handmade brass frame to hold it all together. The Pro Mini and display board are both suspended within the badge’s frame, while some 22-gauge copper wire from a CAT 5 cable is tasked with connecting the more discrete components, like the temperature sensor and resistors.

“The programmable/microcontroller approach lends itself to exploring ‘networked’ wearable computing in upcoming version 2.0 and beyond versions,” the Maker says.

In terms of programming, Reilly notes that it was relatively straightforward through some good ol’ Arduino code. Beyond that, he used examples from the Adafruit_GFX and Adafruit_ST7735 libraries, then added lines that cycled through a couple of bitmaps, such as a “Dr Torq” image and a text readout of the ambient temperature.

As impressive as version 1.0 may be, the Maker already has some ideas for future iterations. A few notable improvements to beef up its steampunk aesthetics and hackability include swapping out its AAA batteries, replacing fake with real leather, and using 10-pin female headers on the MCU side to connect the 10-pin male headers on the LCD breakout board. Reilly is also looking to migrate from the Pro Mini to an Arduino Yún (ATmega32U4), which would enable him to wirelssly connect the badge with his smartphone.

Want to make one of your own? Head over to the project’s page here.

Control your wearable display with a touch-sensitive belt

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Belt is an unobtrusive touch input device for head-worn displays.

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As the wearable market continue to mature, Makers are coming up with some pretty slick ways to use body-adorned items as interfaces for their mobile devices — whether that’s stroking one’s own hair to discreetly make a phone call or affixing stickers to one’s skin to control their music player. And while Google Glass has yet to experience mainstream popularity, it’s only a matter of time before the technology behind it will be enhanced to the point where it can eventually be integrated into a pair of everyday glasses. Until then, however, a group of researchers from Ulm University in Germany have come up with an alternative solution: your belt.

The aptly-dubbed Belt not only can hold up your trousers, but can enable a user to command their wearable display device as well. The accessory is covered in punk-like, touch-sensitive metal studs, which allow a wearer to slide their thumb across its surface to scroll down lists, tap to make selections, or use other gestures to control the wearable device’s UI — all without ever having to touch the side of their head. What’s more, shortcuts to applications be implemented anywhere along the outside of the belt, whether that means accessing Facebook just above the left-hand pocket or opening up emails right above the rear.

Ultimately, wearers can decide as to how much of the belt they would like to use as a touch-sensitive controller. What’s more, the software can be made intelligent enough to distinguish between an accidental stroke of an arm and an actual gesture, as well as ignore any unwanted activity.

The Belt itself is equipped with an Arduino Pro Mini (ATmega328), a Bluetooth Low Energy module, four SparkFun capacitive touch sensor breakout boards, and a battery to power it up.

“In a qualltative user study with 14 participants, we found out that for short interactions (two-four seconds), most of the surface area is considered as appropriate input space, while for longer interactions (up to 10 seconds), the front areas above the trouser pockets are preferred,” the team writes.

Intrigued? Check out the project’s entire paper here, or watch it in action below.

This hoodie can sense and react to weather

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This hoodie will emit various lighting effects based on the forecasted precipitation, temperature, and wind speed.

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As they say, April showers bring May flowers. Or, in Barbara Eldredge’s case, a flower-covered hoodie that illuminates based on the weather forecast.

The aptly-named Spring Hoodie, which is actually a combination of two inexpensive hoodies from Old Navy, is packed with an Adafruit FLORA (ATmega32U4), a CC3000 Wi-Fi module and a lithium battery, all hidden inside an inner pocket. 18 NeoPixel LEDs were embedded inside of fake flowers adorning the hood. In order to protect and conceal the wiring, the Maker turned one of the two sweatshirts inside-out and placed it directly within other. (Or as Eldredge calls it, create a “hoodie sandwich.”) Just so she never had to take the FLORA out, the Maker also added a button that is tasked with turning the wearable on/off.

“When I turn on the hoodie, the Wi-Fi module tethers to my phone, and the FLORA uses it to connect to a simple PHP web page pulling three-hour forecast data for the predicted precipitation, temperature, and wind speed from the Open Weather Map API,” Eldredge writes.

Once the FLORA is connected over Wi-Fi, the lapel flower emits green to show that it is indeed working. When it connects to the webpage, the ATmega32U4 based MCU collects the weather information and uses it to control the color, brightness and changing of the LED flowers. The color adjusts based on the amount of predicted precipitation. In other words, the more rain that is predicted, the more the LEDs will become blue (and not red/orange).

Meanwhile, the intensity of the LEDs is dependent upon temperature — the warmer, the brighter. Though she wanted some slight pulsing or suggestion of movement in the lights, the speed of this movement is actually dictated by the predicted wind speed. The faster the wind, the faster the lights will change or flicker.

“The Spring Hoodie is admittedly a pretty wacky piece of clothing. But after the cold wet winter we’ve had, I’m ready for flowers and color. And I like that it’ll always let me know how the weather’s going to be,” she concludes.

Interestingly enough, for those spring days where you can’t decide as to whether it’s too cold to wear a lightweight jacket, the hoodie will do it for you. Should the temperature dip below an appropriate level, the wearable won’t turn on at all.

Want a Spring Hoodie of your own? Head over to the Maker’s official project page on element14 here, and check it out in action below.

Wear your heart on your sleeve with the Beatband

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This blinking wearable device combines a pulse sensor with a DIY Arduino.

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As showcased on MAKE Magazine, MakerBlock has devised a simple pulse-blinking indicator that enables a user to display their heartbeat when performing nearly any activity imaginable using a DIY Arduino microcontroller.

With the implementation of a MintDuino (ATmega328P + Arduino bootloader), MakerBlock has tasked a pulse sensor to trigger a set of green glowing LEDs. The entire unit fits within a mint tin (hence its name) and can be easily slipped into a specified sleeve for comfortable wearing.

Many would assume a neoprene sleeve would be ideal for this project, but MakerBlock recommends the NXE ActiveSleeve which is comprised of a stretchy material that allows the blinking lights to shine through. What good is an LED pulse display if onlookers can’t see your beating heart, right?

MakerBlock writes about a minor change to the MintDuino, “For this build we want to transfer it to perfboard so it’ll fit snugly in the mint tin and the armband sleeve.” Its creators go on to caution fellow Makers, “Don’t solder the green LED to the perfboard. You’ll replace this component with jumper wires connecting to your 5 red LEDs on the lid.”

Once soldered, wired and worn, this project has a multitude of uses. It can provide a visual representation of your feelings while working out, watching a movie, or even meditating. Now, go show off those emotions!