assisted home storage
DESCRIPTION
Assisted Home Storage. A proof of concept for automated solutions in the home. Original Concept. Scaling down existing technology for warehouse management for use in the household Initial Prototype: home refrigerators. Conception: the future of home refrigeration. Original storage concept. - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
A P R O O F O F C O N C E P T F O R A U T O M A T E D S O L U T I O N S I N T H E H O M E
ASSISTED HOME STORAGE
ORIGINAL CONCEPT
• Scaling down existing technology for warehouse management for use in the household• Initial Prototype: home
refrigerators
ORIGINAL STORAGE CONCEPT
• An internal robotic cycle of shelves• Inventory fully
managed by software• Retrieval and storage
are completely robotized
DEPARTURES FROM INITIAL DESIGN
• Changes in Design
• Technical Challenges
• Lack of Expertise
Eureka?!
FATAL FLAW(S)
• Motor synchronicity• No prior robotics
experience• Lack of facilities for
development of hardware• Only opportunity for
construction was at personal residences
REDESIGN
• Solves issues with motor synchronicity (single motor)• Easy to control via
USB (see software)• Aesthetically
pleasing
MOTION AND POSITION SENSING
• Momentary switch is activated when set portions of the turntable go by
• Arduino sends a signal back to computer when switch is activated
• Character literal ‘g’ starts the motor
• Character literal ‘s’ stops the motor
• https://www.dropbox.com/s/n0l5skpb5pzmzdw/VIDEO0006.mp4
Momentary Contact Switch – wired as floating when open or short to ground
INVENTORY ENTRY AND MANAGEMENT
• Entry of items by barcode
• Initially considered image processing approach• Too complex
• UI program receives input from barcode scanner for food storage, which is managed in a database
MOTOR CONTROL
• Uses Arduino Uno board for motor control
• The Arduino waits for a ‘g’ to be sent to start the motor and an ‘s’ to stop
• Controls ESC via PWM signal through pin 9• Certain PWM signal
arms the ESC• Anything above the
activation signal starts the motor
USER INTERFACE
• UI was coded in C++ in Visual Studio 2010
• Consists of 8 screens which allow a user to enter and retrieve an item
• Each screen contains buttons and some have a text box for the user to enter information
DATA STORAGE
• All items stored, have 3 attributes• Name, Type, and Expiration date
• All items get stored in a text file, named data.txt, in the format:• ItemName ItemType ExpirationDate
• Each itemName also gets stored in an Vector List to quickly determine stored items
• The barcode scanner will read the barcode and send a string of numbers that correspond to the item. The program will then read from a text file, named barcode.txt, and determine which item has been scanned