ECE497 Project: Node.js Weather Station - Revision history

Yoder: Moved to Winter1112 category

2012-07-16T13:57:36Z

Moved to Winter1112 category

Yoder: /* Grading */

2012-02-24T19:44:23Z

‎Grading

Yoder: /* Conclusions */

2012-02-24T19:39:46Z

‎Conclusions

Yoder: /* Work Breakdown */ Formatting

2012-02-24T19:38:50Z

‎Work Breakdown: Formatting

Yoder: /* Installation Instructions */ Updated notation

2012-02-24T19:19:42Z

‎Installation Instructions: Updated notation

Yoder: /* Installation Instructions */

2012-02-24T19:04:18Z

‎Installation Instructions

Yoder: /* Executive Summary */

2012-02-24T19:02:52Z

‎Executive Summary

Ziyi Zhang: /* User Instructions */

2012-02-19T06:58:23Z

‎User Instructions

Ziyi Zhang at 06:55, 19 February 2012

2012-02-19T06:55:36Z

Ziyi Zhang: /* Work Breakdown */

2012-02-19T06:34:56Z

‎Work Breakdown

← Older revision		Revision as of 13:57, 16 July 2012
Line 1:		Line 1:
−	[[Category:~~ECE497~~]]	+	[[Category:ECE497Winter1112]]

	Team members: [[user:Caogecym \| Yuming Cao]], [[user:Ziyi Zhang \| Ziyi Zhang]]		Team members: [[user:Caogecym \| Yuming Cao]], [[user:Ziyi Zhang \| Ziyi Zhang]]

← Older revision		Revision as of 19:44, 24 February 2012
Line 2:		Line 2:

	Team members: [[user:Caogecym \| Yuming Cao]], [[user:Ziyi Zhang \| Ziyi Zhang]]		Team members: [[user:Caogecym \| Yuming Cao]], [[user:Ziyi Zhang \| Ziyi Zhang]]
		+
		+	== Grading ==
		+
		+	Very well done. I had no trouble '''git'''ting your files and running the code. It works! Your documentation is very good. I'm able to follow what you did.
		+
		+	Some things I want to try are:
		+	# Have the current LED trigger selected on the web page.
		+	# Have the new temperature pushed to the page rather than have the page keep polling.
		+	# Only update the part of the page that needs updating.
		+
		+	Wiki: 95
		+	Project: 95
		+	'''Total:''' 95

	== Executive Summary ==		== Executive Summary ==

← Older revision		Revision as of 19:39, 24 February 2012
Line 350:		Line 350:
	== Conclusions ==		== Conclusions ==

−	This project dabbles in the possibility of setting a web-server written in ~~nodejs~~ on the embedded environment and accomplishes the proposed idea of interacting with underlying hardware pins and system via upper-level user interface. ~~nodejs~~ is very simple and easy to implement, its non-blocking, event-driven and single-threaded mechanism is exactly suitable for the embedded system and our project gives a good instance of its application. Our demo system can be scaled up with far more features in remote monitoring and smart control industry. If, for example, the nodemailer can work well on the Angstrom (apparently it's working on Ubuntu, but somehow does not seem to be compatible with Angstrom), or other embedded Linux distribution, it can become as powerful as intelligent agent in monitoring various parameters, like temperature, moisture, so on so forth.	+	This project dabbles in the possibility of setting a web-server written in node.js on the embedded environment and accomplishes the proposed idea of interacting with underlying hardware pins and system via upper-level user interface. node.js is very simple and easy to implement, its non-blocking, event-driven and single-threaded mechanism is exactly suitable for the embedded system and our project gives a good instance of its application. Our demo system can be scaled up with far more features in remote monitoring and smart control industry. If, for example, the nodemailer can work well on the Angstrom (apparently it's working on Ubuntu, but somehow does not seem to be compatible with Angstrom), or other embedded Linux distribution, it can become as powerful as intelligent agent in monitoring various parameters, like temperature, moisture, so on so forth.

@@ Line 73: / Line 73: @@
 <pre>
-fs.writeFileSync("/sys/class/gpio/export", ""+5);
+fs.writeFileSync("/sys/class/gpio/export", "+5");
 </pre>
@@ Line 80: / Line 80: @@
 a) To translate tons of the C codes into JavaScript...including rewriting the union structures like i2c_smbus_write_byte() and i2c_smbus_read_byte(), which requires far more knowledge in understanding how to translate the underlying hardware detail into upper-level script languages...
-b) Try to run the ./myi2c excutable file directly inside nodjs script...
+b) Try to run the ./myi2c excutable file directly inside node.js script...
 * It seems that the second way is easier... We've already found a ActiveXObject.run method... We're working on this... turns out this does not work for some reason.
@@ Line 132: / Line 132: @@
 . The next thing we will do is to refresh the website every other time...
-* We are now able to load html file inside nodejs scripts so that we can put normal HTML stuff inside the web page and load it from server scripts. The following code snippet can accomplish this (borrowed and modified based on Jadon's code):
+* We are now able to load html file inside node.js scripts so that we can put normal HTML stuff inside the web page and load it from server scripts. The following code snippet can accomplish this (borrowed and modified based on Jadon's code):
 <pre>
 function loadHTMLFile(uri, res, temp) {
@@ Line 235: / Line 235: @@
 to apply the change.
-. Our next goal is to toggle LED via web page, whose control flow structure is essentially similar to the i2c communications, plus, we have already learned the way to write to the led pin via nodejs script(see note1 above).
+. Our next goal is to toggle LED via web page, whose control flow structure is essentially similar to the i2c communications, plus, we have already learned the way to write to the led pin via node.js script(see note1 above).
-* Before actually doing that, let's first organize our code in a more hierarchical and reasonable way.Thanks to Mr. Manuel Kiessling's excellent introductory tutorial "[http://www.nodebeginner.org The Node Beginner Book]", which gives a pretty decent explanation on how a formal web server architecture should be constructed using nodejs. Basically, we should maintain an index.js that starts all of our code, have a server.js to actually create the server and listen on the port for any posts from the client side, and pass the request and response to the router.js to handle different requests. In requestHandlers.js, each function then does the real work based on the request information and execute corresponding server responses.
+* Before actually doing that, let's first organize our code in a more hierarchical and reasonable way.Thanks to Mr. Manuel Kiessling's excellent introductory tutorial "[http://www.nodebeginner.org The Node Beginner Book]", which gives a pretty decent explanation on how a formal web server architecture should be constructed using node.js. Basically, we should maintain an index.js that starts all of our code, have a server.js to actually create the server and listen on the port for any posts from the client side, and pass the request and response to the router.js to handle different requests. In requestHandlers.js, each function then does the real work based on the request information and execute corresponding server responses.
 * The following is what's in index.js:
 <pre>
@@ Line 299: / Line 299: @@
 </pre>
-. Now it's time for us to think about how to toggle LED via web page. Turns out it's very similar to how i2c works. However, this time we need to not only parse the uri of the request, but also get the posted data from the request, parse them and write them into the appropriate file system. The event-driven nodejs utilizes "addListener" function to achieve the task, with parameter "data" to receive the data and "end" to handle and process them. The data received(in type of string) should be converted to object class by the "querystring" module.
+. Now it's time for us to think about how to toggle LED via web page. Turns out it's very similar to how i2c works. However, this time we need to not only parse the uri of the request, but also get the posted data from the request, parse them and write them into the appropriate file system. The event-driven node.js utilizes "addListener" function to achieve the task, with parameter "data" to receive the data and "end" to handle and process them. The data received(in type of string) should be converted to object class by the "querystring" module.
 On the client side, we use exclusive radio button to allow user to choose the toggle mode of LED:

@@ Line 17: / Line 17: @@
 * install node.js
-* install node package manager
+ beagle$ '''opkg update'''
-<pre>
+ beagle$ '''opkg install nodejs'''     (about a minute)
-curl http://npmjs.org/install.sh | sh
+ beagle$ '''opkg install nodejs-dev''' (about a minute)
-</pre>
 * install socket.io module
-<pre>
-npm install socket.io
+ beagle$ '''npm install socket.io'''  (45 seconds, but I get an error)
-</pre>
 * install binary module
-<pre>
-npm install binary
+ beagle$ '''npm install binary'''     (30 seconds)
-</pre>
 * install mailer module
-<pre>
-npm install mailer
+ beagle$ '''npm install mailer'''     (5 seconds)
-</pre>
 * install SMTP server postfix

@@ Line 16: / Line 16: @@
 . Additional packages installed via '''opkg''':
-* install nodejs
+* install node.js
 <pre>
 opkg update

@@ Line 5: / Line 5: @@
 == Executive Summary ==
-Our project aims to implement the emerging nodejs technique (the server side javascript) as a lightweight web server on the beagleboard and accomplish a series of remote monitoring and control of hardware pins like gpio/led/i2c on the beagleboard. We also tried to make our web server send automatic email when temperature goes too high. There are a lot of things we can do on the nodejs web server, but we try to make it related to our beagleboard hardware interface.
+Our project aims to implement the emerging node.js technique (the server side javascript) as a lightweight web server on the beagleboard and accomplish a series of remote monitoring and control of hardware pins like gpio/led/i2c on the beagleboard. We also tried to make our web server send automatic email when temperature goes too high. There are a lot of things we can do on the node.js web server, but we try to make it related to our beagleboard hardware interface.
 The automatic email sender is not working correctly. More work needs to be done to set a proper configuration to the SMTP server 'postfix'.
-This turns out to be a very fun application-level project and Node.js is really a very friendly, easy-to-use emerging technology that should be promoted to wider industry use.
+This turns out to be a very fun application-level project and node.js is really a very friendly, easy-to-use emerging technology that should be promoted to wider industry use.
 == Installation Instructions ==

@@ Line 53: / Line 53: @@
 == User Instructions ==
-Go to our github address above, our final work resides in the "new" folder. Pull everything out in that folder, then go into this "new" directory on your host computer, executes the index.js program, then you are good to go:
+Go to our github address above, our final work resides in the "/Project/new" [https://github.com/caoy1/Project/tree/master/new directory]. Pull everything out in that folder, then go into this "new" directory on your host computer, executes the index.js program, then you are good to go:
 <pre>
 node index.js
@@ Line 63: / Line 63: @@
 </pre>
 The webpage will show up and the temperature is real-time updated. You can also select the LED toggle mode on the page, and when you hit "select", the LED light on the board will toggle in the way you specify on the page.
 == Highlights ==

@@ Line 9: / Line 9: @@
 The automatic email sender is not working correctly. More work needs to be done to set a proper configuration to the SMTP server 'postfix'.
-End with a two sentence conclusion.
+This turns out to be a very fun application-level project and Node.js is really a very friendly, easy-to-use emerging technology that should be promoted to wider industry use.
-−
-The sentence count is approximate and only to give an idea of the expected length.
 == Installation Instructions ==
@@ Line 55: / Line 53: @@
 == User Instructions ==
-Once everything is installed, how do you use the program?  Give details here, so if you have a long user manual, link to it here.
+Go to our github address above, our final work resides in the "new" folder. Pull everything out in that folder, then go into this "new" directory on your host computer, executes the index.js program, then you are good to go:
+<pre>
 == Highlights ==
-Here is where you brag about what your project can do.
+Remote monitoring parameters like room temperature, if sensors are equipped on board, and control hardware pins on board, at anywhere, anytime, when you have access to the Internet.
-−
-Consider including a [http://www.youtube.com/ YouTube] demo.
 == Theory of Operation ==
 To build a web server, we need, in essence, both client side and server side scripts. Client side scripts mainly just involve ordinary javascripts that can be embedded in HTML file; while at the server-side, we adopt the emerging node.js, which is a really simple server side script that accomplishes equivalent tasks like ASP, PHP will do, but with even simpler implementation details.
 == Work Breakdown ==
@@ Line 252: / Line 253: @@
 server.start(router.route, handle);
 </pre>
-* And we abstract the server.js to be a general form so it is independent of what will actually be done at the server, such details is left for requestHandlers.js to accomplish:
+* And we abstract the server.js to be a general form so that it is independent of what will actually be done at the server, such details are left for requestHandlers.js to accomplish:
 <pre>
 var http = require("http");
@@ Line 352: / Line 353: @@
 == Conclusions ==
-Give some concluding thoughts about the project. Suggest some future additions that could make it even more interesting.
+This project dabbles in the possibility of setting a web-server written in nodejs on the embedded environment and accomplishes the proposed idea of interacting with underlying hardware pins and system via upper-level user interface. nodejs is very simple and easy to implement, its non-blocking, event-driven and single-threaded mechanism is exactly suitable for the embedded system and our project gives a good instance of its application. Our demo system can be scaled up with far more features in remote monitoring and smart control industry. If, for example, the nodemailer can work well on the Angstrom (apparently it's working on Ubuntu, but somehow does not seem to be compatible with Angstrom), or other embedded Linux distribution, it can become as powerful as intelligent agent in monitoring various parameters, like temperature, moisture, so on so forth.

@@ Line 347: / Line 347: @@
 </pre>
 Another thing to notice is, in order for this requestHandler for led.js not to jump to a brand new web page but stay on the current one, the normal "request.end()" code, which indicates the completion of an intact .js page, should be left out.
 . Eventually we did a little bit beautification on the html page --- somehow CSS does not work as intended, we simply change some font and color of the output to make it a bit neater.
 == Conclusions ==
 Give some concluding thoughts about the project. Suggest some future additions that could make it even more interesting.