4 replies to this topic

[monstermind]

ok ive put my last project on hold to start an older project ive been tinkering with for about a year now.im wanting to make a hydroponic greenhouse monitoring program ,now when i say hydroponic greenhouse a few things should come to mind such as~ nutrient/ppm meters,water temp,room temp,lighting,and humidity.

now to start off i dont know much on programming but i can wire everything together

---starting off with the nutrient meters-i want 3 sensors in the water tank that when pinged pull the ppm data and average all three readings together or can give the data for each sensor.

---water temp-2 sensors that when pinged can either average the data or give seperate readings,i would like also to have a thermostat option so say the water temp rises from a set 65 to 67 it would turn on an appliance to cool the water until it was 1 degree below its set limit then turn off.

----room temp and humidity go together-i basicly need the room temp to do the same as the water temp,only 1 sensor is needed though ,it needs to have an adjustable thermostat that upon passing a set degree turns on either an appliance or a small servo motor that opens a mechanical air vent,

----final step lighting-i want to have the lights on a timer ,so the program would engage or disengage a relay that powers the lights on a set timer(i have bad luck with mechanical timers lol)

----ok now for the add-ons-2 camera apps that will record the greenhouse from seed to harvest.and if im able to i would like to be able to control the whole program remotly from say a cellphone (live camera feed(very encrypted channel if possible) and override to all controls in the program)

so if anyone can help me start feel free to step in if your not sure ofwhat i mean on somthing just ask

Edited by dargueta, 27 July 2011 - 08:21 PM.
Added line breaks to make it more readable

[dargueta]

Mod note: Changed spacing on the above post to make it more readable.

monstermind: This is a long and difficult programming project. Really. You're going to have to find/write device drivers, learn the API to write the software controllers, find and a way to hook these all up to a computer, probably create some customized hardware, create the management software and the GUI...I can tell you right now this project will cost some serious cash and time. How much did you get done in the past year?

EDIT: Looking over this again, it's definitely going to involve designing customized hardware. You'll probably have to either learn Verilog and do it yourself, or pay someone to do it all for you.

[bbqroast]

Actually with parallel ports providing you are semi decent with circuit wiring (eg you can assemble from a diagram) it could be not to hard. You will however need a dedicated computer (OK, it could be used for other stuff but needs to be on).

Quote

---starting off with the nutrient meters-i want 3 sensors in the water tank that when pinged pull the ppm data and average all three readings together or can give the data for each sensor.

I hope you are good with math, I guess if you could set them up so they let more current through under certain conditions and then monitor the input on your parallel port (you may need two BTW don't use built in ones that are wired to your motherboard- one short circut and you could kill like the entire computer).

Quote

----final step lighting-i want to have the lights on a timer ,so the program would engage or disengage a relay that powers the lights on a set timer(i have bad luck with mechanical timers lol)

A cron job in Linux I guess, as parallel ports can only handle 5 ish volts you would need to set up some fancy switches.

Quote

----ok now for the add-ons-2 camera apps that will record the greenhouse from seed to harvest.and if im able to i would like to be able to control the whole program remotly from say a cellphone (live camera feed(very encrypted channel if possible) and override to all controls in the program)

Yeah this will be tough, why does it need to be so secure I mean its just a greenhouse. I guess a SSL forcing webpage would be sufficient.

So yeah you will be programming this probably in Python (or C++ in which case you will need PHP to do the webpage).

This brings to mind that tutorial on how to make (and program) your own sonar system.

[dargueta]

bbqroast said:

Actually with parallel ports providing you are semi decent with circuit wiring (eg you can assemble from a diagram) it could be not to hard.

I'm not quite sure what you mean by this. You'd have to be really careful with the driving voltages and stuff. And just because you can do IO from a parallel port, you'd still have to write software to interpret the signals and have hardware that can do the same. Did I miss something?

[monstermind]

first off thankyou for answering dar and bbq,i know this might take some time and cash but its worth it.ok first yes i can wire from a diagram,dar im looking into verilog and ill try to familiurize myself with it.i havent done much,ive drawn out how the program should look and how each part should act,and setup a main pc for it(only used for greenhouse).now instead of using the parallel posts could we run it through usb and have the program flashed onto the chip so we wouldnt have to worry about driving voltages and have a 12-24v outside power supply to run everything (had a longer more detailed message typed but it didnt post it and i forgot how i worded all of it so i hope i didnt forget anything,
any questions just ask))