John C. Shovic - Raspberry Pi IoT Projects: Prototyping Experiments for Makers

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The Internet of Things (IoT) is a complex concept made up of many computers and many communication paths. Some IoT devices are connected to the Internet and some are not. Some IoT devices form swarms that communicate among themselves. Some are designed for a single purpose, while some are more general-purpose computers. This book is designed to show you the IoT from the inside out. By building IoT devices, the reader will understand the basic concepts and will be able to innovate using the basics to create their own IoT applications.

These included projects will show the reader how to build their own IoT projects and to expand upon the examples shown. The importance of computer security in IoT devices is also discussed as well as various techniques for keeping the IoT safe from unauthorized users or hackers. The most important takeaway from this book is in building the projects yourself.

In this book, we build examples of all the major parts of simple and complex IoT devices.

In Chapter , the basic concepts of IoT are explained in basic terms, and you will learn what parts and tools are needed to start prototyping your own IoT devices.

In Chapter , youll learn how to sense the environment with electronics and that even the behavior of simple LightSwarm type of devices can be very unpredictable.

Chapter introduces important concepts about how to build real systems that can respond to power issues and programming errors by the use of good system design and watchdogs.

Chapter turns a Raspberry Pi into a battery-powered device that senses iBeacons and controls the lighting in a house while reporting your location to a server.

In Chapter , youll do IoT the way the big boys do by connecting to the IBM Bluemix IoT server and sending your biometric pulse rates for storage and display.

In Chapter , well build a small RFID inventory system and use standard protocols like MQTT to send information to a Raspberry Pi, a complete IoT product.

Chapter shows the dark side of the IoT, computer security. The way you protect your IoT device from hackers and network problems is the most difficult part of IoT device and system design.

Are you totally secure? You will never know. Plan for it.

The reference appendix provides resources for further study and suggestions for other projects.

I would like to acknowledge the hard work of the Apress editorial team in putting this book together. I would also like to acknowledge the hard work of the Raspberry Pi Foundation and the Arduino group for putting together products and communities that help to make the Internet of Things more accessible to the general public. Hurray for the democratization of technology! Of course, I have to mention my grandchildren (Lincoln, Hazel, Makenna and Madelyn) that I am constantly building projects to entertain and education them.