Building iPhone and iPad Electronic Projects: Real-World Arduino, Sensor, and Bluetooth Low Energy Apps in techBASIC

Why simply play music or go online when you can use your iPhone or iPad for some really fun projects, such as building a metal detector, hacking a radio control truck, or tracking a model rocket in flight? Learn how to build these and other cool things by using iOS device sensors and inexpensive hardware such as Arduino and a Bluetooth Low Energy (LE) Shield.

This hands-on book shows you how to write simple applications with techBASIC, an Apple-approved development environment that runs on iOS devices. By using code and example programs built into techBASIC, you’ll learn how to write apps directly on your Apple device and have it interact with other hardware.

• Build a metal detector with the iOS magnetometer
• Use the HiJack hardware platform to create a plant moisture sensor
• Put your iPhone on a small rocket to collect acceleration and rotation data
• Hack a radio control truck with Arduino and Bluetooth LE
• Create an arcade game with an iPad controller and two iPhone paddles
• Control a candy machine with an iOS device, a micro servo, and a WiFi connection

Mike started programming on a PDP-8 using a teletype terminal. As the personal computer revolution got going he sold his car and rode a bike for several months to raise cash to buy an Apple II computer. He wanted to write a chess program but couldn't find a good assembler, so he took a summer off to write his own. Two years later he finished ORCA/M, which went on to become Apple Programmer's Workshop, the Apple-labeled development environment for the Apple IIGS.

Born the same year as Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, Mike made the mistake of getting an education instead of getting rich. A slow learner, he graduated from the U.S. Air Force Academy in 1977 with a degree in Physics, earned an M.S. in Physics from the University of Denver, and was Working on a Ph.D. when he started making more money from his sideline software company than from the Air Force.

Since then Mike has developed numerous compilers and interpreters, software for mission-critical physics packages for military satellites, plasma physics simulations for Z-pinch experiments, multimedia authoring tools for grade schoolers, disease surveillance programs credited with saving lives of hurricane Katrina refugees, advanced military simulations that protect our nation's most critical assets, and technical computing software for iOS.

Mike currently runs the Byte Works, an independent software publishing and consulting firm. He is a PADI scuba instructor who lives in Albuquerque with his wife and cat, enjoying being an empty nester and spoiling his grandchildren.