Making Things Talk: Physical Computing with Sensors, Networks, and Arduino

Make microcontrollers, PCs, servers, and smartphones talk to each other.

Building electronic projects that interact with the physical world is good fun. But when the devices you've built start to talk to each other, things really get interesting. With 33 easy-to-build projects, Making Things Talk shows you how to get your gadgets to communicate with you and your environment. It’s perfect for people with little technical training but a lot of interest.

Maybe you're a science teacher who wants to show students how to monitor the weather in several locations at once. Or a sculptor looking to stage a room of choreographed mechanical sculptures. In this expanded edition, you’ll learn how to form networks of smart devices that share data and respond to commands.

• Call your home thermostat with a smartphone and change the temperature.
• Create your own game controllers that communicate over a network.
• Use ZigBee, Bluetooth, Infrared, and plain old radio to transmit sensor data wirelessly.
• Work with Arduino 1.0, Processing, and PHP―three easy-to-use, open source environments.
• Write programs to send data across the Internet, based on physical activity in your home, office, or backyard.

Whether you want to connect simple home sensors to the Internet, or create a device that can interact wirelessly with other gadgets, this book explains exactly what you need.

Tom Igoe teaches courses in physical computing and networking, exploring ways to allow digital technologies to sense and respond to a wider range of human physical expression. He has a background in theatre, and his work centers on physical interaction related to live performance and public space. He is a co-author of the book Physical Computing: Sensing and Controlling the Physical World with Computers, which has been adopted by numerous digital art and design programs around the world. Projects include a series of networked banquet table centerpieces and musical instruments; an email clock; and a series of interactive dioramas, created in collaboration with M.R. Petit. He has consulted for The American Museum of the Moving Image, EAR Studio, Diller + Scofidio Architects, Eos Orchestra, and others.