eRIC Kit Multi-Platform Development Tool based on eRIC Module

As a team, we work on trying to make DIY easier, and our satisfaction comes from removing hurdles for enthusiasts. We plan to take the Vinculum FTDI chip and the eRIC module and turn them into a kit, which comes with a model, open source app that can be customized. We will demonstrate an app that can interact with several nodes and from there you can take the kit in any direction you like.

We propose to develop a multipurpose toolkit eRIC Kit that can be used for different applications. E.g.: Coordination of assistance during disaster management for aid distribution, control of autonomous agents for reconnaissance , maintaining sensor nodes in a server farm, agricultural farm etc. This is achieved by designing the toolkit such that it can interface with devices that run Android Operating System or a Windows laptop/MacBook

The eRICKit Hardware consists of the Vinculum FTDI chip and the eRIC module. The Vinculum FTDI chip comes with a dual USB host/slave controller. This dual controller enables interfacing the module as a slave to Android devices that come with host capabilities - Android OS 3.0, as well as an Android accessory on other Android devices - Android 3.0, and Mac/Windows devices. The Vinculum FTDI chip interacts with the eRIC module via an UART interface.

This dual functionality enables us to write an android app to control a gateway device to scan and interact with other sensor nodes or enable firmware updates to the module. We will write the open source eRIC Kit App using this principle. This app can be used to control the network, or be customized as necessary. An example application will be implemented and the source code will be made available through GitHub.

E.g.: Example Application: Farming

Context: ‘n’ sensor nodes have to deployed in a farm. All these nodes have to be maintained using an Android device by a technician across a greenhouse. Across the greenhouse are nodes that where the eRIC modules are interfaced to devices like Raspberry Pi’s, Galileo’s, Arduino’s etc. that perform various tasks. They are bi-functional devices: they sense and collect data, and perform automated actions based on thresholds and/or when directed through the gateway by an operator.

Sensing functions include sensing temperature, humidity, pH and available CO2 levels. This data is also continually collected and transmitted to the gateway so that big data endeavors can be undertaken - publishing visualizations, gaining insights into plant growth, response to stimuli and even “big data” applications such as the impact of CO2 concentration due to Global Warming on agriculture.

Actionable functions include turning on sprinklers, releasing CO2 or other gases to change atmospheric conditions, opening vents or raising/lowering windows to modulate sunlight, etc.

Getting started: The eRIC Kit Android App, written using the eRIC OS APIs is downloaded to the sensor nodes through the Vinculum FTDI chip. Here, the Vinculum chip is a slave. A gateway device is implemented. This gateway device can be remotely controlled, provides updates, checks for node-health and provides status updates, uploads data and controls the needs automatically or manually. It can be connected to the USB port of an Android device -in this case the Vinculum chip acts either as a slave or host depending upon the flavour of the Android OS .

Deployment and Maintenance of the devices: Once the sensor nodes have been deployed, the gateway device that is interfaced to the Android device connects to the device using the device drivers provided by FTDI.

The App is used to scan for devices on select channels and perform activities like data collection, firmware updates etc. In our sample app, CO2 levels are noted and reported.

The duality of the Vinculum FTDI chip combined with the capabilities of the eRIC module enables using this Gateway module + sensor node combination across different applications.

We backed this very cool Node CO2 sensor through Kickstarter and have already interfaced it with an Android Watch using their sample code. We can extend this for our current demonstration. Android, Raspberry Pi, Kickstarter and Galileo are regular names that appear with the highest frequency on our day to day conversations, so you can rest assured that we will leave you with something really cool to build on!