A while back Jim posted to the blog about this creation by Caleb Larson, which uses a computer to interface with the web, and then the computer uses an NXT as part of a "display device". Cool. But I was wondering when the NXT would do more of the internet portion of the interaction. Well, along comes Linus Atorf, a regular contributor over on NXTasy, with a way to use the NXT to retrieve and display weather from the internet, nicely documented. Very cool.
Now along comes Xander Soldaat, another NXTasy regular and someone who's been pushing the envelope on both sensors (testing them, making them) and languages (he's written a number of drivers for RobotC). Taking internet-saavy LEGO to the next logical step (and a prototype sensor from Mindsensors), Xander has an NXT that can Twitter. Right now he has it detecting how often his dogs bark. When they bark, the NXT determines the number, and tweets it out to the world. Of course, it could tweet any number of other things: put a pressure sensor in the dog's bed to let you know when they snuggle in for the night. Have an US sensor at the door so you know when they are crossing their rear legs, needing to go outside (heck, train them to push a button to "call" you with a tweet). Tweeting the security state of your house ("the front door has been opened"), or anything else you might want is now fairly easy to do.
Heck, use Linus's method to retrieve data and Xanders to send it, and you could network an unlimited number of NXT all around the world using tweets. They could even start posting and following their own blogs.
What's that phrase? "I for one welcome our new robotic overlords"...
Now along comes Xander Soldaat, another NXTasy regular and someone who's been pushing the envelope on both sensors (testing them, making them) and languages (he's written a number of drivers for RobotC). Taking internet-saavy LEGO to the next logical step (and a prototype sensor from Mindsensors), Xander has an NXT that can Twitter. Right now he has it detecting how often his dogs bark. When they bark, the NXT determines the number, and tweets it out to the world. Of course, it could tweet any number of other things: put a pressure sensor in the dog's bed to let you know when they snuggle in for the night. Have an US sensor at the door so you know when they are crossing their rear legs, needing to go outside (heck, train them to push a button to "call" you with a tweet). Tweeting the security state of your house ("the front door has been opened"), or anything else you might want is now fairly easy to do.
Heck, use Linus's method to retrieve data and Xanders to send it, and you could network an unlimited number of NXT all around the world using tweets. They could even start posting and following their own blogs.
What's that phrase? "I for one welcome our new robotic overlords"...