A while back I built my own thermostat using an Arduino, nodejs, and Google Calendar. It worked really well, but when I moved to a new apartment last year I couldn’t use it (because I now have window units instead of centralized heating/AC). I finally got around to putting it back together this weekend, but I had to rip out the (now unused) thermostat code. What was a Google-Calendar-controlled thermostat is now just a thermometer. Not nearly as cool, but I’m at least glad to have the portion that makes sense back up. You can see it here. Continue reading Hot Or Not: Back Up, Kind Of
Tag: coffeescript
Coffeescript, VowsJS, & Asynchronous Testing
Before releasing my coffeescript RRD library, I needed to write some tests around it (RDT: Release-Driven Testing). I went with Vows (in coffeescript), and I had no problems writing tests around the few synchronous (gasp) functions, but the asynchronous parts just didn’t work. At first, I punted on it, and switched my vows from coffeescript to javascript (which all the docs/examples are in). Later, when I came back to it, I was able to figure out the problem, and a dirty hack to get around it. Continue reading Coffeescript, VowsJS, & Asynchronous Testing
Fork & Extend vs. Build Your Own, a NodeJS Example
For Hot or Not, I wanted to leverage as much existing code (open-source libraries) as possible, so I could focus on the more interesting application logic. I found a library to work with the database (RRD), but there were a few things about it that didn’t fit my needs, so I ended up releasing a new library. What follows are the reasons I decided to build my own solution, and the downsides to that course of action. Continue reading Fork & Extend vs. Build Your Own, a NodeJS Example
Announcing Hot Or Not
My latest project, Hot Or Not, is live! It combines Arduino, NodeJS, Coffeescript, and Google Calendar, to make a thermostat which is remotely controllable via the internet. You can check out graphs of the data on the site, and get the code on github. Continue reading Announcing Hot Or Not