Hands-On Internet of Things with Blynk

Build on the power of Blynk to configure smart devices and build exciting IoT projects

Pradeeka Seneviratne

• Publisher: Packt Publishing
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781788997065
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Computer Science
• Subtopic: Hardware
• Index: Computer Science

Connect things to create amazing IoT applications in minutesAbout This Book• Use Blynk cloud and Blynk server to connect devices• Build IoT applications on Android and iOS platforms• A practical guide that will show how to connect devices using Blynk and Raspberry Pi 3Who This Book Is ForThis book is targeted at any stakeholder working in the IoT sector who wants to understand how Blynk works and build exciting IoT projects. Prior understanding of Raspberry Pi, C/C++, and electronics is a must.What You Will Learn• Build devices using Raspberry Pi and various sensors and actuators• Use Blynk cloud to connect and control devices through the Blynk app• Connect devices to Blynk cloud and server through Ethernet and Wi-Fi• Make applications using Blynk apps (App Builder) on Android and iOS platforms• Run Blynk personal server on the Windows, MAC, and Raspberry Pi platformsIn DetailBlynk, known as the most user-friendly IoT platform, provides a way to build mobile applications in minutes. With the Blynk drag-n-drop mobile app builder, anyone can build amazing IoT applications with minimal resources and effort, on hardware ranging from prototyping platforms such as Arduino and Raspberry Pi 3 to industrial-grade ESP8266, Intel, Sierra Wireless, Particle, Texas Instruments, and a few others.This book uses Raspberry Pi as the main hardware platform and C/C++ to write sketches to build projects. The first part of this book shows how to set up a development environment with various hardware combinations and required software. Then you will build your first IoT application with Blynk using various hardware combinations and connectivity types such as Ethernet and Wi-Fi. Then you'll use and configure various widgets (control, display, notification, interface, time input, and some advanced widgets) with Blynk App Builder to build applications. Towards the end, you will learn how to connect with and use built-in sensors on Android and iOS mobile devices. Finally you will learn how to build a robot that can be controlled with a Blynk app through the Blynk cloud and personal server.By the end of this book, you will have hands-on experience building IoT applications using Blynk.Style and approachA step-by-step guide that will help you build simple yet exciting project in no time.

Setting Up a Development Environment

Blynk is known as the most user-friendly IoT platform consisting of an app builder that can be run on iOS and Android operating systems, and a set of libraries to build amazing IoT applications in minutes with your favorite hardware platform. It allows you to quickly build interfaces by simply dragging and dropping widgets to control and monitor your hardware projects from your iOS and Android device.

In this chapter, you will learn about:

• Hardware platforms, connection types, architecture, ecosystem, and online resources
• Installing Blynk app builder on Android
• Creating a user account with the Blynk app builder to log in to Blynk Cloud
• Creating a new project with Blynk
• Preparing Raspberry Pi by adding SD card, Ethernet cable, Wi-Fi dongle, and power supply
• Writing Raspbian Stretch Lite on Raspberry Pi by flashing image to SD card with Etcher
• Configuring SSH on Raspberry Pi
• Installing prerequisite packages such as git-core and WiringPi on Raspberry Pi
• Using PuTTY to connect with Raspberry Pi with SSH protocol
• Configuring wireless connection on Raspberry Pi for Raspbian Stretch Lite
• Connecting Raspberry Pi with Blynk Cloud by running the sample C++ source file

What is Blynk?

Blynk was born as a Kickstarter project created by Pasha Baiborodin, and backed by 2,321 supporters who pledged $49,235 to help bring it to life. This is more than the finally announced stretched goal that is $26,000. Blynk is one of the successfully completed projects listed on Kickstarter (https://www.kickstarter.com/):

Kickstarter campaign page for Blynk

Hardware platforms

Blynk supports hardware platforms such as Arduino, Raspberry Pi, and similar microcontroller boards to build hardware for your projects. The following is a list of some microcontroller boards that can be coupled with Blynk:

• Espressif (ESP8266, ESP32, NodeMCU, WeMos D1, Adafruit HUZZAH, SparkFun Blynk Board, SparkFun ESP8266 Thing)
• Linux (C++) (Raspberry Pi, Ubuntu)
• Arduino (Arduino UNO, Arduino MKR1000, Arduino MKRZero, Arduino Yun, Arduino 101, Arduino Zero, Arduino M0, Arduino M0 Pro, Arduino Nano, Arduino Leonardo, Arduino Due, Arduino Mega 2560, Arduino Mega 1280, Arduino Mega ADK, Arduino Micro, Arduino Pro Micro, Arduino Mini, Arduino Pro Mini, Arduino Fio, Arduino Decimilia, Arduino Duemilanove, Arduino Pro, Arduino Ethernet, Arduino Leonardo ETH, Arduino Industrial 101)
• Particle (particle core, particle photon, particle electron)

You can read the list of up-to-date hardware that you can use with Blynk at https://github.com/blynkkk/blynkkk.github.io/blob/master/SupportedHardware.md.

Connection types

Blynk supports the following connection types to connect your microcontroller board (hardware) with the Blynk Cloud and Blynk's personal server:

• Ethernet
• Wi-Fi
• Bluetooth
• Cellular
• Serial

However, throughout this book, you will only focus on Wi-Fi and Ethernet connection types to connect with Blynk Cloud and Blynk's personal server.

Blynk architecture

The Blynk platform includes the following components:

• Blynk app builder: Allows to you build apps for your projects using various widgets. It is available for Android and iOS platforms.
• Blynk server: Responsible for all the communications between your mobile device that's running the Blynk app and the hardware. You can use the Blynk Cloud or run your private Blynk server locally. It's open source, could easily handle thousands of devices, and can even be launched on a Raspberry Pi.
• Blynk libraries: Enables communication with the server and processes all the incoming and outcoming commands from your Blynk app and the hardware. They are available for all the popular hardware platforms.

All the aforementioned components communicate with each other to build a fully functional IoT application tha...