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Audio & Visual Cue System for Anosmia (Smell Disorder) and Smart WheelChair - Ft. Amazon's Alexa
Week 2: July 10 - 16
The second week has been less progressive due to personal works but I managed to schedule some time to allow myself to explore new areas with regards to this design challenge. Also, Amazon's Echo Dot [Bought Online] followed by the Arduino MKR1000 IoT Bundle [Sponsored] were delivered this week. The IoT bundle is sufficient with all the components required to get started with your first IoT project. It also has what I require to start with my project. This blog will be mainly to cover what the IoT Bundle contains, its Unboxing and Echo Dot Unboxing with a small test to check whether it is working or not.
Arduino MKR1000 IoT Bundle Unboxing
The Design for a Cause Challenge: The Kit page is attractive with many components as part of the sponsored kit. Moreover, it has a separate Arduino MKR1000 IoT Bundle which has much more components. This makes it look like a Jackpot! jkutzsch has done a helpful task by listing down the contents of the IoT bundle in the comments section of the kit page. So I'll just list down below the main contents of the kit and the mark the ones which will be useful for my project with a tick/ check mark. 
- Arduino MKR1000 Dev Board (With Mounted Pin Headers)
- Arduino MKR1000 IoT Bundle
- SD Card Shield for Arduino MKR, Daughter Board
- Arduino MKR1000 & UNO Shield Interface Adapter Board
- EKMC1601111EKMC1601111PIR Sensor
- ADXL335Z Evaluation Board
- 38KHz IR Sensor
- HC-SR04 Ultrasonic Sensor for Arduino & Pi
- Arduino MKR1000 Dev Board (With Mounted Pin Headers)
I received the kit package this week and thanks to Element14 Community, danzima, and UPS for safely delivering the package. However, the outer cardboard package was out of shape [See Unboxing Video]. Surprisingly, the inner contents were left undamaged.
Getting Started with Arduino MKR1000 was quite hassle-free with the help of this document found in this link. I had used Arduino IDE V1.8.5. The installation process resulted in an error while downloading the package in Arduino IDE V1.6.9. Hence I switched to the latest version. As always you have the joy when you blink an LED successfully in a new dev board. I'll try to cover some examples and code snippets which will be useful to play with the IoT bundle in the forthcoming blogs.
Below is the unboxing video of the Arduino MKR1000 IoT Bundle. Join me in unpacking the bundle of happiness!
I am working on improving the audio and voice quality for my videos. For now, I have added subtitles to make the viewers understand the content better.
Amazon Echo Dot Unboxing
The world of Alexa is completely new to me. But I wanted to explore this and Design for a Cause - Design Challenge has provided an opportunity for that. I was inspired by these episodes of the Ben Heck's show - Episode 325: Alexa Automated Workbench Part 1 and Episode 326: Alexa Automated Workbench Part 2. To explore Alexa we need an Alexa enabled device. Hence I bought the Amazon Echo Dot which was the cheapest of the available. Getting Started is easy with a printed documentation along with the Echo Dot package. You will also need to install the Alexa mobile app in order to get started. The next steps will be creating an intent and checking how it works using Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Alexa Skills Kit. I'll cover these in the forthcoming blogs.
Below is the unboxing video of the Amazon Echo Dot along with a small test for it.
I am working on improving the audio and voice quality for my videos. For now, I have added subtitles to make the viewers understand the content better.
Progress made so far,
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