Ancient history - Tresmec

Around the 1990 I did some work for a company called Tresmec (group Acquatechnik) via an intermediary.
I did use the ST6 as microcontroller for a tool and a PC to build up a test machine for such tool, interfacing with a custom interface.

Ancient history - SIPI

My first job I had after finish the military service was in SIPI.
There I did develop firmware for devices based on Z80 to control industrial machines, mainly scales.

Ancient history - Energo Project

I decided to put together some articles on some jobs I did in the past.
The first one is going back to the 1990 and is a code I developed to manage a solar powered heating on a company called Energo Project (today the company still exists but did change the business and its name is SolarSpot).

Video tests with Raspberry Pi

Tests to check quality and feasibility to use a Raspberry Pi to track objects in movement.
In order to create an object follower, is important to see if the quality of the video is good enough.

Recycling an old toy

For some tests for a project I needed a moving base.
The ideal would be a robot, many kits are available now.
But before to spend money I wanted to see if some results were achievable and the quality of a camera.
So I did find an old toy made years before with my daughter and ...

MacOS - duplicate an SD card

Very few notes about how to duplicate an SD card or micro SD card using a Mac.
All these operations are done via terminal.

Raspberry streaming audio

One of the future projects I decided to do is to retrofit an old radio with an IP radio.
Very probably I will start with Raspberry and one of the many many projects is possible to find.
To start, mostly to see what kind of quality I can expect, I decided to build the Pimoroni kit for a pirate radio.

HVAC connections

The "new" thermostat found in an antique mall

In an antique mall I did find a new (well, not really new) WiFi thermostat from Honeywell (Lyric T5), so I decided to change the current one I have at home ( a quite basic and simple one).


I think there is a "right way" to do things, so even for a trivial work like changing a thermostat, I find useful to document and explain what doing and why.

IoT - node-red tips

Playing with node-red I did hit a couple of problems.
This page collects some tips/suggestions/FAQ to easy deal with this great program.

fHelper - MQTT edition

Ok, time to sum up this version of fHelper project.

After a series of tests and experiments, the Huzzah32 client is quite stable and reliable to read the capacitive soil sensor.

After adding a ambient temperature and humidity sensor (AM2302 or DHT-22) and setting a dashboard using node-red, the project is ready for the final stage, using a PCB to hold the client.