IoT device (siren) with RESTful APIs

Question

I am fairly new to the IoT world, so I need help designing a system.

Scenario: I have an application that sends messages to a Service Bus/ Message Queue in Azure. The messages can be classified into three categories:

• CryForHelp [Urgent Issues]
• Applaud [Someone did a great job]
• Sad [Someone needs help not urgent]

Based on the type of message sent to Service Bus I want to play a sound using some IoT device (speaker or siren). Since I am only looking for 3 categories of sounds even if it is not a speaker it is okay.

Cost Requirements: I am looking for a small IoT device that will cost less than $30 so that I can place it in our office area.

Hardware requirements: It can be operated through Restful APIs so that I can integrate it with the Azure Service Bus.

Can someone point me into the right direction? I am not sure what is the right way to design this? Also, what type of Hardware should I be looking for?

Answer 1

I don't think there are many off-the-shelf configurable end products (maybe a Kickstarter idea). The only one I found so far was Hexiware and I have no idea how complete that is. Cost wise, I think you have about the right target in mind.

You absolutely want hardware which has some good eccosystem support rather than being too reliant on a custom stack from the hardware provider (since you only want 10 lines of code on the device). Azure appear to support mbed - which should make using the Hexiware device viable (but only if it provides the right hardware).

If you browse the mbed platform list you can filter by what connectivity they provide. I'm guessing you want ethernet or WiFi, unless you're planning on using an old phone as a gateway. You'll also need to consider power. The mbed boards should all run from a USB power supply (so you could use office PCs maybe).

Finally, you'll need to think about cases. Maybe 3D printing something is a good idea here. Thingiverse doesn't have many yet, but that may change.

Interesting project - share your progress (assuming this is a personal project).

Answer 2

The device you can use is: Raspberry Pi, it will cost you around $30 like you want for your budget.

The best thing with Raspberry Pi is you can install Ubuntu / Debian flavours of Linux on it and then install a LAMP stack on it. Using PHP / Python as the Language you can communicate to the device Using REST API's and can achieve the effect you want.

For detail usage of REST services on the Pi you can get help from https://doc.airvantage.net/av/howto/hardware/samples/rpi-rest-pyth/

Find Raspberry Pi and related products on https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_4_12?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=raspberry+pi+zero+w&sprefix=raspberry+pi%2Caps%2C1053&crid=3F1MTOI0DL29V

You can also get products on https://www.radioshack.com

If you plan to use Windows IoT Core you can buy the Raspberry Pi 3 and get going. https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/iot

Answer 3

If you want an off-the-shelf solution, you might want to consider the D-Link Wi-Fi Siren. It is currently available for $49.99, and has six different siren sounds. It connects directly to a Wi-Fi router.

Currently, the only way to connect to it from an external service (that I could find) is via IFTTT. You could set up a recipe that would:

• receive a call from a webhook
• then play a sound with the siren.

If you're willing to design something yourself, you'll probably avoid the issue of funnelling all your requests through IFTTT, but as a straightforward, off-the-shelf solution, it might be easier, and it isn't way out your price range.