How about an E Ink device that can keep track of the daily power situation and track power outages? It is just such a device that a Ukrainian national by the name Dmytro Panin has developed, hacker.io reported. Of course, the Blackout Logger, as the device is named, has been driven by necessity given the fragile power situation they are facing at the moment owing to the ongoing war. Powered by a Raspberry Pi Pico, the device is designed to not only keep a tab on the daily power outage they are facing but also deduce if there is a pattern in it. That way, it can then try and predict when the next outage is going to happen.
I’ve built a device to keep track and try to predict rolling blackouts in my neighborhood. This allows my household to make better short term plans. The device is powered by a @Raspberry_Pi Pico.
Instructions and source code: https://t.co/REjbphx6Nl pic.twitter.com/hbD3gDTjQo— Dmytro Panin (@dr2mod) November 13, 2022
“I’ve built a device to keep track and try to predict rolling blackouts in my neighborhood,” Panin explains. “This allows my household to make better short-term plans. The device is powered by a Raspberry Pi Pico.”
Panin said the device runs software that has been written in MicroPython. The working principle is pretty much simple though. The device keeps a tab on the time using a battery-powered DS3231 real-time clock which records the time when the power is gone and then again when it has been restored. All of such data is then written to a log. With such data, Panin says he will have a better idea of all that is happening with the power situation and plan his activities accordingly. That can be to arrange the family meal times or other activities to ensure they are able to make the most of when the power is restored.
Specifically, the hardware used in the entire project includes the Raspberry Pi Pico, Precision RTC Module (DS3231), and Waveshare E Ink 3.7. The software, as already stated, is written in MicroPython 1.19.1. More details can be obtained from Panin’s GitHub page.
With a keen interest in tech, I make it a point to keep myself updated on the latest developments in technology and gadgets. That includes smartphones or tablet devices but stretches to even AI and self-driven automobiles, the latter being my latest fad. Besides writing, I like watching videos, reading, listening to music, or experimenting with different recipes. The motion picture is another aspect that interests me a lot, and I'll likely make a film sometime in the future.
