If this is a sign of the times, the Internet of Things promises a lot of entertainment for hackers who can come up with wacky ideas and interactive projects. [Brandon] built a cowbell that rings when you tweet #morecowbell. Why? Because!
On the hardware side it is quite simple, and can be built in a number of different ways depending on the parts you have lying around. [Brandon] used an Electric Imp and its corresponding breakout board. A Sparkfun mini FET shield helps drive the solenoid that hits the cowbell. And because he had one lying around, he added a counter across the solenoid to count the number of times the Twitterati have rung the Cowbell.
The code for the Electric Imp consists of two parts – the “agent code” that runs on a server in the Electric Imp Cloud and the “device code” that runs on the imp itself – and is available at this Git link. Once you tweet with the hashtag, the Cowbell replies back, randomly selecting one from a list of stored responses. Would be nice to see a video of the Cowbell in action. And if it can be made to play the Salsa beat.
Ok, this one needs a live stream!
Sure, why the heck not!
Anything involving Electric Imp is #notahack.
Go away.
Are you the Milhouse of your friend group?
I don’t hear any cowbells ringing in YOUR house.
Kind of useless. I still love it!
Add 11 differently tuned cowbells (or their samples) to make a full octave, then let people tweet full tunes, or add one account for each cowbell and let the intertubes play them randomly.
Gotta have more cowbell!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCd0OjjCz88
I got a fever…
Feature ideas:
1) It plays the cowbell at a maximum speed of 141 bpm (which a quick google is the beats per minute of the song).
2) Anyone who tweets #morecowbell can add to a queue of upcoming beats
3) For as long as the queue has cowbells, it’ll play the song in time with the cowbells (I’d replace the intro 1-2-3-4 with cowbell and start the music on ‘5’)
4) Close the loop and put a webcam on it.
super dank memes up in here
Why TF is this imp BS still used?
You have ZERO controll over your own piece of hw and must rely on the vendor to run their servers.
We have the awesome ESP8266 with an open SDK.
And here I thought they were going to use the cowbell as a feedhorn for the WIFI.
aha.. Cowbell persciption filled. If you experience fever, seek medical attention.