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NodeJS/Heroku Clock server for the ESP8266 module

Somewhere I would like to visit..

So from my last post, I got my ESP8266 up and running. The next step is to implement something into the http web server that allows setting time intervals for when the relay is enabled/disabled. The ESP8266 doesn't have a real time clock component so the ESP8266 doesn't actually know real absolute time other than since when it started. Therefore, I need a way to keep track of time. Luckily, it does have access to the internet so I can just poll network time. I decided not to go with the standard method of NTP because the API is rather difficult to find, not to mention the example sketch that polls time/date from NTP servers looks frightening... and lengthy. Getting a network time is easy, you can just google "Vancouver time" and google has an in-line widget that shows you the time of Vancouver. In fact, thousands of websites actually give you time from different cities. However, performing a GET request from the ESP8266 using these sites doesn't seem like the best of ideas since the returned HTML from the HTTP requests are rather large compared to the 96kb of data ram available on the ESP8266. Since I'm using a gateway RESTful server that handles outbound sms text messages, I can just create an auxiliary service that filters time and outputs as simple JSON response which should reduce the size of these web sites (46kb in my case using timeanddate.com) down to less than 300 bytes. That should be much easier for the ESP8266 modules to gobble down.

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ESP8266: DIY $10 IoT Smart Plug Prototype Part 1

I call it the NeMo... :P

Belkin WeMos are cool, but very expensive. One of the incentives of getting the Belkin WeMo, aside from automation, is to both environmentally and financially save on electricity by enabling and disabling your electronics through "smart" controls like IFTTT ("If This Then That") . However, one plug will set you back $59.99 CAD. That's pretty hefty in order to save you money. You can plug a power bar to really make use of it but that means you have no individual control to each devices. If you want a full home automation around the house, you may need 5+ of these to really get things going. Therefore, I set out to make my own.

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Modding Android SystemUI.apk - UIAutomatorViewer Tool

Previously I looked at how to extract the SystemUI package and analyze the layout files to create mods. However, SystemUI is a gigantic package with a lot of branching resource structures. It is not easy figuring out how the packages are structured. With Web applications running on Chrome and Firefox, this is easy. Simply use the DOM Inspector or related tools to click on the element you want to customize, find the id, and do a quick grep search to figure out what source file that element is referenced in. With Android, there isn't a DOM inspector - there is a UIAutomatorViewer. This is a tool intended to help QA Engineers to identify app elements and create automation scripts in frameworks such as Appium. This tool however can also help facilitate the modding process.

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Modding Android SystemUI.apk

Look at that bloated ugliness of a navigation bar.. And it's not even centered!

I've just upgraded my Teclast X98 Air 3G tablet to Android Lollipop and it is faaaantastic. It's incredible how each new Android release makes older hardware run the software with ever more fluidity. However, with the new upgrade means I've lost the stock navigation bars. These Chinese tablets love to mod the navigation bar to include the screenshot, vol+, vol-, and the menu icon (most likely to support Android TV sticks. They look ugly and are a nuisance when I keep accidentally tapping on it. Now to remove this requires modding the stock Android system app SystemUI.apk. I've done this before but I couldn't quite remember it hence I'm leaving a note to myself on how this is done so I won't have to keep googling next time around.

Note: For Windows users, all of these information should be the same, the shell scripts will not work though, you will have to adapt it for batch scripting.

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