Fish Sitter
Fish Sitter Fish Tank (left). Fish Sitter iOS app (right).
Motivation
While at PennApps S2016, a teammate's fish died from cold weather, and unfortunately, no one was there to turn the tank heater up. We wanted to build a tank and partner smart phone application that would let fish owners monitor their pet fish and adjust the tank settings at all times. With Fish Sitter, no fish owner should have to worry about leaving their fish with them just a tap away.Summary
Fish Sitter is an iOS app that allows fish owners to monitor, feed, and adjust the tank settings for their fish right from their smartphone.
Splash screen for the Fish Sitter iOS application
When opening the app for the first time, users select parameters for their tank (saltwater, freshwater, etc) and identify the speciies of fish in their tank. Fish sitter will automatically select ideal temperature, salinity, and lighting conditions for their tank.
Default settings for the fish tank based on the water type
From the app, users can monitor the temperature,light levels, and salinity of their tank. Users can also adjust the lights in the tank, adjust the heater settings, and feed their fish.
Fish Sitter home page where the fish tank can be monitored and adjusted
Technical Description
The iOS application reads the temperature and light data from a table stored in Parse. This data is written to by an Arduino using an ElectricImp. The sensors used by the Arduino are simple photoresistors for light and heat sensors for temperature. The iOS app can also write to the Parse table to control the heater and the lights. A boolean value is written to turn the heater on and off using an electric relay and a float value from 0.0 to 1.0 is written to control the intensity of the LED light. I built a simple MOSFET amplifier to control the amount of current that goes to the LED to control the intensity.
(Left to Right) Power supply for the heater. Electric relay used to turn the heater on and off. Breadboard with ElectricImp and MOSFET inverster amplifier. Arduino with sensor shield and light/temperature sensors.
Technology Used
Arduino Uno, Electric Imp, Parse, XCode