Lux

Internet-connected Photon-enabled relay module for controlling lights.

About

This is an IoT open source and open hardware project for controlling a relay over the internet. The project is intended to be used for controlling lights, but it can really be used for controlling anything (coffee machine, fan, heater, water pump, etc.).

This project uses the amazing internet-connected Photon and a relay module. The photon exposes a function called relay to manipulate the relay over the internet and a cloud variable lightState to get the current state (on/off).

Read more about Particle variables here.

Read more about Particle functions here.

The relay function

The relay function takes an optional param to determine the kind of action to perform on the relay. If the parameter is not present, the function will toggle the relay (on if it's currently off and vice versa).

Additionally, the parameter can be a string either on or off to force that state on the relay.

The resulting state is returned as an integer inside the data of the response in a variable called return_value. If the value is 1 the current state is on.

The lightState variable

Simple. Returns true if the relay is on and false if it's off.

Setup

Materials

• Photon
• Relay module (like this one)
• Breadboard
• Some breadboard jumper wires
• Button (optional)
• LED (optional)

Connections

As seen in the code, the relay must be connected to the Photon's D0 pin, the button to D2 and the status LED to pin D7. Depending on the relay module you might have to connect it to ground and the 5V pin as well (more info on relays here).

The relay's terminals must be connected as a switch cutting the AC power to whatever you are trying to control. To achieve this I disassemble a power strip (like this one) and replaced the switch with my relay.

⚠️ WARNING: Be extremely careful when manipulating AC. It's dangerous. If you don't know what you're doing, just don't do it. I am not responsible for you not being careful enough.

Deploy

To deploy this on your Photon, you have two options: the we IDE provided by Particle or connecting your device via USB to your computer.

I suggest using the IDE because it's the easiest and fastest way.

For the web IDE read here.

For USB connection read here.

Particle credentials

Once your device is all set, you will need your credentials to operate it.

You will need a device ID and an access token. The device ID can be found here and the access token here inside the settings.

Usage

Because we exposed the cloud function and variable, in order to use it we just need to make HTTP calls!

Webhooks

Let there be light

Make an HTTP POST request as follows:

POST /v1/devices/<DEVICE-ID>/relay?access_token=<ACCESS-TOKEN> HTTP/1.1
Host: api.particle.io
Cache-Control: no-cache
Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded

param=on

Where <DEVICE-ID> is your device's ID and <ACCESS-TOKEN> is a valid access token.

Example (cURL):

$> curl --request POST \
  --url 'https://api.particle.io/v1/devices/9999999999/relay?access_token=AAAA9999ZZZZ' \
  --header 'Cache-Control: no-cache' \
  --header 'Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded' \
  --data param=on

Let there be darkness

Make an HTTP POST request as follows:

POST /v1/devices/<DEVICE-ID>/relay?access_token=<ACCESS-TOKEN> HTTP/1.1
Host: api.particle.io
Cache-Control: no-cache
Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded

param=off

Where <DEVICE-ID> is your device's ID and <ACCESS-TOKEN> is a valid access token.

Example (cURL):

$> curl --request POST \
  --url 'https://api.particle.io/v1/devices/9999999999/relay?access_token=AAAA9999ZZZZ' \
  --header 'Cache-Control: no-cache' \
  --header 'Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded' \
  --data param=off

Let there be toggle

Make an HTTP POST request as follows:

POST /v1/devices/<DEVICE-ID>/relay?access_token=<ACCESS-TOKEN> HTTP/1.1
Host: api.particle.io
Cache-Control: no-cache
Content-Type: multipart/form-data;

Where <DEVICE-ID> is your device's ID and <ACCESS-TOKEN> is a valid access token.

Example (cURL):

$> curl --request POST \
  --url 'https://api.particle.io/v1/devices/9999999999/relay?access_token=AAAA9999ZZZZ' \
  --header 'Cache-Control: no-cache'

Get the current state

Make an HTTP GET request as follows:

GET /v1/devices/<DEVICE-ID>/lightState?access_token=<ACCESS-TOKEN> HTTP/1.1
Host: api.particle.io
Cache-Control: no-cache

Where <DEVICE-ID> is your device's ID and <ACCESS-TOKEN> is a valid access token.

Example (cURL):

$> curl --request GET \
  --url 'https://api.particle.io/v1/devices/9999999999/lightState?access_token=AAAA9999ZZZZ' \
  --header 'Cache-Control: no-cache'

You will get a response like this:

{
  "cmd": "VarReturn",
  "name": "lightState",
  "result": false,
  "coreInfo": {
    "last_app": "",
    "last_heard": "2018-05-24T09:36:46.971Z",
    "connected": true,
    "last_handshake_at": "2018-05-11T11:29:18.741Z",
    "deviceID": "9999999999",
    "product_id": 1
  }
}

The result attribute is what you're interested in.

Android App

I also built an Android app using Meteor to control this switch. Go check it out: github.com/juangesino/photon.

Contributing

1. Fork it ( https://github.com/juangesino/lux/fork )
2. Create your feature branch (git checkout -b my-new-feature)
3. Commit your changes (git commit -am 'Add some feature')
4. Push to the branch (git push origin my-new-feature)
5. Create a new Pull Request

License

See MIT-LICENSE.