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Build a REST API using Node and Express.js

Hello Sailors, if you are a programmer you would have heard about APIs or have developed APIs in JAVA, Python or any language. Today, we are going to build an API which sends random nutrition tips as response, with Nodejs and Express.js. Sounds interesting! What is an API? API stands for Application Program Interface. Ho ho ho! this just made my life, what an explanation! Well, an API is a set of functions and procedures that allow you to create applications which access the data of an application or service. Why do we need an API? When we want to build an android application, a web application and a desktop application because there are different type of users, so instead of building separate logic for all of these applications, we will build an API and all these applications will consume this API and serves the purpose. Here's another example : You have built a printer which prints great on paper but still no one buys it because you do not provide them any tool ...
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Build a facebook chatbot with API.AI (zero coding)

Hello Sailors, chatbot has been the buzz-word these days, many businesses are looking to implement chatbots to their sites or facebook pages to convert traffic into customers. Today in this tutorial, we are going to create a simple conversational facebook chatbot which can send you jokes, images and also it can do a small talk. Messenger bots simply blend artificial intelligence with human interaction. User asks a question and chatbot gives relevant answer to serve the purpose. What do we need to build our facebook chatbot? API.AI  account - A natural language understanding platform to design and integrate intelligent sophisticated conversational user interfaces. Facebook for developers account - To create a facebook app. Facebook page - Chatbot feature is only available to pages, not personal accounts. What we are going to do We are going to subscribe our API.AI agent to read all messages we receive on our Facebook page and in turn our agent processes the messag...
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Automate irrigation system over internet

Hello Sailors! We are back with one more awesome IOT project where we are going to automate irrigation system. The system  can be used in homes to water the plants any time and can also be scheduled so even if you forget to water plants (lazy like me), just schedule the device and your plants get water regularly. That's another great use of IOT, aah! Overview We are going to control an AC water pump using NodeMCU/ESP8266 and blynk application. The Blynk app will have a switch controlling the pump to switch ON/OFF and an Eventor widget to schedule our pump switching with time. This way plants can be irrigated by manual switching or by scheduling with time. Things we need Hardware NodeMCU/ESP8266 5V relay Water Pump Water pipes (0.5 inch) Water flow splitter Water container Pipe clamps Jumper Wires 5V and 3.3V power supply Software Arduino IDE Blynk app If you have already setup the  Time Scheduled electric switch   go ahead to setup the water...
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Setup Mosquitto MQTT broker in Windows

MQTT (Message Queueing Telemetry Transport) is a Client Server messaging transport protocol. It provides a lightweight method of carrying messages using a publish/subscribe model. The pub/sub model being lighweight makes it suitable for IOT messaging with low power devices, sensors, phones or microcontrollers. How MQTT works? MQTT follows publish/subscribe model which is alternative to server-client model where client communicates directly with server. The pub/sub model defines the client which send a message(publisher) to another client which received that message(subscriber). The subscriber and publisher are unaware of the presence of each other. The main part, which we call the Broker, which our both publisher and subscriber are aware of, filters all the coming messages and distributes them respectively. Now we know what is MQTT and how it works. Let's dive in to set this up on Windows 7/8/10. Mosquitto: This is an open source message broker used for handling lightwe...
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Time scheduled electric switch controlled with Blynk app

Most of the times when we go out of home for some days, we think of having some device that could switch ON/OFF (let's say)  Refrigerator  (or any other important appliance)   for some hours during the day. Today, we are going to make such time scheduled electric switch which switches ON/OFF at times which we set the in our Blynk app. Woah! Let's begin! Things we need: Hardware: 5V relay NodeMCU Jumper wires Breadboard 3V3 and 5V power source Electrical Wires Software: Arduino IDE BLYNK app It's circuit is same as we have created for our Smart Switch . So, if you already have that circuit set up, go ahead with Blynk app set up and Start playing. Circuit: Connections: D5 pin of NodeMCU connects to IN1 pin of 5V relay. 3V3 of NodeMCU connects to 3V3 powers source and GND to GND. Vcc of relay connects to 5V source and GND to GND. Live wire is connected directly to appliance. Neutral wire from source comes to relay NC pin and another w...
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Control switch over internet with BLYNK

Yo... yo... yo... Shippers! It's been quite a few days that we have not built anything awesome. Come let's gather up the stuff and get ready to roll. Today, we are going to control switch over internet using our very precious BLYNK app, let's call this Smart Switch . Cool! Overview: The 5V relay connected to D5 pin of NodeMCU goes ON when D5 pin is set LOW and relay goes OFF when D5 pin is set HIGH. We are simply going to set D5 pin HIGH to turn ON the appliance and D5 as LOW to turn OFF the appliance, considering the neutral wire is passing through the NC and COM of the relay. Stuff required: Hardware: 5V relay NodeMCU Jumper wires Breadboard 3V3 and 5V power source Electrical Wires Software: Arduino IDE BLYNK app Circuit: Connections: D5 pin of NodeMCU connects to IN1 pin of 5V relay. 3V3 of NodeMCU connects to 3V3 powers source and GND to GND. Vcc of relay connects to 5V source and GND to GND. Live wire is connected directly to ...
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Home made temperature and humidity meter

Hello Shippers! Once again, it's time to create something awesome. How about a temperature and humidity sensor controlled with NodeMCU or ESP8266 which sends the temperature of your room and our very special Blynk app shows the data with values and graphs. That sounds cool! Let's sail. Overview: The NodeMCU collects the temperature and humidity from DHT11 sensor and sends it to Blynk app every second. Wow! Things we need: Hardware: NodeMCU DHT11/DHT22 sensor Jumper Wires 4K7 resistor 3V3 power source Software: Arduino IDE Blynk app Now that we have gathered all the stuff we need. Let's connect them. Temperature and humidity sensor circuit: Connections: D4 pin of NodeMCU connects to pin 2 of DHT11. 3V3 pin of NodeMCU connects to pin 1 of DHT11 & GND of NodeMCU to pin 4 of DHT11. 4K7 ohm resistor connected between pin 1 and pin 2 of DHT11 sensor. Connect power(3.3V) to NodeMCU to make it work without USB cable. Before we dive int...
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