FAB ACADEMY 2015

Project Description

A device to better manage our everyday time to help us to not overcommit our lives.
A simple way to visualize and manage time from a different point of view. A non invasive but strongly communicative device to think about time as a discrete resource instead of a continuous flow.

NOTE FOR THE GURUS I strictly followed the instructions provided on the page of the assignment, answering to each question. Some answers are merged to avoid to repetition.

What will it do?

It count time as a percentage over an amount of time defined by the user instead of a delta between two moments. This way I can commit an amount of time to do something and monitor how much time left I have.

Thinking about our everyday life we can easily recognize three main classes of tasks: duties, leisure and needs. These three categories are bounded by the following equation:

Duties + Leisure < 24h - Needs  

so each of them is a variable that everyone can set. The residual amount for each variable is shown by three led bars, going always from 100% to 0% at different rates depending on the amount of time resource committed for each one.
Two buttons to press simultaneously allow to swap from a variable to another. When the current variable reach the 0% automatically the other two will be decreased at half of each rate until you wont choose which one is currently running; when also the second variable has reached the 0% the remaining variable continue to decrease at it’s own rate.

Who’s done what beforehand?

Everything starts from this an article I’ve read online some month ago. A Formula to Stop You from Overcommitting Your Time

This device will just show this simple principle overtime.

Online I’ve found different watches with fancy displays, but the most counts on an hour and minute base, just because they are watches, and they don’t need to be configured but just synchronized with the local area time.

A very fancy project is the Nixie watch.

At the following link I’ve found a great website about data visualization Flowing Data

Project’s modules

The whole project can be divided in several parts; every part may be made in one ore more process:

Electronics
- Milling of a double layer board
- Soldering of the electronics components
- Testing

Code
- Code to drive the led matrix
- Program of the device
- Configuration interface

Enclosure
- Frame in casted resin or 3D printed. I’d like to have a sturdy frame and a customizable front panel, but in the end everything can change.

Watchstrap
- It’s lasercutted and assembled without any sort of glue or even sewing, but just using hinges and .

Materials and components required

Electronics Atmel ATtiny44
Quantity 1 Cost 1.05€

Led Blue Clear 1206
Quantity 15
Cost 0.45€

Resistor 0kOhm 1206
Quantity 1
Cost 0.004€

Resistor 10kOhm 1206
Quantity 1
Cost 0.05€

Resistor 499Ohm 1206
Quantity 5
Cost 0.03€

Capacitor 1uF 1206
Quantity 1
Cost 0.14€

FTDI pins
Quantity 1
Cost 0.14€

ISP pins
Quantity 1
Cost 1.86€

Enclosure
Frame Quantity 20g
Cost 3€ Process Casting

Front Quantity 5g
Cost 0.50€ Process 3D print

For this project the following processes will be used:

• Project planning 13.05.2015
• Electronic design 16.05.2015
• 3D design 18.05.2015
• Elettronic production 18.05.2015
• 3D milling 24.05.2015
• Lasercutting 24.05.2015
• Molding and casting 26.05.2015
• Input and output 01.06.2015
• Embeeded programming 02.06.2015
• Interface design 05.06.2015

What tasks need to be completed?

• Design the board
• Design the case
• Design the molds
• Design the wristband
• Make the boardMake the case
• Test the fitting
• Debug the board
• Develop the base program
• Verify transparency of the case
• Verify accessibility of the buttons
• Flash the board
• Fix some minor issue
• Assembly the parts
• Document

What questions need to be answered?

• Will it be a useful device?
• Will help me to better organize my time?
• How can it evolve?
• What function can easily be integrated using the same hardware?
• What functions can be integrated upgrading the hardware?
• How can it be optimized?
• Does people will build it? and why? or why not?

How will it be evaluated?

It has to meet 3/5 of these requirement:

Step1: the board (led matrix and buttons) works CHECKED
Step2: the code for the counters works CHECKED
Step3: the configuration via FTDI works NOT YET
Step4: the configuration interface works CHECKED
Step5: the parts of the case fits properly among them CHECKED

Further developments

In further development I may integrate:
- rechargeable lithium battery
- less energy drain system
- liquid cristal/oled display
- subroutine to manage up to 5 tasks per category
- gather statistics of habits and time commitment
- make a good package