Darian Johnson's Favorite Things

Building an Automated Cat Feeder with Amazon Alexa

In my second IoT project, I tackle feeding my cats by voice commands.

My family owns three cats; for the most part, they are well behaved – unless they are hungry. When it’s time for them to eat, they get a little crazy – constantly meowing and running under/between our legs, or waking us up at night.

We used to keep extra food in their dishes, but they would just overeat – resulting in cat throw-up (which, without fail, I seemed to step in every morning on my way to the kitchen).

We’ve been living in this “claw-ful” situation for a few years, and never really considered resolving the problem. My oldest daughter suggested that we (and by we, she really meant me) build an automated cat feeder. I told her that I didn’t have the time to build one… but then, I figured, why not give it a try.

Full instructions are on the write up at Hackster – https://www.hackster.io/darian-johnson/alexa-powered-automated-cat-feeder-9416d4

Getting the Most out of my Amazon Echo: Using TuneIn Radio

Telling Alexa to “Play The Big DM on TuneIn” has been the highlight of my Alexa experience to date

Before I talk about technology, a quick segue: I grew up in the age of radio and cassettes. The hiss of a cassette tape is a callback to simpler times – when most albums were constricted as complete pieces (and not as a string of singles); when the order of an album was important (no easy skipping)… when building a mixtape was more art than science.

I feel the same way about radio. There’s nothing like the excitement of not knowing what great song is coming next, or the magic of slowing flowing from one song to another. Before there was music video¹, there was radio – where I discovered Incognito, and Angela Bofill, and Teena Marie…. Continue reading “Getting the Most out of my Amazon Echo: Using TuneIn Radio”

Moving my blog to AWS Lightsail

In a span of a few hours, I successfully migrated my Wordpress blog from an EC2 instance to Amazon Lightsail.

Of all the new releases announced at AWS re:Invent, I was most excited about Amazon Lightsail. I love AWS, but sometimes it’s too complicated. If someone wants to run a blog, then they shouldn’t have to learn about VPCs, subnets, etc…. they should, in a few clicks, be up and running.

So, I spent a few hour this weekend migrating this blog from the t2.small EC2 instance I’ve been running (with RDS and Memcache) to a new, smaller Lightsail instance.

The migration was straight forward (instructions here: https://docs.bitnami.com/aws/how-to/migrate-wordpress)- the biggest challenge was re-installing my WordPress plugins (they did not migrate over).

Will this be better than running my own VPC and EC2 instance? I’m not sure. I still have my old instances available if I need to switch back. I’m hoping that it does; I was spending about $20 a month running my t2.small (I know, I know.. I should have been running on an RI to reduce cost). The small instance of Lightsail is on $5/month.

Going from Skinny Fat to Fit: No go to Yoga

Swallowing my pride and starting Yoga was one of the best fitness decisions I’ve ever made.

Five years ago, I would have laughed out loud if someone asked me to attend a yoga class. I could not imagine any sane man willingly subjecting himself to something as BORING and MUNDANE as yoga. Fast forward to today: practicing yoga is one of the highlights of my fitness routine. I love my weekly class; I always leave feeling exhausted, energized, and excited for the next opportunity to practice again.

When I started my fitness journey, I was primarily focused on building strength and stamina. The progress was slow and steady. I gained strength and felt healthier – plus, moving big, heavy things was a great stress reliever. Unfortunately, my flexibility began to suffer; my upper back and neck always felt tight. So, on the recommendation of my trainer, I started going to a yoga class. Continue reading “Going from Skinny Fat to Fit: No go to Yoga”

Getting the Most out of my Amazon Echo: The Roadmap

I’ve got an awesome smart device in the Amazon Echo. Now I need to use it.

Me with my Amazon Echo (and trophy from Hackster)

Two weeks ago, I received an Amazon Echo as part of the prize for Hackster’s Internet of Voice challenge (2nd Place¹). I checked the mail every day for its arrival, thinking of all the cool things I could and would do with it.

Fast forward to today, and I’m using the Echo daily… but not at its full potential. I use it for timers, connecting my phone via Bluetooth to play music, and to play Jeopardy. That’s not a diss: with four kids, timers are a necessity. Plus, I love Jeopardy. Still, with a device this powerful, I could be doing more. So, I’m putting together a plan to better use the device as a smart home assistant. Here, at a high level, is my roadmap. Continue reading “Getting the Most out of my Amazon Echo: The Roadmap”