Book Image

Hands-On Internet of Things with Blynk

By : Pradeeka Seneviratne
Book Image

Hands-On Internet of Things with Blynk

By: Pradeeka Seneviratne

Overview of this book

Blynk, known as the most user-friendly IoT platform, provides a way to build mobile applications in minutes. With the Blynk drag-n-drop mobile app builder, anyone can build amazing IoT applications with minimal resources and effort, on hardware ranging from prototyping platforms such as Arduino and Raspberry Pi 3 to industrial-grade ESP8266, Intel, Sierra Wireless, Particle, Texas Instruments, and a few others. This book uses Raspberry Pi as the main hardware platform and C/C++ to write sketches to build projects. The first part of this book shows how to set up a development environment with various hardware combinations and required software. Then you will build your first IoT application with Blynk using various hardware combinations and connectivity types such as Ethernet and Wi-Fi. Then you'll use and configure various widgets (control, display, notification, interface, time input, and some advanced widgets) with Blynk App Builder to build applications. Towards the end, you will learn how to connect with and use built-in sensors on Android and iOS mobile devices. Finally you will learn how to build a robot that can be controlled with a Blynk app through the Blynk cloud and personal server. By the end of this book, you will have hands-on experience building IoT applications using Blynk.
Table of Contents (10 chapters)

Building Your First Blynk Application

Now you know how to connect your Raspberry Pi to the Blynk cloud with a simple C++ application running on itself. You also know how to create a project with Blynk app builder running on your smartphone or tablet to connect with your Raspberry Pi through the Blynk cloud.

In this chapter, we will cover the following:

  • Attaching an LED to the Raspberry Pi
  • Building an application with Blynk app builder
  • Using GPIO_BCM pins with the Button widget
  • Using virtual pins with the Button widget
  • Writing C++ code with nano editor
  • Editing the build.sh file
  • Controlling the LED on the Pi by running the Blynk application (the C++ project and the Blynk app)