I could see this being a useful tool when trying to form good habits. Brush teeth? push the button. Get a fresh glass of water from the fridge? push the button.<p>When analyzing other aspects of my life such as spending, I have tools to show me what I've done in the past, and those tools can help me improve (e.g. spending reports). This is admittedly reactionary, but I find it useful nonetheless. Track enough other "stuff about stuff", and I think the data could become interesting over time, providing similar "hindsight" that in turn can be used to improve oneself.<p>Of course, this means it will be necessary to have button things all over the place...
Hi folks -- what a surprise to check HN and see my own article.<p>Here's a summary of the reports I've gotten since publishing it the other week:<p>1) It works. Most likely problem you'll have is installing the Python libraries I used.<p>2) Check the comments for a version someone posted that works on RasberryPI with no extra libraries.<p>3) I'd love to hear what you build. Coolest use case so far is a few folks using it as a remote light switch for connected light bulbs.
> Just follow this list of instructions, but don’t complete the final step — don’t select the particular product you want ordered.<p>Overall I think this is great. I can see this being useful for a variety of different tracking; not only for infants. I'd probably go a step further and using my router I'd block the Wifi Button from having access to the web. I can just imagine the feeling of having many unexpected packages showing up at my door.
This is really cool. I suspect the buttons are already sold at loss, so it is probably very hard to build a similar, but more open, device at around a price point where you could just plaster the whole house with such buttons.<p>But I wonder if it might be done when leaving out the WiFi and most of the processing power from the button, and having essentially what is a RF remote control (like used for remote controlled outlet switches) with a receiving station. The receiver would be the "expensive" part, the gateway to Wifi/Internet and contain all the logic that links a button press to something usefull like a HTTP request.<p>A kit of<p>5x Etekcity Outlet Receivers
2x Remote Control Transmitters
2x 12V Batteries<p>can be had for 30 bucks including shipping, so based on that I could see it done.<p>Edit: obviously the behavior of such a button would have to be much better than a typical cheap remote control regarding reliably registering and then transmitting each and every button press, so the comparison is of course very limited
I was wondering the Button was configured for WiFi access. It's more interesting than I though. It's configured by running a Dash Button app on your Android or Apple smart phone.<p>The Android version works about as I would have guessed, by using the Dash Button as an access point, and the app helps you connect to it. But the Apple version communicates with the phone by ultrasonic tones!<p><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=201746340" rel="nofollow">https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=...</a>
Does this remind anybody of the CueCat? Same story...subsidized hardware that hackers repurposed for other uses. I think the makers of CueCat tried to unsuccessfully sue the hackers:<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CueCat" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CueCat</a><p><a href="http://www.securityfocus.com/news/89" rel="nofollow">http://www.securityfocus.com/news/89</a><p>Do the Amazon Dash buttons come with a license agreement? Has anyone read it to see if it prohibits these kinds of hacks?
Something similar could be built easily using an ESP8266, but a single AA battery would not be enough. Looking at this guide[1] it looks like new sw can already be flashed on it, but other than using the uart or some gpio, i don't see attempts at using the wifi interface.<p>[1] <a href="https://learn.adafruit.com/dash-hacking-bare-metal-stm32-programming/overview" rel="nofollow">https://learn.adafruit.com/dash-hacking-bare-metal-stm32-pro...</a>
Here at Penn we have a research platform where we try to motivate (among other things) medication adherence. We have integrated with various devices in the past that automatically track when the meds are taken, but for some reason the vendors of these devices always seem to flake out. We've been thinking lately that a simpler approach where people just push a button when they take their meds might be more sustainable, especially as a simpler device may reduce our dependence on those outside vendors.<p>What we're looking for: A simple, preferably small device, that we can program to make HTTP calls home to our server. Participants in our studies are scattered geographically and not all of them have wifi, so cellular is crucial. We have done studies with anywhere from a few hundred to a thousand+ participants, and hope to scale up beyond that as well, so cost at scale is a big factor. Today I came across bt.tn, and I love the UI simplicity of their product, but their prices are high, and it seems they don't include SIM cards with their buttons. Particle.io's prices are more in line with what we're looking for (especially the $3/month data fee), but my concern is that (at least from their website) the devices still look like hobbyist electronics with PCBs still visible, rather than like simple consumer devices.<p>Does anyone have suggestions for something with the UI simplicity of Amazon Dash or bttn but without bttn's price point? (Or feel like making us 500 or 1000 such things? The economics can totally be worth it.)
There is also this (unrelated) repository for doing more hardware-oriented hacks (i.e. programming the microcontroller): <a href="https://github.com/dekuNukem/Amazon_Dash_Button" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/dekuNukem/Amazon_Dash_Button</a><p>Edit: Just saw that this was also posted in this comment's thread <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10075734" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10075734</a>
I'm really surprised that there isn't already a ready solution for this. Maybe there is and it just got buried under bad marketing or something. Almost seems like a no brainer, but then again there's the whole "It seems obvious in retrospect thing." Maybe someone will jump in and outdo Amazon at this particular task. China?
Someone please release a generic "generate event" button! (Or please tell me where I can get one... Googling for "wifi enabled button" provides irrelevant results).<p>Below someone mentioned this: <a href="https://flic.io/" rel="nofollow">https://flic.io/</a>
But apparently it is only for pre-order right now.<p>Update: I searched for this on Amazon and noticed:
"Available for Pre-order. This item will be released on August 31, 2015."<p>So, it seems it will be released not that long from now...
Awesome article and idea.<p>Would it be unreasonable to try to reverse or update the actual code on the hardware to get it to send a request to an arbitrary server instead? I'd love to team with a hardware person to cut out the layer of having to have a script polling the network to find the device. It's always been something I've wanted to learn more about. Or is that unrealistic?
It's popular to observe that cell phones are more powerful than the Apollo 11 spacecraft. Well, this button further highlights just how far along we've come.<p>The Apollo 11 AGC was 16-bit, 2MHz.<p>The Dash Button is 32-bit, 120MHz, and at $5 is practically disposable.
I use eps8266 for my IoT. Can't get any easier or cheaper than that. <a href="http://nodemcu.com/index_en.html" rel="nofollow">http://nodemcu.com/index_en.html</a>
This sounds like a potential Kickstarter project idea. A generic version, perhaps a pack of stickers to put on devices symbolizing misc. everyday things.
Sounds cool, easy, and cheap. Not sure what I would do with it. Here is a tear down: <a href="http://mpetroff.net/2015/05/amazon-dash-button-teardown/" rel="nofollow">http://mpetroff.net/2015/05/amazon-dash-button-teardown/</a><p>I can't find how long the battery lasts and with only one AAA, it might not be that long.
Anybody know if the MAC address in buttons of the same type is the same?<p>I know it'd be terrible network practice and terrible standards-wise and just generally terrible, just figured I'd double-check before buying a crate of Tide buttons and discovering they all report the same MAC
This is pretty cool!<p>I got distracted by the startup, though. Cloudstitch sounds kinda... strange. Their sole product is APIs that interact with Google Docs - well, Google Spreadsheets, they don't use the other formats. Are they wanting Google to buy them, or something?
Wouldn't the button still call back to Amazon every time you click it? Even if it doesn't purchase anything, I don't need Amazon to know my assorted button-clicking habits.
Wait, so the Dash button <i>isn't</i> an April Fool's Joke? I have been having conversations with people about those things every couple months and we still kept coming to the conclusion "it must have been a joke, but we aren't sure, and we actually can see a couple interesting use cases"....