Native Client, Workshops

M03 Workshop: Building for the Internet of Things: Hardware, Sensors & the Cloud

05/15/2017

9:00am - 6:00pm

Level: Introductory

Nick Landry

Senior Technical Evangelist

Microsoft

Connected smart devices have become pervasive. These "things" already outnumber more traditional computing devices and are set to surpass the 100 billion devices mark within a few short years. The Internet of Things (IoT) extends your reach as a software developer into this world of diverse hardware devices controlled by your code and powered by the cloud. This workshop will explore the Maker or Things side of IoT with hardware boards like Arduino, Raspberry Pi, Particle, Netduino, Intel Edison and others, as well as the various sensors and shields you can use to measure temperatures, capture user input via buttons, display data on micro displays and more fun electronic stuff. You'll build your first simple electronic circuits using LEDs and push buttons, and then write embedded code to augment that circuit by deploying and running it on various microcontroller boards.

You'll also extend the reach of your hardware projects by connecting your "things" to the cloud, thus fulfilling the promise of the Internet of Things. You'll learn about many of the options available to plug devices into connected intelligent systems, including Ethernet, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and other custom wireless options. You'll explore how to collect sensor data from hardware devices in the field and route it through gateways using Machine-to-Machine (M2M) messaging. You'll also learn to store it in the cloud using Azure IoT Hubs, process it via Streaming Analytics, and display it in real-time data visualization dashboards using PowerBI, websites or mobile apps.

Don't fret if you've never done anything with hardware or electronics. This session will give you the guidance you need to get started. Note there will be no hands-on portion for attendees in this workshop due to the many hardware requirements. All hardware demos are instructor-led and presented on screen for maximum learning.

You will learn:

  • About the world of connected devices in the "Internet of Things" (IoT), the various components such as smart devices, custom boards (Arduino, Netduino, and Raspberry Pi), protocols and sensors
  • How to build a simple electronic project with LEDs and user input, write simple code projects or sketches and deploy them to hardware boards
  • How to use Microsoft Azure services for IoT, including Azure IoT hubs and streaming analytics