Potty Watcher

Zitcom case: a system to make sure that the toilets are avaible, when you leave your desk. A RGB-LED board that shows you which toilets are available, reserved or taken. A "friendly nudge" counter.

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Inspiration

Case presentation from Zitcom. Funny pitch that made us laugh and still a real challenge. We were inspired from movie theater booking systems and LED intuative systems with color sorting (traffic light simplicity).

What it does

Monitors available toilets and shows by LED light if it is in-use, reserved or available (red, yellow and green). A device registers when the toilet door is locked (prototyped with button for now) and a main server is notified of the locked door, which in turn broadcasts toilet status on a webpage. The monitoring board then gets the updated info to change the LED color for the specific door, so that the users can see available toilets. If the door is not locked, it is green and you can go ahead and use the toilet. We have also installed a timer on the inside of the door, that registers when you turn the lock. The timer counts upwards and is a friendly "nudge" to get the fudge back to work. Sometimes we tend to look at our phone (reddit, stock-market, FOMO or relaxation) and we forget time and place. The timer will hopefully serve as a tool to be considerate toward your colleagues in toilet-distress. If not, we might implement a buzzer that begins after 3 minutes!

How we built it

*Monitoring board, for easy accessability for employees * • Shows all toilets in the building, and their status (green, yellow and red) • Controlled by ESP8266 • LEDs used are ws2812b for minimal wires • Alu Frame for maximum sexiness

Toilet door monitor • Also ESP8266 based • Built in sensor (could be hall effect, but right now it's a button) to check if the door is locked • Used a four digit 7-segment display (and a bunch of shift registering) for nudging employees back to work. • Pings server when the door lock changes state. Also sends state, duh?

Server, handling all traffic • Built on Raspberry Pi, using Python and Flask framework • Receives and handles "Toilet door monitor" input (which door and what state) • Updates a website to show toilet status on all toilets. • Responds to "LED monitoring board controller" requests

Challenges we ran into

Alot. Mainly coding challenges that should work, but didn't. Also, when we were soldering our LED-display, we had some issues making it work - luckily we have a part-time sattelite builder on our team.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Our story board. Teamwork. Server that is actually working and not hard coded.

What we learned

Tons. We learned programming in arduino from a expert user. We learned how to connect hardware from our engineer team members. We learned UX from a designer team member. We learned how coding can be real easy to complex hard-core mode in a blink of an eye. Finally, as a cliche, we learned that teamwork actually pays off.

What's next for Potty Watcher

The entire world lies on our feet!

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