This blog has a new home. After several years on Blogspot, I have moved all my content to a self-hosted site: prolinix.com What changed? All existing posts from this blog have been migrated to prolinix.com New posts will only be published on the new site This Blogspot site will stay online as an archive but will not be updated Why the move? I wanted more control over how the site looks and works.…
This project turns a cheap Digispark ATtiny85 USB dongle and a KY-040 rotary encoder into a dedicated hardware volume knob. Rotate clockwise for volume up, counter-clockwise for volume down, press to mute. It enumerates as a standard USB HID Consumer Control device — no custom driver, no desktop app. Linux, Windows, and many Android devices recognise it out of the box. Last updated: February 19,…
VMBOX packages web applications and runtime dependencies into a self-contained VirtualBox VM. Teams can deliver internal tools as a portable OVA artifact with browser-first access, reducing per-app EXE/MSI/DEB installation work on managed endpoints. Last updated: February 18, 2026 The Problem If you've ever tried to deploy a custom tool on managed Windows laptops, you know the pain. Installing…
This is version 2 of my multi-screen Raspberry Pi infotainment project. The first version ( DIY In-Car Infotainment ) required a separate pocket router for DHCP, DNS, and DLNA. This version eliminates that dependency — one prebuilt SD card image works for all terminals, and the system configures itself automatically at boot. Last updated: February 9, 2026 What's New in v2.1 Touch-friendly OSD…
A compact "lab-in-a-box" that turns a $30 GL-MT300N-V2 pocket router into a remote hardware bring-up station. You get serial console, PoE power control, SD card image swapping, USB power cycling, PiKVM video/keyboard, and a camera feed over a single box. Last updated: February 2, 2026 Quick start: Flash the Remote-Kit firmware, log in at http://192.168.20.1 , wire in PoE switch + PiKVM, then…
Ambient Light + Air Quality + More — a reliable, low-cost sensor network for home, lab, and in-vehicle prototypes, built around CAN with OTA updates and multi-node management. Last updated: February 11, 2026 Why CAN for sensors? CAN was designed for noisy, distributed environments and it shines when you want dependable, multi-drop communication over long cables. That makes it a strong backbone not…
If you run Domoticz and have an Amazon Echo , this is one of the simplest ways to get voice control while keeping device commands on your local network — no cloud subscriptions, no Alexa skills, no Philips account. Last updated: January 18, 2026 Note: Alexa still uses the internet for speech recognition, but device control stays on your LAN. Hue Emulator -> Domoticz -> devices (local network)"…
Bring Minecraft-style adventures home — no internet needed. Last updated: January 11, 2026 If your kids love sandbox building games but you'd rather keep playtime inside your home network, Luanti (an open-source Minetest fork) plus this Dockerized home server is a perfect fit. It ships with two kid-friendly game worlds — Mineclonia and VoxeLibre — including curated mods, texture packs, and a…
Build your own in-car entertainment system — individual touch displays for each passenger, streaming multimedia over a local network with no internet required. Using off-the-shelf hardware and open-source software, each screen costs around $180–$200. Last updated: February 7, 2026 What's New (Feb 2026) Pre-built SD card image — Download, flash, and boot. No manual installation needed. Download…
While the internet is flooded with hello-world examples and simulations demonstrating the connection and message exchange between AWS-IoT Devices and AWS-IoT-Core using various programming languages like Python, C, C++, and Java, some of us beginners, students, or enthusiasts find true satisfaction in delving into the world of connected devices through hands-on interactions with physical…
Turn a ~$30 GL-MT300N-V2 pocket router into a standalone DLNA media server — no internet required. Flash a custom OpenWrt firmware, plug in a USB drive with your media files, and any device on the Wi-Fi hotspot can stream via VLC or any DLNA client. In-car setup: pocket router powered by a 12 V-to-5 V adapter, paired with a USB media drive. All smart devices on the hotspot can stream via DLNA.…
How to interface rugged metal pushbuttons with LED rings to a headless Raspberry Pi — using the built-in triggerhappy daemon to invoke scripts on button press and provide LED feedback, with no display or keyboard needed. Connection diagram — two pushbuttons wired to Raspberry Pi GPIO pins. How it works Instead of userspace I/O libraries, this approach uses the triggerhappy daemon (built into…
Bridge your mobile SMS with XMPP instant messaging so you can read and send text messages from anywhere over the internet. The primary use case: receiving 2FA verification codes while travelling internationally, without roaming or asking someone at home to read them out for you. Setup overview — a Raspberry Pi with a USB 3G modem bridges SMS to XMPP via a public Jabber server. The setup uses a…
How to flash a ~$30 GL.iNet MT300N-V2 pocket router with a custom OpenWrt image that includes the AWS IoT Device SDK and an aws-iot-pubsub-demo application — turning it into an AWS IoT Edge device that can feed local sensor data to the cloud. GL.iNet MT300N-V2 pocket router — ready to become an AWS IoT Edge device. Quick overview Three steps to turn your pocket router into an AWS IoT Edge device:…
A ready-to-use bootable SD card image for BeagleBone Black/Green with a fully preemptible Linux kernel (PREEMPT_RT) — includes a gpio-test program that mirrors an input signal to a GPIO output pin for measuring scheduler latency with an oscilloscope. Oscilloscope view — yellow is the input signal, blue is the GPIO output. The phase difference indicates scheduler latency. Thanks to Maxime…
Six simple steps to get an AWS IoT Device SDK demo running on a Raspberry Pi 4 — using a lightweight custom Linux image built with Buildroot (just under 25 MB). Quick start Download sdcard-pi4-aws-iot-demo.img.xz (~25 MB) Write the image to an SD card using Balena Etcher Unplug and re-plug the SD card so the boot partition appears on your PC Open aws-iot-pubsub-agent.conf and set your AWS IoT…
A one-script installer that turns a Raspberry Pi + CC2531 USB adapter into a vendor-neutral Zigbee home automation gateway running Domoticz — supporting 800+ Zigbee devices from any manufacturer. Raspberry Pi with CC2531 USB Zigbee adapter — the complete Pimoticz hardware. The problem Cheap Zigbee home automation devices are everywhere, but they're locked to the manufacturer's gateway — limiting…
A lightweight Buildroot-based media player image (<65 MB) for Raspberry Pi that autoplays video, audio, or images in a loop — booting in under 20 seconds. Supports all Pi 1 variants ( Pi Zero , Pi Zero W , Pi A/B , Pi A+/B+ ) Works on older Pis with just 256 MB RAM and a 1 GB SD card Autoplays media from the internal SD card or an external FAT-formatted USB drive Battery-powered Pi Zero running…
How to power a Raspberry Pi 3/4 over an Ethernet cable (up to 100 m) using passive PoE — with off-the-shelf parts costing under ~$2. Complete setup — Raspberry Pi powered over Ethernet via passive PoE. Warning: This uses passive PoE with T568B wiring: Blue / Blue-White → + (positive) terminal of DC supply Brown-White / Brown → − (negative) terminal of DC supply If you don't know what passive PoE…
Step-by-step guide to replace the stock Qualcomm firmware on an A5-V11 pocket router (~$5) with OpenWrt, giving you a fully hackable Linux device. What you need A5-V11 pocket router (Qualcomm variant) FAT-formatted USB flash drive PC with Ethernet port Ethernet cable 5 V USB power source Step 1 — Prepare the USB drive Download and unzip a5-v11-openwrt.zip onto a FAT-formatted USB flash drive.…
A DIY Wi-Fi-controlled 5 V switcher for USB LED fairy lights, built around an ESP-12F module running Tasmota firmware. Powered by a battery bank, it lets you toggle garden lights remotely from your phone — no 230 V wiring outdoors and no freezing walks to the power outlet. The lights "USB Fairy Lights" or "USB String Lights" — 10 m / 100 LEDs, available from China for under ~$3. They are 5 V…
A custom OpenWrt firmware ( autom8box ) that packs router + Domoticz server + MQTT broker into an all-in-one home automation gateway running on a ~$20 off-the-shelf GL-MT300N-V2 pocket router. System overview: GL-MT300N-V2 running autom8box firmware as Wi-Fi AP, MQTT broker, and Domoticz server. The problem Wi-Fi based home automation products are cheaper than Zigbee or Z-Wave, but they typically…
How to use a bare ESP-12F module as a standalone IoT/MQTT node — powered directly from a USB charger with just a handful of passive components, no base board required. Total cost: under $2. Finished board — ESP-12F module with USB connector, ready to plug into any 5V charger. Items needed Prices based on AliExpress at the time of writing: 1x ESP-12F module (pre-programmed with Tasmota firmware )…
How to convert a Wemos D1 Mini into a pogo-pin programming dock for flashing Tasmota (or any firmware) onto bare ESP-12F modules — no breadboard wiring needed. Completed pogo-pin dock — a modified Wemos D1 Mini ready to flash ESP-12F modules. Why? ESP8266-based IoT modules can be purchased from AliExpress for as low as 1.3 EUR . These cheap Wi-Fi modules are handy for many home automation DIY…
How to remote-access a Raspberry Pi over the internet using an XMPP-based chat-bot — no port forwarding or dynamic DNS required. The chat-bot is written in C++ using the gloox XMPP client library, and communicates through a public Jabber server. Typical setup — Raspberry Pi behind a firewall communicates with a smartphone via a public XMPP/Jabber server. Building the chat-bot on Raspberry Pi…
