After putting together the rotary phone beaglebone machine, I decided that I still needed to do something with the extra pinouts on the beaglebone. Since I had recently started using MyTinyTodo to keep track of my todo list, I thought it would be nice to have a quick visual display of how many things are still on my todo list.

To Accomplish this my goal, I would need to add some LEDs to the beagle bone and then hack some code to do what needs doing. First thing first: add the idea to the todo list.

Gather Some Components

In order to get this project going, a trip to the nearby electronics store was in order. After returning home with 10 green LEDs ( the plan was to use 6, but I figured buying extra would let me fry a few), I realized that there was a lack of 100 Ohm resistors in my home.

Fortunately, I had some 50 Ohms that I soldered in series to handle the job.

This is a very boring pictures; don't look at it.

Solder 6 of These

This is the basic circuit that get's wired to the BeagleBone. The extra length of wire will get cut off and the entire thing will be wrapped in a bit of electrical tape.

While I was at the electronics store, I bought some fans to replace the fans in the clock server because I think it runs too hot.

The Finished Circuit

Well looky looky! The circuit is finished. Six LEDs with a common ground, with a 100 Ohms of resistance for each LED.

Time to wrap these babies up with electrical tape and hot glue them into the BeagleBone's case.

Glued in Place

On the third attempt, I managed to almost get the LEDs glued into place where I wanted them. Yea, it took me a few time of gluing, and then prying the LEDs from the case a regluing before things were working properly.

As it is, one of the LEDs still doesn't let the box close very easily. Terrible terrible design. That's it! I'm firing myself.

Oh hey! This is probably the best picture that shows off the flowers etched in the glass.

7 Things On The ToDo List

At the time this picture was taken, there were 7 things on my todo list. But there are only 3 LEDs lit up. That's right, the LEDs need to be counted in binary from left to right.

With this setup, using 6 LEDs, the ToDo List will max out at 63 items; and I if I have that many things to do, something is very wrong.

Every 5 minutes, the LEDs run a simple animation sequence, parse the ToDo List RSS feed and then turn on or turn off LEDs as necessary.

Since there is still plenty of room in the box, I'm thinking of adding another something-or-other that is controlled by the BeagleBone pins. I'm not sure what it will be, but I can guarantee I'll have fun making it.

Hack on!

PS. I really want to have 15 things on my ToDo list, just so I can say "THERE...ARE...FOUR...LIGHTS" Ha hahahaha, I crack me up.