Raspberry Pi 3 today has only Wi-Fi connectivity, but soon it will also be able to handle low-throughput cellular communications and let users control devices over long distances.
Altair has completed testing of its ALT1160 Category 1 LTE chip on Raspberry Pi, and is making it available, a company representative said. That's significant, as it will bring much-needed, long-range communications to the popular board computer.
The LTE chip is ready for sale by Altair and its partners, a company representative said. The chip will be included in various third-party add-on LTE expansion boards and sensor modules for Raspberry Pi; otherwise, Altair will take volume orders for the chip. Each chip will cost roughly $15 to $20, though prices are coming down, said Eran Eshed, co-founder of Altair.
(Score: 2) by dlb on Friday December 02 2016, @03:40PM
Anyway, it'll still be informative to see how anubi sets things up. And, anubi, if you're writing your own software to handle the interactions between the text messaging and the hardware implementation, I'd love to see the specifics.
(Score: 1) by PurpleAlien on Friday December 02 2016, @06:30PM
Yes, my site and tracker. Of course, I encourage everyone interested in this area to build one :)
(Score: 2) by dlb on Friday December 02 2016, @08:19PM
And with respect to everyone interested building one...easier said than done!
(Score: 1) by PurpleAlien on Friday December 02 2016, @09:12PM
We're actually prepping a Kickstarter to bring that tracker (well, the next gen version of that one) to a wider audience in the form of a bike tracker (but no reason you can only use it for that). Until now we've focused mostly on larger projects like smart cities for government etc. We know there are other trackers out there, but this one will be truly plug and play (no SIM contracts, finding SIM cards, dealing with settings, etc.) and has lots of other advantages.
(Score: 2) by dlb on Saturday December 03 2016, @03:39AM
(Score: 1) by PurpleAlien on Saturday December 03 2016, @04:25AM
It should be priced nicely. We've also had some experience installing them in bikes: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-birmingham-33154673 [bbc.com] :)