ClearedHot
Member
Long-time lurker first-time poster, with a burning question for my fellow brew geeks:
Is it time to collectively re-think our approach to software in the Brewery?
I can hear the responses already "What a ridiculously vague question!" "What the hell are you on about?" "Can you help me get my RPi to work??"
Allow me to clarify:
I have just spent the better part of the last week reading all of the threads and Git docs from Elco, FuzzeWuzze, Thorrak and Pocketmon on their dev board projects and it has been extremely motivating to see the progress you all have made making pro-level tools available for homebrewers in recent years. It seems like a wild ride and one that's clearly taken a massive amount of time & passion on the part of a few to enable the many. We would all rather be making & drinking beer, I reckcon, than debugging code. Then there are the hundreds of beta testers bravely soldering & YouTubing their way toward a better brew. To all of you: I raise my glass, offer a hearty cheers and offer my sincere 'Thanks'.
As I settle down, sipping my perfectly lagered Pils and taking it all in, something is nagging me...
I just spent the month prior, moving into a new house and going full throttle on a home automation project. I am amazed at how quickly ZWave has matured and how easy it is to link, control and build intelligence into a thousand off-the-shelf devices. The devices take a mere minutes to install, connect, configure and integrate with a half-dozen access points, input devices and apps that do wodnerful things. No wires dangling precariously, no smell of burning PCBs or burnt fingers from soldering irons. But you all know this already.
Then I look to my brewhouse: To control power for just two devices and gather sensor data, it weeks of forum reading/posting, command lining and soldering. Wires are everywhere. A pile of dead or now-unsupported Chinesium bits are piling up in the corner. I see new dev boards coming out every day and tforum threads spiralling off into a dozen different directions. From a dev perspective, that's all great. Tinker away I say! But as a brewer, it's distracting, confusing, frustrating and only sometimes, enjoyable.
But three or four years on into these projects, it's not much faster, better or cheaper. Maybe it's only one command to install (rarely) and 2 bits instead of 3 to build & wire. Meanwhile, today, I am able to compose symphonies of IoT from my phone.
So I pose the question again, with slightly more specificity:
Have we all jumped down the dev board hole and now can't get ourselves out?
I'm sure there is someone out there who has already figured out that a Zwave outlet can turn on their pump with IFTTT with a hacked sensor and dump the data into Google Sheets. At least one person has figured out, just for the hell of it, to use Alexa to turn on a heating coil. The tech is there, people are using and coding it so I'm not worried that it will get here soon enough.
What's bothering me is I don't see the individual visions for the future or the community having a discussion about how to take advantage of new tech. We're still flashing firmware and waiting on rotary encoder support.
It's one thing to build the best ferm chamber for your physical space and budget allow, but software doesn't work like that. We stand on the shoulders of giants and don't waste time reinventing the wheel. Most of the time, we know when to kill a project and start fresh.
TL;DR. So what?
If you're still reading, [thank you] here is my 2019 wishlist for our brew-ware community to chew on:
If that means shutting up and supporting your Kickstarter, fine. Just don't tell me Beersmith and BrewPi are the best we can hope for in 2019. There are way too many smart people around here with spare time & money to say we've reached The Promised Land.
What tech are you excited about?
Is your homebrew club also hosting hack-a-thons?
Are you Cal Poly guys & gals building an incubator with secret VC from ABInBev? On second thought, don't answer that.
Is your company selling a widget that can make our brew days or debug sessions easier?
Share it with the rest of us. We're all hanging on the edge of our keyboards and the keg is getting low.
Cheers,
CJ
Is it time to collectively re-think our approach to software in the Brewery?
I can hear the responses already "What a ridiculously vague question!" "What the hell are you on about?" "Can you help me get my RPi to work??"
Allow me to clarify:
I have just spent the better part of the last week reading all of the threads and Git docs from Elco, FuzzeWuzze, Thorrak and Pocketmon on their dev board projects and it has been extremely motivating to see the progress you all have made making pro-level tools available for homebrewers in recent years. It seems like a wild ride and one that's clearly taken a massive amount of time & passion on the part of a few to enable the many. We would all rather be making & drinking beer, I reckcon, than debugging code. Then there are the hundreds of beta testers bravely soldering & YouTubing their way toward a better brew. To all of you: I raise my glass, offer a hearty cheers and offer my sincere 'Thanks'.
As I settle down, sipping my perfectly lagered Pils and taking it all in, something is nagging me...
I just spent the month prior, moving into a new house and going full throttle on a home automation project. I am amazed at how quickly ZWave has matured and how easy it is to link, control and build intelligence into a thousand off-the-shelf devices. The devices take a mere minutes to install, connect, configure and integrate with a half-dozen access points, input devices and apps that do wodnerful things. No wires dangling precariously, no smell of burning PCBs or burnt fingers from soldering irons. But you all know this already.
Then I look to my brewhouse: To control power for just two devices and gather sensor data, it weeks of forum reading/posting, command lining and soldering. Wires are everywhere. A pile of dead or now-unsupported Chinesium bits are piling up in the corner. I see new dev boards coming out every day and tforum threads spiralling off into a dozen different directions. From a dev perspective, that's all great. Tinker away I say! But as a brewer, it's distracting, confusing, frustrating and only sometimes, enjoyable.
But three or four years on into these projects, it's not much faster, better or cheaper. Maybe it's only one command to install (rarely) and 2 bits instead of 3 to build & wire. Meanwhile, today, I am able to compose symphonies of IoT from my phone.
So I pose the question again, with slightly more specificity:
Have we all jumped down the dev board hole and now can't get ourselves out?
I'm sure there is someone out there who has already figured out that a Zwave outlet can turn on their pump with IFTTT with a hacked sensor and dump the data into Google Sheets. At least one person has figured out, just for the hell of it, to use Alexa to turn on a heating coil. The tech is there, people are using and coding it so I'm not worried that it will get here soon enough.
What's bothering me is I don't see the individual visions for the future or the community having a discussion about how to take advantage of new tech. We're still flashing firmware and waiting on rotary encoder support.
It's one thing to build the best ferm chamber for your physical space and budget allow, but software doesn't work like that. We stand on the shoulders of giants and don't waste time reinventing the wheel. Most of the time, we know when to kill a project and start fresh.
TL;DR. So what?
If you're still reading, [thank you] here is my 2019 wishlist for our brew-ware community to chew on:
- I wish we had a more cohesive vision (or a discussion, at least) as homebrewers and tinkerers on where we want software-driven homebrewing to go next
- I wish we had the time and help to make our solutions simpler and easy for anyone to use
- I wish our projects were just as accessible to entry-level brewer as they are to hardcore HBT lifetime supporters
- I wish the professional brewing industry was looking to us first to find ways to reduce cost, brew smarter and solve big brewhouse problems.
- I wish homebrew developers and engineers had more access to industry financial support and advice to turn their project into small businesses
If that means shutting up and supporting your Kickstarter, fine. Just don't tell me Beersmith and BrewPi are the best we can hope for in 2019. There are way too many smart people around here with spare time & money to say we've reached The Promised Land.
What tech are you excited about?
Is your homebrew club also hosting hack-a-thons?
Are you Cal Poly guys & gals building an incubator with secret VC from ABInBev? On second thought, don't answer that.
Is your company selling a widget that can make our brew days or debug sessions easier?
Share it with the rest of us. We're all hanging on the edge of our keyboards and the keg is getting low.
Cheers,
CJ