Ruby
Programming in the Small: Kids, Chickens, and Ruby
Summarized using AI
Programming in the Small: Kids, Chickens, and Ruby
by Coraline Clark and Jason ClarkThe presentation "Programming in the Small: Kids, Chickens, and Ruby" by Jason and Coraline Clark at RubyConf 2016 discusses a father-daughter project aimed at solving a real-world problem associated with their backyard chickens. After years of programming together using the Ruby Shoes GUI library, they decided to build a chicken monitoring system to track egg production, given their eleven chickens and the difficulty in identifying which chicken laid which egg.
Key points covered include:
- Introduction: The presenters share their programming background with Ruby, and their pet guinea pig named Ruby illustrates their love for programming in the Clark household.
- Identifying the Problem: The challenge of keeping track of their chickens and the eggs is highlighted, especially given the indistinguishable appearance of the eggs laid by different breeds.
- Solution: The Clarks created a Raspberry Pi camera system to capture images that would help track egg production. They explained the system's architecture involving hardware like the Raspberry Pi and software components built using Ruby.
- Tips for Engaging with Kids: Jason shares valuable advice for working with children, such as breaking down projects into manageable tasks, allowing kids to take control, and focusing on hands-on, visual programming experiences.
- Programming Process: The presentation covers their programming approach, including connecting the Raspberry Pi to a display, using terminal commands, and developing a desktop application using Shoes.
- Demo: They present a demo showing how the camera system works in real time by capturing images of the chickens in their coop. They also discuss future enhancements, including better lighting, improved date selection for egg-laying tracking, and the idea of automating the coop door.
Conclusions and Takeaways: The presenters emphasize the joy of bonding through programming with children while sharing practical insights on implementing tech projects. They express hopes for continuing to engage children in technology and making meaningful projects that address real-life problems while enjoying the creative process of programming together.
00:00:14.280
Welcome everybody to our presentation on Programming in the Small: Kids, Chickens, and Ruby. I'm Jason Clark, and I work as a software architect at New Relic.
00:00:19.800
And this is your opportunity to introduce yourself.
00:00:27.360
Hi, I'm Korra. We're so glad that you're here today!
00:00:35.010
A few years ago, Korra and I did a presentation at Cascadia Ruby, which was about Shoes programming. Shoes is a GUI library, and we will see a little bit more about it later.
00:00:48.539
Together, we had created a series of different programs using Shoes. Can you tell us about some of the things we made, Korra?
00:01:01.980
We made a Star Wars program!
00:01:09.240
That's right! What did the Star Wars program do?
00:01:18.439
Well, when we pressed 'D', Darth Vader's lightsaber lit up.
00:01:25.759
And when we pressed 'Y', Yoda's ears went down.
00:01:31.579
And when we pressed 'L', Princess Leia's lightsaber came up.
00:01:43.880
That's right! And I found a bug that my dad didn’t notice. If we pressed 'D' too many times, Darth Vader's lightsaber went off the screen.
00:01:52.140
Yep, she was my tester! This was just one example of the many programs we created together, and we had a really good time.
00:02:00.289
We love Ruby in our household, don't we?
00:02:13.140
Ruby is pretty awesome! How much do we love Ruby?
00:02:18.180
A lot!
00:02:24.599
So who's this on the screen? This is Mike, our pet guinea pig.
00:02:30.850
That's right! We like Ruby so much in the Clark household that we named our guinea pig Ruby.
00:02:37.510
After enjoying our programming and games, we wanted to take things to the next level. We wanted to solve a real-world problem in our lives.
00:02:50.200
What was our problem, Korra?
00:02:57.970
Our chickens weren't laying eggs!
00:03:04.570
That's right! We have chickens in our backyard. We are from Portland, Oregon, so of course, we would have chickens.
00:03:11.200
Keeping track of the chickens and the eggs they lay is a real challenge for us.
00:03:16.390
Can you explain why this is such a problem, Korra?
00:03:22.120
We have two identical ones.
00:03:31.420
We have eleven chickens.
00:03:38.500
Now, if the city of Portland asks, 'Is eleven a lot?'—well, eleven chickens is a lot to keep track of!
00:03:45.459
A big part of the trouble is that, as you may know, chickens lay eggs that look very similar.
00:03:51.580
We have a couple of Ameraucana chickens that lay kind of blue-green eggs, one that lays white eggs, and the rest lay brown eggs.
00:03:59.260
We can't tell the difference between the vast majority of these chickens and what eggs they lay.
00:04:05.440
The Polish doesn't lay eggs very often.
00:04:12.610
That's right! We'll see a picture of her in a few minutes. She's pretty small and doesn't lay often.
00:04:18.310
But we can tell when she does!
00:04:24.220
Another issue is that the chickens lay eggs at different rates, depending on their age and the time of year.
00:04:31.120
During certain times, they may lay eggs every day, or every two to three days, or they may hold out for much longer.
00:04:36.409
This isn't ideal, especially as winter sets in.
00:04:41.539
They all tend to slow down considerably.
00:04:47.449
So, let's give them a little introduction to some of our flock.
00:04:53.059
This is Cuckoo Maran. My brother and I named her Blackie because she's black.
00:05:01.309
Alright, let's move to the next one.
00:05:06.709
These are a pair of our Ameraucana chickens.
00:05:12.709
Yeah, that's what Mom said. One is an Americana, and the one at the back...
00:05:17.929
is the kind that I forgot.
00:05:23.329
Well, she might...
00:05:28.610
Okay, Mom is confirming she may actually be correct about this.
00:05:34.219
This is why it's great to co-present!
00:05:39.379
Alright, the next one. This is one of our Turkens.
00:05:46.459
They aren't actually related to turkeys, but you can understand where the name comes from.
00:05:51.499
Yeah, that's our oldest one. It's among our older ones. We got them from some friends after there had been a little coyote incident.
00:05:58.119
People would come over and we'd say, 'These are the chickens we adopted because they got attacked by coyotes.'
00:06:04.089
And they would respond with, 'Oh, that's so terrible! When will her feathers grow back?'
00:06:09.619
But that is just what turkens look like—it was not related to the injuries at all!
00:06:19.219
Okay, next we have I think three Red Sexlinks.
00:06:25.099
Because when they lay eggs, they're brown.
00:06:31.969
This is our Polish chicken, the one chicken we have that is actually named. Her name is Rockette.
00:06:39.499
She had a little incident early in her life, and we ended up nursing her back to health.
00:06:45.949
My brother tried to pet her with a stick, which almost killed her!
00:06:53.720
Life's rough as a chicken!
00:06:59.450
So, this is a bit of what we're dealing with. We've got so many chickens and different things to keep track of.
00:07:05.120
So what was our solution? What did we come up with to figure out how to keep track of the chickens?
00:07:11.780
We made a Raspberry Pi camera!
00:07:17.780
Okay, why don't you step forward and we can show them our system diagram.
00:07:24.140
You took care of the artwork! So, what happens in the first stage?
00:07:30.120
A chicken lays an egg.
00:07:36.170
And then what happens above it?
00:07:42.230
The Raspberry Pi takes a picture.
00:07:47.300
And then where does the picture get sent to?
00:07:53.750
Amazon! That's right. We send our chicken pictures to the cloud.
00:08:00.230
It's great working with modern architectures; it makes development so easy.
00:08:05.600
Then it shows this on Shoes.
00:08:11.180
So then we wrote a little desktop app to view this data. This was a fun project to put together.
00:08:17.780
There were many different stages to it, which brings us to the first tip I have for working with kids.
00:08:24.740
When you're working on projects with your kids, it's important to break things into small, digestible pieces.
00:08:31.070
The attention span of an eight-year-old is not the same as that of an adult. As kids get older, their attention spans typically improve.
00:08:41.660
You need to know how much time you can spend with them, and plan accordingly.
00:08:48.140
You don't want to overwhelm them or bore them with long sessions.
00:08:55.220
It's important to keep it light and fun.
00:09:02.310
So, Korra, what's your first takeaway?
00:09:07.890
It's fun to spend time with Dad!
00:09:15.170
And I totally agree! Building things together with kids is a fun way to connect.
00:09:20.310
It links the work we do as developers with their interests and helps teach them valuable skills.
00:09:27.890
Our first big section that we're going to discuss is hardware. So, what is hardware, Korra?
00:09:37.170
Stuff you get at Home Depot!
00:09:43.160
I love it! That's technically accurate but not exactly what we're talking about.
00:09:48.200
What kind of hardware are we really discussing?
00:09:54.000
We're talking about computers!
00:09:59.100
That's right! We're inside the computers.
00:10:01.260
What we've got up here on screen is a partial shot of our Raspberry Pi.
00:10:07.140
It's just a little teeny tiny computer—about the size of a card.
00:10:14.370
This brings us to our next dad tip.
00:10:20.160
As you're doing these projects, it's great to explore with your kids, but it's also valuable to try some things out yourself ahead of time.
00:10:26.280
For me, I had never worked with a Raspberry Pi before this project, so I spent some time debugging it.
00:10:32.010
I wanted to make sure everything would run smoothly when Korra and I started working together.
00:10:39.210
It's great to do as much as you can with the kid while avoiding roadblocks.
00:10:46.320
So, what's in this picture, Korra?
00:10:53.010
The Raspberry Pi with the camera attached.
00:10:59.990
That's right! The Raspberry Pi does not come with a camera—you have to order it.
00:11:07.430
You also need to get a Wi-Fi card.
00:11:12.460
So we got both the camera attachment and a little Wi-Fi adapter, so the Pi could connect to the network.
00:11:19.150
What step of our process are we on now in building out the hardware?
00:11:27.570
We put a hole in the box to fit the glass part of the Raspberry Pi camera.
00:11:33.430
This way, it can take clear pictures of the chickens and their eggs.
00:11:41.390
Why did we need this plastic box?
00:11:48.080
To prevent the chickens from picking at it.
00:11:55.640
We're placing this outdoors in a chicken coop, so it needs some protection.
00:12:02.200
But we didn't do anything fancy—we just used a plastic box we had and punched a hole in it.
00:12:10.430
So let's look at the completed physical part of the project.
00:12:15.650
We screwed it down to a couple of pieces of wood, and what did we use to prevent it from sliding?
00:12:21.920
Duct tape! Why would we use duct tape in a chicken project?
00:12:29.900
Well, it should have been chicken tape! But I guess it worked out in the end.
00:12:36.080
So here is a picture of our chicken coop with the camera installed.
00:12:43.150
You can see the ladies roosting at nighttime.
00:12:47.060
That's partly why the lighting looks like it does. We have those lights strung up so that during the darker parts of the year, they get a few extra hours of light.
00:12:54.410
This sometimes encourages them to lay eggs more frequently than they otherwise would.
00:13:01.040
I hope those of you into woodworking appreciate the craftsmanship involved in this!
00:13:07.670
You can see the hole where the camera looks through, positioned right over their nesting area.
00:13:14.680
Now, there was some software to go with our hardware. What software did we write?
00:13:22.040
We wrote all sorts of software! It's the instructions we give the computer.
00:13:27.050
If the Raspberry Pi is just a small device, how do we program it?
00:13:32.839
We plug it into a big screen because the Raspberry Pi does not have a built-in display.
00:13:42.949
Thankfully, Raspberry Pi has an HDMI output, allowing us to connect it to our TV.
00:13:50.180
We were also able to plug in a USB keyboard to get programming!
00:13:57.319
So what was the first thing we did when we booted up the Raspberry Pi?
00:14:04.699
Raspberry Pi will, by default, run a basic desktop Linux environment called Raspbian.
00:14:10.250
We did quite a bit of work in the terminal. What command were we using?
00:14:15.889
What do you want? 'LS'!
00:14:22.610
Anytime Korra sees a terminal, she wants to type 'LS'.
00:14:27.639
And what does 'LS' do?
00:14:33.110
It shows us the files!
00:14:39.019
This leads me to my next dad tip. Korra really enjoyed working in the terminal.
00:14:46.910
Learning these basic commands was empowering for her.
00:14:53.510
She could tell the computer what to do and received immediate feedback.
00:15:06.050
While there are powerful programming tools for kids, giving them real developer tools can lead to a great experience.
00:15:12.949
What’s your tip around this, though, Korra?
00:15:19.220
Be careful; otherwise, the program won't run!
00:15:24.470
Computers are really picky! One letter off and things won't work.
00:15:30.889
Initially, I wrote our 'rb' all in uppercase, and my dad corrected me. 'No, no, it should be lowercase!'
00:15:41.690
It was interesting to see how many conventions and assumptions we just understand after using computers for a while.
00:15:50.220
It was fun to teach her about the oddities of computer programming.
00:15:57.450
Next, we explored command line utilities that come with the Raspberry Pi camera.
00:16:04.200
What does 'raspistill' do?
00:16:10.320
It creates a new file with a picture!
00:16:15.930
It will pop up a little preview and then take a picture, saving it as a JPEG where you specify.
00:16:21.930
Next dad tip while programming with kids: Focus on things that provide fast results.
00:16:28.630
Within minutes of plugging in the camera and booting up the Raspberry Pi, we got images working.
00:16:35.650
It's great to make things visual and provide immediate feedback, so kids can stay engaged.
00:16:42.930
Now, let’s look at the code we wrote. This is what we ran on the Raspberry Pi.
00:16:48.880
At the top, the 'loop do' command means taking a picture repeatedly.
00:16:55.600
Then we used 'raspistill' to take the picture.
00:17:01.770
And 'sleep' followed by the desired time in seconds determines how long to wait between pictures.
00:17:08.760
We wanted a reasonable amount of time to pass, knowing that it takes about 10 minutes for a chicken to lay an egg.
00:17:16.690
We chose to take pictures every two minutes.
00:17:23.420
This was also an upgrade because Korra started using the Atom editor, which many programmers use daily.
00:17:31.600
More importantly, Atom is customizable!
00:17:36.800
What was the first thing we changed to set ourselves up?
00:17:44.300
We changed the background color.
00:17:51.260
We would like to thank Amy Wilbois for her Fairy Floss theme. It works wonderfully for Sublime and Atom.
00:18:01.100
Let’s move to the next dad tip. There are some drawbacks to the coding we showed.
00:18:08.430
As a developer, my instinct was to use a gem for interacting with Amazon.
00:18:16.100
I quickly realized it would be boring for Korra to get into.
00:18:23.560
Instead, we took the commands we used in terminal and placed them in backticks.
00:18:32.220
It wasn’t as reliable or had good error handling, but it worked, and we received quick feedback.
00:18:39.580
When you work with kids, focus on having a good experience.
00:18:44.399
The Raspberry Pi is only one aspect of the software equation.
00:18:52.850
The other is Shoes.
00:18:58.130
Shoes is a GUI library for Ruby that allows us to write desktop applications.
00:19:05.220
I've discussed Shoes at several conferences, and if you're interested, come talk to me.
00:19:12.600
When we're writing a Shoes program, what's the first thing we do?
00:19:19.169
We draw it on paper first!
00:19:23.810
We plan before diving into typing out the code. We draw how we want our program to function.
00:19:30.840
This planning is critical when programming with kids.
00:19:38.409
Programming is about understanding and expressing problems and how to use tools effectively.
00:19:45.800
This reflection can happen on paper and in our minds before we start coding.
00:19:51.899
Here's a great picture of Korra working on her programming.
00:19:58.810
What was your favorite part of writing the Shoes application?
00:20:05.060
Experimenting with how it looks!
00:20:11.840
One of the great aspects of Shoes and similar tools is the fast feedback you can receive.
00:20:19.510
We often spent as much time customizing how it looked as we did writing the initial program.
00:20:28.190
What did we customize about this application, Korra?
00:20:35.220
We experimented with the colors for the characters.
00:20:43.680
We also adjusted the window size and worked with the pictures.
00:20:51.500
Let's take a quick look at the Shoes code we wrote before we move to a demo.
00:20:59.510
This is a basic Shoes app, and it's quite minimal compared to some other UI frameworks.
00:21:06.510
What do we do first in our code?
00:21:13.270
We ask the user to input any number.
00:21:19.100
Then, we ask what day they want to see on the pictures.
00:21:26.560
This is another point where I thought we should interact with Amazon’s API, but it was simply easier to just download the files.
00:21:33.600
We had more fun that way, and it was a better experience overall.
00:21:41.820
Almost time for the demo, but I have one more quick tip.
00:21:47.660
As much as possible, let kids have control and guide them; don't just dive in.
00:21:53.220
It takes patience, but you're the adult, so you can afford to be patient as part of your job.
00:22:00.010
Alright, let's get ready for the demo!
00:22:05.430
May I take the keyboard for a moment and get us set up?
00:22:13.510
Here we go! That's my dad and me when I was five.
00:22:20.010
I think we're ready now! Remember, that's the Raspberry Pi with our program.
00:22:26.190
We'll run it with Shoes.
00:22:33.020
So you want to start the Shoes program, and then you have to tell it the file.
00:22:38.230
There it is! She learned how to navigate this and it makes me so happy!
00:22:43.720
Okay, ready to hit it?
00:22:51.660
So what date do you want?
00:22:58.270
There's a very specific day you want—tell me the numbers!
00:23:06.600
September 25, 2016.
00:23:15.210
The secret story here is that as soon as we finished the project, we had about two days of the chickens actually laying eggs.
00:23:23.030
They haven't laid anything since, which is a bit annoying.
00:23:29.840
Alright, it's time to run!
00:23:36.870
Yay, there we're seeing the red hen, and there's an egg!
00:23:42.840
Let's watch a little longer; it will get dark soon.
00:23:50.650
We can see the chickens moving around in the coop.
00:23:57.530
One chicken is sneaking in on the edge, and it's going to get darker.
00:24:05.030
The Raspberry Pi is quite light-sensitive, too, and we can see it cut out.
00:24:10.510
My dad took the egg, and we shipped it out too!
00:24:17.270
That was the plan for our demo.
00:24:21.080
Now, what are some ideas we thought about for next steps?
00:24:30.120
First off, improving the lighting would help.
00:24:38.130
Better lighting in the coop means the camera wouldn't cut out as early.
00:24:45.150
We could simply change the light positioning to improve success.
00:24:53.110
Next, we need better date selection.
00:25:01.430
Instead of typing the exact string for the date, we could implement a calendar selector.
00:25:07.590
That would definitely enhance user experience!
00:25:14.490
Moving forward, we could also play with the size of the images.
00:25:19.380
The images might have been too large, causing some display issues.
00:25:26.430
I've heard of people successfully streaming video off of a Raspberry Pi, which is very fascinating.
00:25:33.570
Another idea involved OCR.
00:25:41.670
Optical character recognition could help us distinguish which chicken laid an egg.
00:25:47.180
Also, we can create a mechanism where the Raspberry Pi captures a picture right as the chicken lays an egg.
00:25:55.020
One more idea was to automate the coop door opening and closing.
00:26:02.950
Currently, I have to let them out every day in the morning and ensure I close it at night.
00:26:10.830
We need to avoid predator issues, like raccoons.
00:26:17.750
I once forgot to shut it at night, and a raccoon came.
00:26:25.460
Thankfully, none of the others were harmed!
00:26:35.390
Any other future ideas?
00:26:43.830
Thank you! Any questions?
00:26:50.390
Yes, the question was about automating the door open and close.
00:26:59.389
It would primarily rely on light detection.
00:27:05.450
Chickens usually head into the coop at dark, so if we can detect that, we could automate.
00:27:12.580
We need a better mechanism to shut the door quickly.
00:27:20.500
The last time a chicken was lost was around 10 or 11 PM.
00:27:27.970
I didn't even hear the sticks crack, which might have indicated something was off.
00:27:35.330
Using a glass door, we can gauge their movements, too.
00:27:43.160
Someone said about exploring the OCR options for recognizing chickens.
00:27:50.670
We've talked with experts to investigate how they recognized magic cards through OCR.
00:27:58.820
The technology could be crucial for identifying the positioning of our chickens.
00:28:06.740
It’s possible to develop flags for pictures when changes are detected.
00:28:15.010
Any other questions?
00:28:20.520
So the question was whether the Raspberry Pi can play music for our chickens to sleep.
00:28:34.679
What do you think, Korra? Should that be on our future list?
00:28:40.838
Yes! That could brighten up their environment.
00:28:48.039
Especially the Star Wars program!
00:28:51.580
So what was your favorite program we made?
00:28:57.860
The princess game! That was our first big program.
00:29:04.509
It was kind of an adventure game with your artwork.
00:29:11.990
Yeah! We could create another one.
00:29:18.880
So do you explore programming without me?
00:29:24.340
Not much yet, but I'm beginning to run programs on my own.
00:29:30.500
I hope to modify and extend them some day.
00:29:36.530
Do you have programming friends?
00:29:42.750
Not really, but at school, I do some coding with my friends.
00:29:50.150
We use code.org during library time, which has been fun.
00:29:58.050
Yay for pairing!
00:30:04.050
Since our chickens look similar, could we add markings?
00:30:11.570
That's certainly possible! It would help differentiate them.
00:30:18.610
We also talked about using RFID tags to track them better.
00:30:27.130
Some chickens are meaner to others, and we must be aware.
00:30:34.040
Do chickens lay eggs in the same spot?
00:30:40.320
Some chickens consistently lay in the same spot, while others vary.
00:30:47.640
In the lower half of our coop, they can even lay eggs in an enclosed area.
00:30:57.950
We've found their behavior can be quite unpredictable.
00:31:05.950
Thank you so much for your questions!
00:31:12.060
Thank you!
Explore all talks recorded at RubyConf 2016
+78