hi i’m new to this arduino uno. may i know if its possible to use this as a tracker? i also would like to know if its possible to implant it as a range type means if its get out of the circle it would trigger a sound? and can i use a app to contol the settings? im trying to make this for my final year project. if anyone can help. bless you
Tracker ? Perhaps you should explain in detail what you want to do ? Sounds like more than an Arduino is needed … if one is needed at all.
Implanted ? Into what, an elephant (I won’t ask where) ?
The “make a noise if out of a certain range” is a tough problem that is almost impossible for any system. There are no good solutions.
The Arduino (Uno) is just a processor of information. It can do (simple) calculations on numbers, and it can rearrange memory according to some desired algorithm. It can measure voltages or notice digital state changes of a voltage input. But it cannot sense anything of the world on it’s own. Perhaps only with a built in temperature sensor (iirc). You need sensors for any other kind of sensing. So think about what size of circle you want to detect range in. And through which method this sensing is to be done?
An Arduino can also output digital voltage levels (like high voltage 5 volt, and low being 0 volt. Or simulate an analog changing voltage with a low-pass filtered PWM signal comming out of some of it’s digital pins. To make a sound or whatever it needs an actuator, like a speaker or buzzer. There are plenty of examples on the web on how this is done. Ranging from powering on a simple autonomous buzzer, to driving a magnetic coil speaker, to drive a special MP3 player board.
The Arduino (Uno) can also communicate. Either with your needed sensors (through serial UART, SPI, TWI/I2C), or with a computer(built in serial connection over USB), or with a wireless communication device of your choice (Bluetooth, Wifi, Zigbee/Xbee, maybe even NFC). The latter usually also using a serial UART connection. But for sure these need expansion shields with wireless transceiver modules. In the end it depends on what your pc/phone/tablet can do. And how you can program this app.
Short answer: Yes it can, but not on it’s own alone. Describe better how and what you want to track.
I suggest that you choose a simpler project - this one goes against the laws of physics, unless you can get by with a very crude circle-radius. Where that would vary by 500% or so, for a practical system using either RF or acoustics.irkizanil:
hi i’m new to this arduino uno. may i know if its possible to use this as a tracker? i also would like to know if its possible to implant it as a range type means if its get out of the circle it would trigger a sound? and can i use a app to contol the settings? im trying to make this for my final year project. if anyone can help. bless you
The field you should read about is Real Time Location systems (RTLS), and the technologies are named multi-lateration, tri-lateration, Time Difference Of Arrival. Search and read.
Outdoors of course, GPS gives you a radius for that circle of perhaps 20m. If your GPS has clear view of 1/2 the sky and is a WAAS capable GPS and is in a region where WAAS or its equivalent in other than the US, exists.
But indoors, not so easy.
ok what i have in mind is that, a device that can be put on a toddler pocket to prevent them from be separate from their parents in a shopping mall. im trying to find a way whether the arduino can be program in such way. for example of the toddler is far from the parents at a certain range it will sent a signal through a mobile app so that the parents will receive a notification. my lecturer ask me to use RFID technology. i still have no idea which to use. she also say its better to use a bluetooth device as it has a limited range.
The problem is the “certain range”, the range can vary by 10’s of meters depending on the local conditions. In your case, it would probably generate lots of false alarms.
It’s obviously for a school project (now that he’s bothered to mention that) so it doesn’t need to be perfect: just basically work.
The short answer is yes, it can work. A Bluetooth Class 2 device has a nominal range of about 10 meters: that’s already farther than I’d want a toddler getting from me in a mall. However, some devices provide access to signal strength readings and that can be used as a crude method of determining distance. Here’s a discussion on the subject: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1370 … ble-device
Good luck
Thanks everyone. I appreciate it a lot. Sorry if I didn’t explain it properly. 
Why couldn’t the toddler carry a BT microphone (or transmitter of some sort) and have it paired to the parent’s phone ? Your app, running on the phone, detects when the pairing is broken … and alerts the parent. No Arduino needed.
it can alert the parents but the bt microphone can’t show the toddler location
irkizanil:
it can alert the parents but the bt microphone can’t show the toddler location
That is more preciscion and functionality than you initially wanted. Now you also want directionality? If that was economically feasible then it would have existed commercially already.
You could combine a BT mike with a RFID field receiver. If the kid happens to walk out the shop it would likely pass the RFID detector transmitters near the entrance. (assuming the shop has them) Then a RFID field detector could send a warning signal via the bluetooth mike. But beyond that tracking is lost. Inside buildings GPS is not going to work.
Maybe I underestimate the size of US-based shopping malls (or other developed countries) but if you cannot locate your kid within a shop in this confined space, then it’s more of a parenting issue rather than a technological one. But I know, this is school project. The objective is to learn. Anyway, as I said before, what the Uno can do is not the issue. It’s the other hardware that needs most of your worries.
hc-06 is possible? because i found a device which is simillar to my idea. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ec … f=category … this what i meant heh.
Hi,
Thanks for checking with us on this. GPS trackers are a bit trickier and bigger than people think. We as an American society have been way too spoiled by James Bond. While the government might (and that’s a big if) have tracers that size, its not really possible with DIY components. They are just too big. Basically a GPS tracker only needs a few components. A GPS device, a microcontroller, a power supply, and an output device.
The GPS device reads information from the GPS satellites, calculates the distance and outputs it. It actually output a pretty long string with quite a bit of data, including position, heading, speed, time, etc. Some simple parsing should give you the data you need. Most GPS devices will output information at 1Hz although some will do it faster. The main differences in the GPS modules we carry are maximum output frequency, type of antenna, operating voltage, size, connector type and price. Check out the GPS buying guide for more information.
https://www.sparkfun.com/pages/GPS_Guide
The microcontroller is the brains of the operation. This is what will parse your GPS data, send your data when you want it, configure your output device, etc. If you want to setup your device to alert you when the device goes out of a certain range, this is where you’d do it. If you want it to send you locations once per minute but wait and only send it every hour this is where you do it. Technically you don’t need a microcontroller, you can just output all the GPS data every second but at some point you will need to get all of the data under control. Pretty much any microcontroller should work for this job, but if you are unfamiliar with microcontrollers I recommend the Arduino boards. The Arduino Uno is a great place to start, but feel free to check out the Arduino buying guide.
http://www.sparkfun.com/pages/arduino_guide
The output device is what people tend to forget, and usually the trickiest. So far the GPS device has figured out where it is and told that information to the microcontroller. The problem is the microcontroller doesn’t care where it is, you do. Usually the GPS device is out in the wild. You can turn it into a GPS logger by adding a simple logging device, but usually you want it to send the information out so it is useable from a different location. Unfortunately most wireless devices don’t have the range to make this useful. An XBee might work if you need to locate something on a piece of property that’s only a couple of miles (cows on a farm, trucks on a lot, etc.), but usually you are going to need more than a few miles. This pretty much limits you to cellular (there are also satellite services and such, but they are not as common). That means we need a cellular module and a SIM card. We also need some sort of plan, and just voice isn’t going to cut it. A messaging plan will work for some application, but sometimes a data plan is the way you want to go.
The power supply is usually some sort of battery, most of the components don’t take a lot of power, except the cellular module. Cell modules have been known to pull 2A when connecting, so while you may not always need that much power you will want to make sure your battery can output that much power in small bursts. Depending on your setup you might even want to keep the cell module off until you need it to save power. Also don’t forget a way to charge your battery, it might be removing it, built in charger, solar panel, etc, but always make sure you have enough power.
I’ll add that GPS generally doesn’t work indoors, like in a shopping mall.