Spark.io and Internet of Things

I was looking for an embedded device little, cheap and with Wifi support when I found Spark.io.

Surfing inside its website, I decided to buy the dev kit, 99$ (the core is only 39$). I took the version with embedded antenna because I'm lazy.

The dev kit contains the Spark core and a lot of hardware devices:

Getting started without an Android phone or Iphone, I had to connect the core to the PC with putty, following instructions to set WiFi password and retrieve core Id.
Once connected to the network, I followed the tutorial to switch on and off two LEDs.
Before I realized the hardware circuit:

Then I switched to programming. The code is compatible with language used on Arduino and IDE is available from a web interface: you need to log in and the IDE shows the sample projects that you can edit and automatically save to your cloud space.

The amazing thing is how to flash firmware via OTA. From a web page you press a lightning button: the project is recompiled and the core receives the update via WiFi. When the operation is complete, the device will continue to operate with the new firmware. 

In the next post I will blink LEDs and will show temperature using a Windows Phone app.