An iroh powered smart fan (iroh.computer)
153 points by surprisetalk 4 days ago
unsolved73 3 hours ago
Iroh is probably one of the best shots we have at making IoT finally secure with the built-in endpoint-to-endpoint encryption. The only thing that is missing is an embedded QUIC stack, the setup described in this article sees a little bit too hacky (4 MiB of PSRAM, really?).
Liftyee 4 hours ago
While this is neat, it strikes me as the software developer's idea of a "smart fan". The engineer in me says that an actual "smart fan" would be one whose blades are designed to produce maximum airflow with minimum noise (variable pitch? avoiding turbulence?)
lilhenry 3 hours ago
He’s using a noctua fan which are pretty much the quietest pc fans you can buy while still moving large amounts of air
pessimizer 37 minutes ago
I think you're describing a "great" fan. A "smart" fan is one that thinks. e.g. smart TVs are worse (and therefore cheaper) than dumb TVs, but they do a lot more thinking.
cold_pizz4 3 hours ago
devttyeu 6 hours ago
Any plans to standardize Iroh IoT protocols, e.g. Matter over Iroh / Some other standard that would be plug-able to things like Home Assistant?
karissa 33 minutes ago
Yes, iroh here. We are looking into projects who want to use iroh with matter or thread. If you have a project you want to collaborate with our engineers on, please get in touch! Send an email to support@iroh.conputer
Alien1Being 12 hours ago
I use a inexpensive 36 AUD Tapo infrared hub to control my fan reliably.
It links to my Google Home installation and responds to voice commands.
https://us.store.tapo.com/products/tapo-h110-smart-ir-iot-hu...
Someone with too much time on their hands might benefit from the iroh solution....
skybrian 15 hours ago
It's unclear to me why they needed to compile Rust to WebAssembly to write a website. It looks like iroh has a JavaScript API:
https://docs.iroh.computer/languages/javascript
Edit: actually, that's a Node.js-specific API. For browsers, it seems like they should have a platform-independent JavaScript/TypeScript API that includes a WebAssembly file (if needed) instead of expecting you to compile WebAssembly yourself.
nine_k 15 hours ago
Not touching JavaScript might be a reason enough. (Though I bet it has a Typescript API, and Typescript is great.)
croes 12 hours ago
Typescript is nothing without JavaScript
roblabla 10 hours ago
sunshine-o 9 hours ago
iroh is very interesting and in many way it could get traction for IoT.
Now I am not sure it is feasible but it would be interesting to have it available in esphome. I feel this is really where real adoption happens.
Teknomadix 12 hours ago
Why.
gurjeet 11 hours ago
In hacker culture, the correct question is "Why not?"
Somebody wanted to do something, and they did it; it doesn't have to be any more complicated than that :-)
> Don't be curmudgeonly. Thoughtful criticism is fine, but please don't be rigidly or generically negative.
Sincerely, HN Guidelines Police :-)
kennywinker 10 hours ago
To demonstrate the potential of iroh to enable accessing stuff across complex network structures for iot type use cases
Frenchgeek 12 hours ago
Because Uncle Iroh needs more fans maybe? (should have been a tea kettle)
shermantanktop 15 hours ago
This is interesting as an example of just how complicated and elaborate a toolchain you can use to build something dead simple.
There’s a lot that comes for free by adding all these libraries and crates and steps. But from what I can tell it comes down to:
let _ = if fan_on { fan.set_high() } else { fan.set_low() };
klooj 15 hours ago
iroh is a peer to peer networking technology so the project example of controlling a fan isn't so much about the fan but rather that it's controllable from anywhere through an esp32 microcontroller that can maintain a resilient connection endpoint even through power cycles and so on. I think iroh was posted about on HN a few weeks ago and I had a similar reaction of like...what in the world is this blog post even saying haha. But I found their docs page and found it pretty fascinating learning! https://docs.iroh.computer/what-is-iroh
aquariusDue 7 hours ago
Works on Android too when developing Dart applications and making use of flutter_rust_bridge though it's a bit of an involved setup to be honest.
I really hope more people will play around with iroh and build stuff especially because in the last year some things have been renamed in the API to be more clear and other stuff has been simplified e.g. see this blog post https://www.iroh.computer/blog/iroh-0-94-0-the-endpoint-take...
rwmj 12 hours ago
I use a fan with an on/off button.
kaashif 7 hours ago
cinntaile 10 hours ago
dtj1123 8 hours ago
miki123211 7 hours ago
The hard part isn't controlling the fan, it's controlling the fan from anywhere, without a central server in the way.
Sure, you could probably make this much smaller if you invented a specialized p2p fan control protocol, but that's a lot of work.
quickthrowman 3 hours ago
The simple way to do this is a dumb thermostat wired through a relay coil that enables a fan. It doesn’t give you remote access to change the setpoint but that’s all this setup does. Something like this has a setpoint you change once and then leave it.
For specific applications like transfer fans for a server room with a small amount of heat to react, you can buy an all-in-one thermostatically controlled fan: https://acinfinity.com/room-to-room-fan-8-with-temperature-c...
drnick1 2 hours ago
In a heatwave, you need AC, not a fan. Moving hot air around without cooling it is pretty much useless.
lookeey an hour ago
Fans increase the efficiency at which your body's own cooling system (sweating) works by increasing the amount of air that flows by your skin, be it hot or cold.
embedding-shape an hour ago
Anything helps, when you don't have AC. Moving slightly colder air to where you sit, or moving away generated from your body, does make a ever so slight difference. Helps to get rid of some sweat too, if you're sitting and sweating, which also helps a tiny bit.
phoghed an hour ago
Lived in the California desert with no AC as a kid, fans definitely help. Especially if you are sweating or spritz yourself with some water
Cthulhu_ 2 hours ago
But a fan is nice in not-heatwave but still warm temperatures. I have a usb desk fan from a PC cooler manufacturer (Arctic I believe) and it's one of the best accessories.
basro an hour ago
A fan is better than nothing, even in a heatwave.