PatternAgents, LLC
Microcontroller Boards

thingSoC "Grovey"

Build any IoT or Networked device you can imagine!

$1,375 raised

of $1 goal

Funded!
Not Available
Mar 01 2017
funded on

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Easily build the IoT device you’ve always wanted!

The thingSoC Grovey! platform gives you the freedom to choose from hundreds of existing sensors, actuators, and radios to quickly create new electronic systems, in plug together configurations that were not possible before. Easily mix together different CPUs, Radios, and Peripherals, like Servos, Motors, Relays, Sound and Lights, and then program them in your choice of Integrated Development Environments (IDE).

thingSoC is an Open Source Hardware standard that anyone can use to design new IoT products and widgets; The thingSoC Grovey! series combines access to the Seeedstudio Grove system, and the Mikrobus "Click" system, to give you the widest selection of radios, sensors, and actuators available today.

For Educators, Developers, Systems Integrators, and Hackers

Many classrooms, laboratories, shops, and hacker spaces already have access to the Grove ecosystem, with sensors, relays, actuators, and other components; often purchased (or donated) in kits for the Intel Edison, Raspberry Pi, Beaglebone, or the Arduino. However, they have not typically had experience with the Mikrobus "Click" ecosystem, and it’s wider selection of radios and useful peripherals, that complement the Grove ecosystem.

The thingSoC Grovey! series is the missing link, connecting together these formerly incompatible systems in many new and exciting ways. Grovey! allow you to connect, communicate, and reprogram the widest variety of different processors, radios, sensors, and actuators available today.

Choose from off-the-shelf, certified, radio modules like Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, LoRa, EnOcean, LTE, Packet Radio, and more. Choose from hundreds of in-stock, sensors and actuators available at Mouser, Arrow, Digikey, SeeedStudio and others, giving you the best plug-and-play platform choices.

ReMix, ReUse, ReEngineer!

thingSoC gives you the ability to combine many different development systems and peripherals, allowing you to reuse electronics that you may already have, in new and interesting ways. Unfortunately, as technology advances, many systems can become obsolete, getting added to the electronics waste stream. By enabling our users to easily remix and reuse components for their new applications, they won’t have to purchase new sets of sensors and actuators for each new platform they use, or each new class or workshop they teach. ReMix, ReUse, ReEngineer, ReCycle…

Grovey Product Comparisons

FeatureArduino ProGrovey OneGrovey TeensyGrovey I2C
ProcessorAVRAVRCortex-M4FN/A
Speed16 MHz16 mHz96 MHZ1 Mhz
Flash32K32K256KN/A
SRAM2K2K64KN/A
VoltageFixed 3.3V/5V Selectable 3.3V/5V 3.3V Only Selectable 3.3V/5V
ProgrammingFTDI FTDI USB N/A
I2C Ports112 4
Grove Ports0- 4 3 4
Mikrobus Ports0- 1 1 1
thingSoC Ports0- 1 1 1
Arduino IDEYes Yes Yes Yes
Blynk IDEYes Yes Yes Yes
Cayenne IDEYes Yes Yes Yes

The thingSoC "Grovey Series" was designed as "Everyday Electronics"; a no-frills, low cost, approach to modular embedded product design. thingSoC boards are similar in size to most break-out-boards (BOBs), but feature a standardized stacking pinout, as well as a metadata store (Embedis) to store configuration settings.

Integrated Development Environments

The thingSoC Grovey! platform gives you the freedom to choose the environment you are most comfortable with; or the tools you need to learn a new one.

Prototype with Arduino

The thingSoC Grovey! series supports multiple platforms types including AVR, ARM, ESP8266, and Intel x86/Currie based platforms on the Arduino IDE. In addition, the thingSoC Embedis embedded database is available for most of the supported platforms; allowing you to easily add permanent storage to your projects using EEPROM, FRAM, NVSRAM, MRAM, and FLASH modules.

IoT Drag-and-Drop with MQTT, Blynk, and Cayenne

The thingSoC Grovey! series supports several different drag-and-drop Internet of Things (IoT) development systems, Blynk

Apache Cayenne

Choose the development environment that you want to use!

Surprise Drawing

All backers will be automatically be entered into a surprise drawing at the conclusion of the campaign. A special collection of thingSoC boards and peripherals will be sent to the lucky winner!

Manufacturing Plan

The thingSoC standard has been in development for over two years, and several revisions of the boards have already been produced and tested. We are ready to begin moving thingSoC into production over the next few months. The current revisions of the thingSoC Grovey! series are implemented using the Seeedstudio Open Parts Library (OPL), which is designed to give the best results and the most flexibility when working with Seeedstudio and several other manufacturing partners.

Risks & Challenges

We have already received pilot runs of fifty (50) boards from Seeedstudio, for the Grovey Teensy3.2 adapter and the Grovey I2C hub, they look great and are working perfectly. Based on the price, quality, and delivery schedule of this pilot run, we are projecting the costs and schedules for this campaign. Based on our initial success with our hand-built prototypes, we expect the transition to production to be relatively low risk. Of course, supply chain issues, fabrication house schedule problems, and other delays happen to anyone, so we will update our backers throughout the campaign if any problems are encountered.


In the Press

Hackster News

"thingSoC is a low-cost, highly-flexible and vendor agnostic socket system for IoT product development. It consists of both open-source hardware and software supporting many different processor types"

LinuxGizmos.com

"The support for both Grove and Mikrobus means users can draw on the strengths of both platforms"

IoT Expert

"I love new development kits...I was even more happy when I opened the box and found a ThingSoC PSoC4L kit."

diarioelectronicohoy

"Proporciona al desarrollador la libertad de poder elegir entre centenares de sensores, actuadores o radios disponibles para crear, de forma rápida y simple, nuevos sistemas electrónicos, con configuraciones que hasta ahora eran difícilmente asumibles."

Ask a Question

Produced by PatternAgents, LLC in Portland, OR.

Sold and shipped by Crowd Supply.

Support Open Source Hardware Projects!

Thank you for helping to make thingSoC a reality! The source code files for all of these products are available on our Github server, and you have the freedom to download the projects and build your own copies, if you would like to. Copy, edit, remix, and remaster however you like. In addition to being rewarded with good karma, you will receive regular backer updates, and entry into the surprise reward drawing.

$5

Grovey Teensy3.2 Adapter

Use Grove, Microbus, and thingSoC peripherals with your Teensy3.2, simply plug, program, and play. Supports Teensy3.1 and Teensy3.2 boards. (Teensy3.2 Board is sold separately, and not included.)

$10 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

Grovey I2C Hub

Connect four(4) of the same I2C sensor, display, or peripheral to your thingSoC without having to change I2C address settings. Select either 3.3V or 5V operation, and the Grovey I2C Hub can perform the level shifting for you. Add thingSoC connectors to stack thingSoC and Mikrobus peripheral boards.

$15 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

Grovey GPIO Hub

Connect four(4) GPIO sensors, displays, or other Grove peripherals directly to your thingSoC without using extra I/O. Select either 3.3V or 5V operation, and the Grovey GPIO Hub adds eight(8) additional GPIO lines with 5.0 volt level shifting. Includes four(4) independent power control circuits to turn off peripherals when using them to save power. Includes four(4) independent LEDs (R,G,B,Y), one for each quadrent. Add a thingSoC connector pack to stack thingSoC and Mikrobus peripheral boards.

$25 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

Grovey ADC Hub

Connect four(4) Analog sensors directly to your thingSoC without using extra I/O, with either 12 or 16 bit ADC precision. Select either 3.3V or 5V operation, and the Grovey ADC Hub adds four(8) Analog-to-Digital lines with 5.0 volt level shifting. Add a thingSoC connector pack to stack thingSoC and Mikrobus peripheral boards.

$25 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

Grovey PSoC4L

The TSOC_PSoC4L is a PSoC4-Programmable System on Chip based board with integrated USB and Li-Po battery power and charging functions, in an Embedded Module format. It comes preprogramed with a USB Bootloader and a command line intepreter for out-of-the-box applications.

$25 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

Grovey NeoLED Hub

Connect eight(8) strings of WS2812 Color LEDS directly to your thingSoC without using extra I/O, with each Grovey NeoLED Hub. Use to eight(8) NeoLED Hubs to drive sixty-four(64) string of programmable LED's. Add a thingSoC connector pack to stack thingSoC and Mikrobus peripheral boards. Add a LED string connector pack for easy LED interfacing.

$25 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

Grovey USBUART

The Grovey USBUART is a dual (two channel) USB to Bridge device that can be configured for USB to UART, GPIO, I2C, SPI, JTAG, or CapSense. By default is comes configured as a dual channel USB to UART. (It's like have two "FTDI" adapters in one!)

$25 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

Grovey ESP8266 Wi-Fi

Espressif ESP8266 Wi-Fi processor, supporting Grove, Mikrobus, and thingSoC peripherals. Add a thingSoC connector pack to stack thingSoC and/or Mikrobus peripheral boards.

$20 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

Grovey ESP32 Wireless

Espressif ESP32 wireless processor, supporting Grove, Mikrobus, and thingSoC peripherals. Add a thingSoC connector pack to stack thingSoC and/or Mikrobus peripheral boards.

$30 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

Grovey Sensor Kit

The Grovey Sensor Kit includes ten (10) Grove modules, the OLED Display, Temperature Sensor, RGB LED, 3-Axis Accelerometer, I2C Junction, Sound Sensor, ADC, Relay, Button, and Buzzer, and Grove cables.

$60 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

Grovey Freedom Kit

Includes the Grove Sensor Kit and an extra large assortment of Grove Sensors, actuators, and peripherals. Includes Weather Sensor, Water Sensor, Angular Sensor, High Temp Sensor, and much more. Also includes the complete units (with connectors) of the Teensy3.2, Grovey One (ATmega328), Grovey I2C Hub, Grovey GPIO Hub, Grovey ADC Hub, ESP8266, ESP32, programming adapters, and Grove cables. Just what you need for a classroom or laboratory.

$450 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

thingSoC Header Pack

Not everyone will want to add connectors, so we give you the freedom to add connectors or simply solder wires directly to the thingSoC boards if you would like. These connectors are used for the top of the stack of boards, or with a breadboard.

$5 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

thingSoC Connector Pack

These connectors are used for the bottom of the stack of boards, typically attached to one of the thingSoC processor boards.

$5 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

thingSoC Stacking Connector Pack

These connectors are used on boards in the middle of the stack of boards, typically attached to one of the thingSoC peripheral boards.

$5 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

thingSoC Mounting Pack

Threaded mounting standoffs (M2x3mm) can be used to securely attach thingSoC boards together and/or mount into an enclosure.

$5 $8 US Shipping / $18 Worldwide

About the Team

PatternAgents, LLC

Portland, OR  ·   patternagents.com

PatternAgents provides community and commerce for electronics designers, helping them to collaborate using shared patterns, practices, and resources; connect with others in the industry, conceptualize and create new ideas, commercialize their designs, and keep up on the latest technologies and concepts.

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