Sending notification to spark core from phone

I would like to make a spark core photon smart watch, I think it would be cool to have the spark core connected to a display and battery and a few other peripherials It would get notifications from my phone and display it on the display, I would also have it check my email, twitter, and Facebook( if possible) and since the spark core has wifi upload I can always make tweaks add games or more peripherials

Yes? And what is your actual question?

Since all the described things are already possible, what do you need help with?

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Purely out of interest, what are your experiences with projects like this so far? Just so you know, your Core won’t run off a coin cell battery. The Core itself can use up to 300mA with wifi enabled. Add your suggested peripherals to that, and you’re going to have a major power issue. You could solve that by using extensive sleep intervals, but then your real time phone notifications would suffer. Also, since this is a micro controller, it’s meant to control things. It’s not going to be as easy as hooking up a screen to it, browse Facebook and post all day long. Going to the App Store to install angry birds isn’t likely to happen either.
Those things aren’t impossible, but require some serious effort on battery management and size. Just know what you’re getting into :wink:
We’re glad to help if you need any, so feel free to ask. Looking forward to seeing it working

Sorry I did not have a clearer question. My question is I don’t know how to notifications from a phone to the spark core over wifi. The smart watch would run on a 3.7 volt LiPo battery, I would continue updating the watch with new software and features every week. About the Twitter and facebook I just want the core to check my Twitter feeds and facebook posts and display the newest one on the oled display. Thanks again

The SparkCore is cool… very cool, but it is, sadly, not the “right” tool for what you want to do.

You want battery life & a direct connection to a smart phone. That’s bluetooth (specifically 4.0 BLE), not WiFi.

If you wanted to build a little display that sat on your desk, plugged into you computer or wall, and displayed that info then yes, the SparkCore would be fantastic. However there’s simply no easy way to A, connect a SparkCore directly to a phone over WiFi and B, have it run for any real length of time on a battery. The WiFi spec implemented on the core (and most devices) just won’t allow it!

Sorry for the bad news. I like the idea it’s just not feasible, at least not right now :frowning:

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In one of the spark core promo videos some one made a twitter feed fridge magnet with a battery. All I want to do is import that project on to your wrist and to check facebook posts and my twitter feeds, I don’t Necessarily need it to connect to a phone, By the way is their a way for the spark core to check the status of your snapchats? I think it would be cool to have a spark core on your wrist, you can do many projects with the spark core (like an email inbox notifier, etc) thank you for your help :smile:

If you are OK not to have a direct connection to the phone, you can do what you want with IFTTT.
Spark announced today the official support of IFTTT.
You can configure it to get a notitication on the spark when something happens on your Twitter/email etc.
Check https://community.spark.io/t/new-product-spark-ifttt-internet-button/9521

Thanks for that speedy reply, I took a look and was wondering could it display a notification on an oled display when I get a new email? I saw that you could use your core to trigger things on the internet but could the internet trigger the core? Thanks again for that response
-Fishy4341

Yes, you could it that way around. The only real problem that exists is the fact that the Core is relatively power hungry. Unless you’re planning on walking around with a backpack full of batteries, it’s just not doable. The Core is also fairly big to wear on your wrist, although the P0/P1 modules are smaller.
You’d also only have Internet where ever there is wifi. That can of course be dealt with by using a hotspot, but WiFi is pretty unfriendly when it comes to power.

Does the spark core have a sleep mode where it sleeps turns off wifi and stuff? If not I can have a power switch and turn it on when I want it on because I dont need it constantly checking for emails or facebook post only when i want it. I was also wondering if their is a function to disable wifi and enable it if so I just want it to show the time on the display when I press one of the buttons to show a menu to choose an item, like check facebook for posts or check my inbox, etc.
-Fishy4341

You can do that. See the documentation here: http://docs.spark.io/firmware/#spark-sleep

You can easily get the spark core to wake up every X minutes, check what’s up online, display it on an OLED and go back to sleep.
You still need a way to make sure the OLED display remains while the spark is sleeping.

Now that I have that all figured out does anyone know of a good oled display that works with the spark core photon, I would prefer it to be a graphical display aprox. .98 inch or 1 inch
-fishy4341

Would something cheap from deal extreme work? http://www.dx.com/p/0-96-128x64-i2c-interface-blue-color-oled-display-module-for-arduino-avr-arm-pic-346542#.VMFElSvF_hw

@fishy4341, OLED is not very low power. You may want to consider using what the Pebble watch uses: A Sharp Memory LCD display:

I thought the Pebble was e-ink? Or am I confuzled?

The pebble uses the Sharp Memory LCD. It’s very similar to e-ink in several of it’s characteristics but it is not the same thing.

I love what your doing and I plan to do the same thing, who cares if it hogs power thats what lipos are for right? You can see my project here http://makezine.com/2014/07/16/diy-google-glass/ Im re making it with the spark photon and a little 0.96 inch monochrome oled which is very low on power, good luck!

@fishy4341

This might be of interest to you: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/167134865/blynk-build-an-app-for-your-arduino-project-in-5-m?ref=category_popular

Thanks clay for that information I know I just want a watch that can last about 8 hours before I need to recharge it. Does anyone know of a good display that is easy to hook up and have it working? I was thinking for the battery it would be a 3.7 volt 1200 mhz battery that I could just hook up to the vin pin and to recharge it I would by a charger until I can get the final project done with a power/charge port. I would have the core disable the wifi every 5 minuets it is not in use to save battery and turn off the display until the user interacts with the watch (presses one of the four buttons)
-fishy4341

https://www.adafruit.com/products/326 I might use this