Gristle King

Category: Helium

  • Let’s Talk NanoTags on Helium

    Let’s Talk NanoTags on Helium

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    by

    Nik
    in

    One of the core ben­e­fits of a glob­al LoRaWAN net­work like Heli­um is the abil­i­ty to track assets across a large area. Now, track­ing isn’t mag­ic, it’s engi­neer­ing, and it always comes down to fun­da­men­tals: How are you get­ting your loca­tion? How long do you need your track­er to run? How often should it ping?  As…

  • The Transition to Solana — A New Chapter for Helium

    The Transition to Solana — A New Chapter for Helium

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    by

    Nik
    in ,

    We’re about to make one of the largest migra­tions ever done on a blockchain, from one L1 to anoth­er. Sure, there have been oth­er large migra­tions, but this is eas­i­ly the largest ever seen in the DePIN space. With that that as our frame­work, let’s talk about the rea­sons for the move, the chal­lenges we…

  • Level Up In A Connected World Using 3D Printing

    Level Up In A Connected World Using 3D Printing

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    by

    Nik
    in , ,

    One of many extra­or­di­nary aspects of being alive in 2023 is access to resources. In this case, it was access both to a 3D print­er (a Prusa Mk3S+ I assem­bled from the kit) and find­ing design tal­ent to get max­i­mum val­ue of the print­er. Before we get there though, let’s start at the beginning. Some­time…

  • What devices can you use on Helium?

    What devices can you use on Helium?

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    by

    Nik
    in ,

    Heli­um opened the door for a lot of us into the world of LoRaWAN, which stands for Long Range Wide Area Net­works. After all the excite­ment of get­ting up Hotspots (tech­ni­cal­ly, “gate­ways”) up to earn HNT for pro­vid­ing cov­er­age, we’re left ask­ing, “What can you do with Helium?” One of the best places to start…

  • How Wet Can Ya Get? Let’s Get Muddy!

    How Wet Can Ya Get? Let’s Get Muddy!

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    by

    Nik
    in ,

    Div­ing deep­er over at Meteo Sci­en­tif­ic on this plant nurs­ery project, we want­ed to blast out of the gate with some­thing we thought would be incon­tro­vert­ibly use­ful. For a nurs­ery in the coastal desert envi­ron­ment of San Diego (albeit with local microm­e­te­o­ro­log­i­cal con­di­tions), keep­ing track of soil mois­ture in all the pots seemed like a…

  • How To Measure Endangered Vernal Pool Depth Using The Helium Network

    How To Measure Endangered Vernal Pool Depth Using The Helium Network

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    by

    Nik
    in ,

    Over at Meteo Sci­en­tif­ic (the busi­ness unit I start­ed to run an IoT Sen­sor as a Ser­vice, or iSaaS), I’ve been work­ing on a few projects, one of them around mea­sur­ing ver­nal pools in the mountains.  Ver­nal pools are “one of California’s most endan­gered wet­land nat­ur­al com­mu­ni­ties” accord­ing to Dave Hogan, head of the Chap­ar­ral…

  • People Counter Update: Many Obstacles, Much Learning

    People Counter Update: Many Obstacles, Much Learning

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    by

    Nik
    in ,

    Way back in Feb­ru­ary of 2022, I wrote a Heli­um Foun­da­tion grant to deploy peo­ple coun­ters on a trail here in San Diego. The grant was approved, I used the first tranche to buy the devices, and then ran into a series of obsta­cles that are com­mon enough in this world of busi­ness, IoT, and…

  • Using Helium To Automate Your Home

    Using Helium To Automate Your Home

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    by

    Nik
    in , ,

    This is a project tak­ing you through the basics of how to use the Heli­um LoRaWAN for projects around the home. Relax, we won’t be automat­ing your entire house and acci­den­tal­ly unleash­ing Ter­mi­na­tor. This is just a very sim­ple start into using Helium. At the end, if you fol­low all the direc­tions, you’ll have a…

  • After Action Report — Helium In The Wild

    After Action Report — Helium In The Wild

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    by

    Nik
    in ,

    From Nov 4th through 17th of 2022, Gris­tle King Inc con­duct­ed the Heli­um In The Wild tour on behalf of the Heli­um Foun­da­tion.  This idea was con­ceived, devel­oped, and sup­port­ed by Nik Hawks, Joey Hiller and Scott Sigel to help get boots on the ground off US soil and demon­strate the Heli­um Foundation’s com­mit­ment to…

  • Reports from the Field — Helium In The Wild, Hackathon Train

    Reports from the Field — Helium In The Wild, Hackathon Train

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    by

    Nik
    in , ,

    “The job right now isn’t to make IoT easy. It’s to make it work”.  As I look across the Heli­um ecosys­tem in ear­ly Decem­ber of 2022, I’m start­ing to see the emer­gence of work­ing busi­ness­es built on Heli­um. Baxus may be the most recent exam­ple; a com­pa­ny track­ing all the con­di­tions of items as they move…