Monitoring the Fullness of Paper Shredder

When Paper Shredder is fulfilled by paper trash, Arduino notifies someone via Gmail that paper trash is full and it should be taken out.

In this tutorial, I am going to show you how to detect the fullness of Paper Shredder and send a notification via Gmail using Arduino Uno.

I made this tutorial for beginners! It is really easy!!!

Let's get started!

Demonstration

Detecting the Fullness of Paper Shredder

Ultrasonic Sensor - HC-SR04 is used to detect the fullness of Paper Shredder. When the distance between sensor and paper trash is below a threshold, Paper Shredder is considered to be full.

Handling Event

In this project, when an event occurs, a notification is sent via Gmail.

Thing used in this projects

Arduino Uno
PHPoC Shield for Arduino
Ultrasonic Sensor
2 Jumper wires

Assembly

1. Stack PHPoC Shield on Arduino
2. Connect LAN cable or USB wifi Dongle to the shield for Ethernet

3. Wiring Diagram between Arduino and Sensor.

Arduino Source Code

Code:

#define PIN_TRIG 5
#define PIN_ECHO 6
#define BIN_HEIGHT 20 // maximum containable height of bin in centimeters

#include "SPI.h"
#include "Phpoc.h"

long ultrasonicGetDistance();
boolean dustbinSendGmail();

PhpocEmail email;
boolean isSent = false;

void setup() {
 Serial.begin(9600);
 while(!Serial)
 ;
 pinMode(PIN_TRIG, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(PIN_ECHO, INPUT);

 Phpoc.begin(PF_LOG_SPI | PF_LOG_NET | PF_LOG_APP);

}

void loop() {
 long distance = 0;
 // read 10 time and get average value to eliminate noises
 for(int i = 0; i < 100; i++)
 {
  long temp = 0;
  do
  {
   temp = ultrasonicGetDistance();
  }
  while(temp > BIN_HEIGHT);

  distance += temp;
  delay(10);
 }
 distance /= 100;

 Serial.print(distance);
 Serial.println(" cm");

 if(distance <= 5)
 {
  if(!isSent)
  {
   Serial.println("Dustbin is almost full");
   isSent = dustbinSendGmail();
  }
 }
 else if(isSent && distance > 8) // avoid send alot of email when the distance is oscillated around 5cm
  isSent = false;

 delay(500);
}

long ultrasonicGetDistance(){
 long duration, distance;
 digitalWrite(PIN_TRIG, LOW);
 delayMicroseconds(2);
 digitalWrite(PIN_TRIG, HIGH);
 delayMicroseconds(10);
 digitalWrite(PIN_TRIG, LOW);
 duration = pulseIn(PIN_ECHO, HIGH);
 distance = (duration/2) / 29.1;
 return distance;
}

boolean dustbinSendGmail(){
 // setup outgoing relay server - gmail.com
 email.setOutgoingServer("smtp.gmail.com", 587);
 email.setOutgoingLogin("your_login_id", "your_login_password");

 // setup From/To/Subject
 email.setFrom("from_email_address", "from_user_name");
 email.setTo("to_email_address", "to_user_name");

 email.setSubject("Your dustbin is almost full");

 // write email message
 email.beginMessage();
 email.println("Location: Planet Earth.");
 email.println("");
 email.println("Your dustbin is almost full.");
 email.println("");
 email.println("Prepare to through it out.");

 email.endMessage();

 // send email
 if(email.send() > 0)
 {
  Serial.println("Email send ok");
  return true;
 }
 else
 {
  Serial.println("Email send failed");
  return false;
 }
}

Announcement

Monitoring the Fullness of Paper Shredder

Monitoring the Fullness of Paper Shredder