iPad machine control

We are still working hard at it we connected the tablet over wifi using HTML5 but found in field testing that the data transfer was too slow, we went back to the drawing board and with some academic assistance opened a specific data tunnel cant tell you how we did this as its subject to IP but we have excellent data transfer now to the tablet, will be beta testing in late March so will keep you informed.
Thanks. Hopefully you can tell us more about it soon.
 

harvestyield

New Member
This thread makes very interesting reading for me, as a farmers son who went to work in Technology. Currently I'm working with my dad to improve his use of technology to make his business more efficient and have been doing alot of research into ISOBUS and how the dependency on expensive proprietary screens can be removed.

I'm not sure if anyone has seen this project: http://www.isoblue.org/. I've not got round to building one myself, but I hope to soon, creating a completely open device to get the data out of the ISOBUS and give farmers the freedom to analyse their own data that they have created. It streams out all of the ISOBUS data to your phone via Bluetooth.

A commercial version of this has just been released by 640Labs out of Chicago (www.640labs.com). However it should be noted this company got bought by Monsanto at the end of last year. It's acquisition by this company in my opinion raises very important questions for farmers to tackle, who owns their data? In this case I would personally find it unacceptable for the worlds largest seed and agrichemical business to have access to all of the data around my farm work.
 

funtime

New Member
Sleepy,
People making the apps, selling the aps or just the HTML need to make it financially viable!
Anyone can do it, but making a business out of it is very different !
A couple of years ago I had a go at making an app/ control system that could be used on a variety of implements, it worked and if it will let me I will upload a vid on this thread.
Most of the components were off the shelf and reasonably priced. The logic back then was as most have said here- apps could be easily updated over the existing market network, parts easily bought and replaced with pattern ones (tablet £100 from Maplin) ect.
The big problem I could foresee was exactly this, how to make it financially viable long term. There are a lot of people trying to do it But competing with the big boys in user support, development, knowledge (electrics, hydraulics, gps, data mapping, isobus, ect) is not easy. The user base is not big and the amount of different implements it would have to be able to retro fit to is massive (take a lot of time to get right for each one). I also felt although I would be obliged to help users and be on call 24-7 (we all know how annoying it is when a computer goes down and there's nothing you can do to fix it, in agriculture it could mean finishing the field before it rains) it would also result in certain clients ranting down the phone expecting someone to drive 1/2 way across the country at ridiculous times. And trying to guarantee electrical hardware in an agricultural environment on different equipment would be difficult so unfair on the end user.
Quite simply I didn't feel I would be able to do it justice and therein let people down. It really needs a couple of skilled people working together with low overheads and an agricultural view towards money.
I did debate free releasing it but then my laptop coped it and I lost the code.
I'm very tempted to have another go if there's still interest?? But it would only ever be as an enthusiast and I wouldn't like to guarantee support I couldn't give.
Sorry for the pessimism got into a bit of a rant there.
 

sleepy

Member
Location
Devon, UK
A couple of years ago I had a go at making an app/ control system that could be used on a variety of implements, it worked and if it will let me I will upload a vid on this thread.
Most of the components were off the shelf and reasonably priced. The logic back then was as most have said here- apps could be easily updated over the existing market network, parts easily bought and replaced with pattern ones (tablet £100 from Maplin) ect.
The big problem I could foresee was exactly this, how to make it financially viable long term. There are a lot of people trying to do it But competing with the big boys in user support, development, knowledge (electrics, hydraulics, gps, data mapping, isobus, ect) is not easy. The user base is not big and the amount of different implements it would have to be able to retro fit to is massive (take a lot of time to get right for each one). I also felt although I would be obliged to help users and be on call 24-7 (we all know how annoying it is when a computer goes down and there's nothing you can do to fix it, in agriculture it could mean finishing the field before it rains) it would also result in certain clients ranting down the phone expecting someone to drive 1/2 way across the country at ridiculous times. And trying to guarantee electrical hardware in an agricultural environment on different equipment would be difficult so unfair on the end user.
Quite simply I didn't feel I would be able to do it justice and therein let people down. It really needs a couple of skilled people working together with low overheads and an agricultural view towards money.
I did debate free releasing it but then my laptop coped it and I lost the code.
I'm very tempted to have another go if there's still interest?? But it would only ever be as an enthusiast and I wouldn't like to guarantee support I couldn't give.
Sorry for the pessimism got into a bit of a rant there.

Post a video on YouTube and link it to here.

I think a web based system is better than apps, much faster to develop and will run on anything with a web browser.
 

Andrew

Never Forgotten
Honorary Member
Location
Huntingdon, UK
A couple of years ago I had a go at making an app/ control system that could be used on a variety of implements, it worked and if it will let me I will upload a vid on this thread.
Most of the components were off the shelf and reasonably priced. The logic back then was as most have said here- apps could be easily updated over the existing market network, parts easily bought and replaced with pattern ones (tablet £100 from Maplin) ect.
The big problem I could foresee was exactly this, how to make it financially viable long term. There are a lot of people trying to do it But competing with the big boys in user support, development, knowledge (electrics, hydraulics, gps, data mapping, isobus, ect) is not easy. The user base is not big and the amount of different implements it would have to be able to retro fit to is massive (take a lot of time to get right for each one). I also felt although I would be obliged to help users and be on call 24-7 (we all know how annoying it is when a computer goes down and there's nothing you can do to fix it, in agriculture it could mean finishing the field before it rains) it would also result in certain clients ranting down the phone expecting someone to drive 1/2 way across the country at ridiculous times. And trying to guarantee electrical hardware in an agricultural environment on different equipment would be difficult so unfair on the end user.
Quite simply I didn't feel I would be able to do it justice and therein let people down. It really needs a couple of skilled people working together with low overheads and an agricultural view towards money.
I did debate free releasing it but then my laptop coped it and I lost the code.
I'm very tempted to have another go if there's still interest?? But it would only ever be as an enthusiast and I wouldn't like to guarantee support I couldn't give.
Sorry for the pessimism got into a bit of a rant there.


Welcome to the forum Mr C!
 

Cowabunga

Member
Location
Ceredigion,Wales
A couple of years ago I had a go at making an app/ control system that could be used on a variety of implements, it worked and if it will let me I will upload a vid on this thread.
Most of the components were off the shelf and reasonably priced. The logic back then was as most have said here- apps could be easily updated over the existing market network, parts easily bought and replaced with pattern ones (tablet £100 from Maplin) ect.
The big problem I could foresee was exactly this, how to make it financially viable long term. There are a lot of people trying to do it But competing with the big boys in user support, development, knowledge (electrics, hydraulics, gps, data mapping, isobus, ect) is not easy. The user base is not big and the amount of different implements it would have to be able to retro fit to is massive (take a lot of time to get right for each one). I also felt although I would be obliged to help users and be on call 24-7 (we all know how annoying it is when a computer goes down and there's nothing you can do to fix it, in agriculture it could mean finishing the field before it rains) it would also result in certain clients ranting down the phone expecting someone to drive 1/2 way across the country at ridiculous times. And trying to guarantee electrical hardware in an agricultural environment on different equipment would be difficult so unfair on the end user.
Quite simply I didn't feel I would be able to do it justice and therein let people down. It really needs a couple of skilled people working together with low overheads and an agricultural view towards money.
I did debate free releasing it but then my laptop coped it and I lost the code.
I'm very tempted to have another go if there's still interest?? But it would only ever be as an enthusiast and I wouldn't like to guarantee support I couldn't give.
Sorry for the pessimism got into a bit of a rant there.

You certainly know your market. I particularly like this bit…

"with low overheads and an agricultural view towards money." :LOL:
 

funtime

New Member
Post a video on YouTube and link it to here.

I think a web based system is better than apps, much faster to develop and will run on anything with a web browser.
Cheers Andy although I've just seen Reed are now in charge hmmm.
Sleepy, I understand where your coming from there are a lot of advantages, broad devise compatibility being the main. I don't know much on HTML5 (web pages) but I understand the biggest constraint that make it less than ideal is having a devise powerful enough to process a glitzy webpage capable of working in a variety of different formats (screen sizes ect) and then continually transmit it, traditionally this would be expensive and fragile. Laptops, tablets ect have big processors for making things look nice for us. Most microprocessors don't because all they have to do is read some signals, process 'simple' code and switch a few switches, generally cheap and relatively robust. Things like the Raspberry Pi are changing this though they seem to be primarily capable of user interface but can also have control hardware added. Reaction speed should also be considered, there's quite a few processes involved, delay is not ideal with heavy machinery.
The beauty of the app is you can get the tablet to do all the graphical stuff and have a very light stream of data transmitting to and from a microprocessor eg. tank full, change rate to... ect. And then leave the microprocessor to run the implement. The other beauty is if the User Interface goes tit up which is the most likely bit to crash being by far the most complex, it doesn't take down the important bit that's doing the work.

From my basic understanding of Isobus it's very robust 'language' based upon Canbus which was designed for use in the automotive industry. The cable is a tad elaborate and expensive but your always going to have to run a power cable regardless. And there's little chance of interference. My problem with it is it's tied up by the big manufactures and it doesn't seem easy for the farm engineer to work on/ develop it.

That's my take on it, I could be feeding you a load of horse **** tho.
 
Hi I should have this device launched sometime in the new year as you say the technology is there we are just working on the software to do the different functions needed one of these being a ISObus VT

@pas-john just caught your posts in the other simple GPS for a dairy farm thread. Is your Grass-Guide system the end result of the system you were referring to above or something different?
 

pas-john

New Member
Hi we pivoted our business and really focused on what we really knew well which was our customer needs and coming from Ireland the majority of our customers were grass based, so instead of trying to do a lot of different things and be master of none we decided to focus on a particular market segment and develop our proposition to fulfil their needs.
 
Thread resurrection!!

So anyway we're now 3 years further down the track from when this thread was started: where do we think things have moved on? Have there been any ground shaking changes or developments?

Claas have (finally) come to market with their ISOBUS app for iPad. It's free....the catch is you need to buy their proprietary wireless adapter (CWI) to make it talk to the tractor (about £1500). It's also a bit hobbled, can't do section control or variable rate. Just a basic VT/UT really. Maybe that will come in a future release?

Has the tech come down in price or is it any better or user friendly or plays any better with others makers kit? Despite a lot of press, I'm not sure it's really changed a huge amount which is frankly disappointing.

What differences can we expect in the next 3 to 5 years?
 

trook135

Member
Location
Hampshire
Was thinking about this today, just bought a Spaldings air seeder at auction and needed a speed signal cable, couldn't believe when looking at the parts list online the control box was over £1300!!! It's not a complicated piece of kit either, surely an iPad/ iPhone could do the same job for much less cost!!
 

Cowabunga

Member
Location
Ceredigion,Wales
I've recently bought an iPad Pro 12.9" with 125 Gigabyte RAM that could easily cope with any display, computation or control demand on any tractor, if only tractor manufacturers would embrace it.

Car manufacturers are now doing so with Apple CarPlay and similar Google thing that duplicates phones on the car display. What tractor manufacturers need to do is go one step further and make the iPad or Google tablet the actual display and control centre itself. There's nothing stopping them. Nothing. Except perhaps internal politics within the tractor companies electronic engineering departments that push clunky outdated displays and controls our way. It's not good enough when we already experience the Apple and Android devices and their near universal utility and ease of use in our everyday lives.

Come on tractor manufactures, pull your fingers out, pull your socks up and embrace commonly available technology solutions
 

SFI - What % were you taking out of production?

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Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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As reported in Independent


quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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