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Sending Raspberry Pi data to Google Sheets for the Low Code people — the easy way
How a single line of Python code and Integromat can substitute this whole AWS IoT Core / Azure IoT Hub nightmare…
I consider myself reasonably tech-savvy. Bwah, I would say, I really like computers and tinkering with technology. However, my background was purely commercial and until last year I have never touched a line of code.
Out of nowhere a few months ago, as a newly born tech entrepreneur (adding “tech” gives the title far more flair), I was all of a sudden facing a new scenario. I needed to send data from my edge device (another “edgy” word that likes to be sprinkled with crumbles of “IoT” for more flavor) to… hmm, to the cloud, I guess?
How difficult can it be to send sensor data from Raspberry Pi to somewhere in the cloud? Should I hire an IoT consultant (likely expensive) or give it a go myself? What followed after was a 3-month long exploration of AWS / Azure and IoT solutions offered by these providers. In the end I have built a working solution with Azure, only to find out afterward, that it was a giant overkill. There was a much simpler and faster way of achieving the same objective.
The hard way
AWS
Having been noticed on one of the start-up competitions, I had some spare Amazon credits in my pocket and even a connection to an Amazon tech adviser. Unfortunately at that stage I was so technically clueless, that talking to my advisor I felt like a Stone Age man learning about fire. Nevertheless, AWS IoT Core felt like the right way to go.
Marketing materials on their website certainly convinced me that AWS IoT Core is a comprehensive tool for the job. Message Broker to execute commands on the device sounded certainly useful. Device Shadows allowing to set the state of your device even if it is offline (syncing back when the connection is restored), seemed to be an ingenious solution, especially when my devices had issues with consistent electricity access.
I have waged my war with AWS IoT SDK for 2 weeks. Setting up the access permissions in JSON format in elaborate Resource/Policy/Identity management conundrum has exploded my head. I was building a car, by learning how to vulcanize…
