The PiCycle an amazing student project

I have had the pleasure this year to have been a supervisor for one of our sixth form students doing an Extended Project Qualification (EPQ).

The EPQ is a level 3 qualification (similar to A-level) for students to do something that they are interested in. This can be an essay or an artifact and can take a myriad of forms. In this case my student chose to do a Raspberry Pi based project which was how I became involved.

Dan had no previous experience of the Raspberry Pi or Python before starting the project. He had done some web development but wanted to try something new. He spent a large portion of the project time mastering the basics of Python and the basic hardware before moving on to getting the project up and running.

The result is the PiCycle a Raspberry Pi based cycle computer that takes the position of the rider an plots it on a map on a website. The idea was to use the device to prove the designer had completed a planned charity cycle ride across France but could be used for all sorts of tracking applications. As well as getting the device working he spent some time getting it to look good too with branded interfaces on the device and the web tracking page.

The student developed the program to collect the GPS position and store this in a file on the Raspberry Pi and then upload the data to the web to display the position(s). The design means that whilst the cyclist is in areas of poor phone reception they can still log the GPS position (assuming GPS signal) and then upload the data when the phone signal is regained.

This project was a great achievement especially considering that Dan had no prior knowledge of the Raspberry Pi or Python before he started the EPQ.

Some more information about the project can be found in his project presentation. He can be found on twitter: @DJWOOLFALL.