Data Logging Station - Arduino Networking - page 33

Hardware and software requirements
On the hardware front, you will of course, need the Arduino Ethernet shield and an Ardu-
ino board such as the Arduino Uno.
You will also need a sensor to measure some data. As this topic is about how to use the
Ethernet shield and not how to measure from sensors, you could actually take any sensor of
your choice.
I used a DHT11 sensor, which is a digital temperature and humidity sensor. I chose this
sensor for this chapter and for many chapters of the topic as it is a very cheap sensor and
easy to interface with Arduino. Along with the DHT11 sensor, you will also need a 4.7k
ohm resistor.
To log the data, you will need to have a MicroSD card that you can plug into the Ethernet
shield. I don't have a specific brand to recommend, but I used a SanDisk MicroSD card
with a normal SD adapter (which worked well for me), so you can also plug it into your
computer to check whether the data was correctly logged. Also, make sure that the SD card
is formatted using the FAT32 format.
You will also need a breadboard and some jumper wires to create the connection between
the sensor and the Ethernet shield.
The following is a list of all components that were used for this chapter:
• The Arduino Uno ( https://www.adafruit.com/products/50 )
• The Arduino Ethernet shield ( https://www.adafruit.com/products/201 )
• The DHT11 sensor ( https://www.adafruit.com/products/386 )
• A MicroSD card ( http://www.amazon.com/SanDisk-Micro-SDHC-Memory-Ad-
apter/dp/B0052MHQM6 )
• A breadboard ( https://www.adafruit.com/product/64 )
• Jumper wires ( https://www.adafruit.com/product/758 )
On the software front, the first thing you will need is the library to interface with the sensor
you chose before. I chose a DHT11 sensor for this project. You will need to download and
install the DHT library from https://github.com/adafruit/DHT-sensor-library .