Web application to control a drone remotely
I work on this project with a friend. He built a drone using Raspberry Pi 3 Model combined with Arduino. He added some modules to enhance it like:
- Camera Module of 5Mpx connected to Raspberry Pi via USB port
- GPS Module to retrieve GPS coordinates at specific time
- Portable battery to have possibility to use it without required to plug on alimentation. The battery has a lifetime of 15 minutes.
- Six servo motors to have possibility to fly
- A controller to control the drone by sending command to execute a specific action. The controller use radio frequence to send the commands.
He alse wanted to control the drone remotely through a web interface but he didn't know a lot in programming so i join him to implement this part. We was really proud of the result at the end.
From the web interface, we will able to do the following action:
- View battery status: Frequently receive update of the battery life when the drone is turned on
- Stream the camera: We can view in realtime what the camera is focused on.
- Take picture: Press a button to send command to the drone to take a picture.
- View picture taken with the camera: Fetch pictures taken by the camera from Throner API and display on the page
- Controls: A interface contains a controller with many button. When we press on one button, a command is sent to the drone to execute the action.
- View the path: We can access to all the sessions of the drone and for each session, we can view the path on Google Maps.
A session reprensent the duration between the turn on and the turn off of the drone.
- Node.js 8+
- Python 3
- RabbitMQ
- MongoDB
I used 4 projects make all these features work. I will list them below and describe the role.
-
Thoner IOT: Node.js app hosted in Raspberry Pi who communicates with client web application
Link: https://github.com/tericcabrel/throner-iot -
Throner API: REST API with Node.js and MongoDB to manage data for Throner project
Link: https://github.com/tericcabrel/throner-api -
Throner WEB: Web application built with React and CoreUI who allows to control a drone
Link: https://github.com/tericcabrel/throner-web -
Throner Dispatcher: Dispatch request between throner-api, throner-iot and throner-web
Link: https://github.com/tericcabrel/throner-dispatcher
