Overview
Project Aura is an intelligent multi-node IoT lighting system developed as a capstone project at Fanshawe College. The system uses ESP32 microcontrollers as distributed sensor nodes and a Raspberry Pi 5 as the central hub, all communicating over MQTT.
Key Contributions
Technical Details
Firmware was written in C/C++ and structured around FreeRTOS tasks to handle concurrent sensor reads, LED PWM control, and RFID event detection without blocking. Serial communication was validated using a logic analyzer to confirm correct I²C and SPI timing before final integration. The cloud pipeline used MQTT topics to publish sensor data, which AWS IoT rules forwarded to storage and alerting services.
Overview
A two-node PIC18F-based embedded control system designed to mirror a real-world industrial greenhouse control panel. The system monitors temperature, humidity, and CO₂ levels and drives actuator outputs (fans, heaters, irrigation) based on programmable setpoints.
Key Contributions
Technical Details
The two nodes communicated via UART, with one acting as a sensor aggregator and the other as the actuator controller. Hardware faults were diagnosed using UART serial monitoring and oscilloscope traces on the ADC input lines. The final PCB was designed from schematic to layout in KiCad and hand-assembled with SMD components.
Overview
Professional hardware repair and diagnostics role at The Phone Stop in London, Ontario. Daily work involved identifying and resolving board-level faults on consumer electronics using schematics, multimeters, and proprietary diagnostic software.
Key Contributions
Technical Details
Fault isolation typically involved tracing power rails and signal lines against schematics to identify failed passives, ICs, or connectors. All repairs were documented with root cause analysis notes to maintain traceability and identify recurring failure patterns. This role sharpened systematic debugging skills directly applicable to embedded hardware bring-up.