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February 2, 2010 2:41 PM

I'm interested in self-tracking/home automation. What products (or DIY projects) are out there in the same vein of "Withings" and "FitBit" that will semi-passively track data about myself?

Example projects:
Withings Body Scale
FitBit Pedometer
Twitter-enabled Toilet
DIY Mobile Hotspot and GPS Webcam
Twitter-controlled lights
Emergency Party Button

Some additional ideas:
GPS tracking (don't yet have a GPS phone, but will soon)
GeoTagged Photography
Software that will give me heavy-handed reminders to do certain chores or tasks.
Motion sensors that will graph amount of motion in my room over time.
Sound sensors that record the level of noise over time.
Keystroke counter/grapher

I'm interested in any kind of quirky, creative, practical, or otherwise interesting trackable data. It needs to be trackable in a somewhat passive sense without much input from me.

posted by TimeTravelSpeed to Technology (5 answers total)

Best answer: How about an app that locks your comp when you walk away (it tracks a bluetooth device, such as your phone), and a similar idea to unlock a real door.
posted by aeighty at 3:00 PM on February 2, 2010

Best answer: Whatpulse for keystroke counter: http://www.whatpulse.org
Google Latitude for tracking: http://www.google.com/latitude/intro.html
posted by deezil at 3:32 PM on February 2, 2010 [1 favorite]

Best answer: Sleep Cycle app for the iPhone gives you a graph of how deeply you slept throughout the night.
posted by dixie flatline at 5:55 AM on February 3, 2010

Response by poster: Thanks for the suggestions, guys! These are perfect.

I now have Whatpulse installed on my work and home computers and it is twittering my daily "pulses".

Although I've had Google Latitude for awhile, I've been avoiding using it because it slows down my poor old Blackberry. New phone coming soon should fix that.

I like the bluetooth locking idea. Just need to find my bluetooth dongle.

Unlocking the door is something I really want to set up, but I'm a bit nervous about the security implications.

I've purchased the Sleep Cycle App (although I'm slightly skeptical) and will give an update here tomorrow morning after I've tried it.

If you're interested in following my self-tracking twitter feed, you can Mefi-Mail me for the username. It currently tweets my weight, bmi, fat, and now Whatpulse results. It will certainly be expanded to other interesting things in the future.
posted by TimeTravelSpeed at 10:07 AM on February 3, 2010

I think you should subscribe to The Quantified Self.
posted by CharlesV42 at 12:16 PM on February 3, 2010