Pocket Forest
A smart terrarium monitoring and control system for managing multiple terrariums.
Overview
Pocket Forest is a smart terrarium control system developed as a four-person team project. The system combines physical hardware with a companion web application for monitoring environmental conditions, managing lighting schedules and controlling multiple terrariums.
My Contribution
Focused primarily on the web interface including the dashboard, temperature and humidity pages, lighting controls, journal, information pages, settings, navigation and terrarium management.
Interface Preview
Screens and interface examples from Pocket Forest.
Key Features
Manage up to five terrariums
Temperature and humidity monitoring
Custom time-based lighting schedules
Sunrise and sunset simulation
Terrarium journal
Photo Mode
Information pages
QR and network access
System Architecture
The ESP32 acts as the main controller for the user interface, configuration and web access. An Arduino Nano acts as a sub-controller for direct lighting and environmental sensor control. The system supports up to five terrarium lid modules.
Testing
Testing performed during the development of Pocket Forest.
- QR connectivity
- Time-based lighting behaviour
- Humidity response
- Warning thresholds
- Warning clearing
- Ease of connection
- Connection success rate
Challenges
Some of the main technical challenges encountered during development.
- SPI bus conflict on the ESP32 board
- Limited pin availability requiring an Arduino Nano sub-controller
- DHT11 sensor accuracy limitations