Checkpoint around the project

The project is here a little bit more advanced than what the code suggests. It can almost be used in production, although it still doesn't switch my heater yet, as it's not connected. I'm struggling with a dumb problem : I want to make things clean, as not-looking-like-a-bunch-of-wires clean.

As I don't have access to the required material for making my own PCBs, I bought one of these boards. This is great for soldering the extra-arduino components and having things neat and tidy, but what about the cables that are coming from the "outside world"? Right now, I have four pairs of cables coming into the prototype board : three pairs for the three sensors (living room, basement and outside) and one pair to pilot the heater. I don't want to solder these cables to the PCB, as I know I'll have to move the Arduino around one of these days (when I get some extras sensors or if I add a new function). I've been looking for one of these things where you can screw thight cables to some kind of domino soldered to the PCB, but there's only one electronic shop around and online, either post tax is really expensive (10$ for a standard delivery is common here), or you can have it for free, but it'll take a month to get the missing part...

So I'm looking around for a standard connector I could hack, easily found on a broken PC, loke a PS/2 or a USB port. If I don't find any, I think I'll buy a set of tiny dominoes that you can separate at will. It's not the cleanest solution, but I guess that'll do and I can go forward.

I'm no electronic expert, so everything on the electronic side is taking more time than the programming part.

Right now, what I see is missing to be able to release a beta version :

• Get the piloting part for the heater working
• Build a PCB and get the components on it
• Have a page to manage the schedules for the sensors
• Make a javascript object for the widget so it can be automatically updated
• Make both the graphs and the widget update themselves automatically
• Clean up the codes (PHP and Arduino)
• Publish the Arduino code
• Build up the documentation

After this, anybody will be able to use Ardamon alone.

The goals for after the beta release :

• Build up the translation system
• Make a nice box with the PCB and the Arduino inside
• Use my LCD shield to display the temperatures

By the way, I bought most of my stuff from the DealExtreme website. They have very low price, although most of the stuff comes from China and it takes up to a month to get an order delivered. The small components (resistors, thermistors, power supply...) were bought at a local electronic retailer. I think the total price for my Ardamon setup (three sensors, an Arduino Uno and an Ethernet shield + some small stuff) costs around 60$ when every components are bought new. But you can always recycle some old electronics you have around !