Do you know how to make Node-RED a complete IoT solution?
Node-RED is a popular open source IoT software that was originally developed by IBM. It is a visual, flow-based development environment that allows you to drag and drop nodes that process data and stitch them together. We will show you how to turn a Node-RED flow into a complete IoT solution with a web-based user interface, dashboards, rules, notifications and data storage.
Node-RED has a vibrant community of contributors that share ready-to-use nodes and flows for IoT data collection, processing and integration. For example, you can create a flow with a MODBUS node reading industrial data from a PLC or you can use the MQTT broker node to collect data from sensors. You can then use an AWS node to send this data to the AWS cloud. Node-RED is a great tool to stitch a data flow together. This makes Node-RED an easy option to quickly collect, process and send data elsewhere. But if you want to turn this into a professional IoT solution, there isn’t a good way to do so… well, not until now.
One way to turn a Node-RED flow into a professional IoT solution is to use Node-RED to collect the data and then install a database like MySQL or PostgreSQL to store the data. You can then develop a web-based application with user management, dashboards, and a rules engine as the frontend application that reads data from the database. Whew, this could take weeks, months, or more.
To make this quick and easy, I will use a small software application (about 20MB) called Machinechat JEDI Pro that has a ready-to-use node for Node-RED. Machinechat JEDI Pro runs locally on Microsoft Windows, Raspberry Pi OS, Linux and Apple macOS, so you don’t have to spending time registering for another cloud service. Once you drag-and-drop the Machinechat JEDI node into your Node-RED flow, Machinechat JEDI becomes the frontend for your IoT solution in an instant with web-based user interface, user management, data dashboards, rules, notifications and integrated data storage. Because Machinechat JEDI Pro runs locally beside your Node-RED installation, you can bundle the IoT solution together. This solution will work even without Internet access or the cloud. Cool right?
Let’s get started with just a few easy steps:
To quickly test things out, import this flow into your Node-RED system. It pulls information from openweathermap.com and sends it to JEDI.
Explore how easy it is to setup and use rules and notifications, local storage, user management and the many other powerful capabilities of JEDI!
You may run into use cases where memory constraints and disk space are tight. Though Node-RED has been written really well, it is developed on top of the NodeJS runtime. It can all end up having a footprint of over 200 megabytes! In IoT use cases where your solution needs to fit into tight spaces, you may be able to use Machinechat JEDI Pro by itself. At about 20MB and a single-binary architecture, Machinechat JEDI Pro might help your IoT solution address opportunities that you cannot attempt with other technologies. Machinechat JEDI Pro not only has the capabilities mentioned above, it also has integrated data collectors for ingesting data over HTTP, MQTT, TCP or a completely custom plug-in that you can easily develop for your own application.
I hope this will help you turn more of your Node-RED flows into real IoT solutions!
