推特喂狗器

A dog-lover has invented a high-tech way of feeding his pet by Twitter. Computer buff Nat Morris, 30, has rigged up a system to give his pet a ‘tweet treat by sending him a Twitter message.

Dog Toby gets a snack from an automated food dispenser whenever Nat sends a message to ‘@FeedToby.

IT consultant Nat spends a lot of time working away from home and isnt always able to feed Toby by hand. But using his new invention he is able to send his dog a treat from anywhere in the world.

Nat said, “Toby absolutely loves it. At first he didnt know what was going on. Now he sits underneath, wagging his tail and waiting for the treats to drop.”

Nat loads up the feeder with crushed dog biscuits, but not too much in case four-year-old Toby gets too many messages. When a comment is received the mechanism drops a helping of crushed up dog biscuits out of the tube.

And Nat has even rigged up an online camera so he can see Toby enjoying the food at his home in Milford Haven, West Wales. Nat is even considering patenting his system.

But one problem is that friends and family have been amazed with the ‘Tweet treat dispenser. And they have been joining in to send Tweets to Toby, so Nat has had to introduce restrictions to make sure Toby doesnt turn into Tubby.

Nat added, “People have been sending him food at all hours of the day, so I had to limit it to between nine in the morning to nine in the evening. Im thinking of doing an updated version which features a scale to weigh him before he is fed just to make sure hes not putting on too much puppy fat.”

How The Twitter Feeder Works:

When a message is sent to @feedtoby it is received by a mini-computer known as a Nanode microcontroller. This is linked up to little motor taken from a household printer HP Deskjet 500.

When the mini-computer receives the message, the buzzer goes off and Toby comes running over and sits beneath a tube under his feeder contraption. Then the motor comes to life and pulls open a trap door which releases a serving of food. The doggy treat then comes dropping down the tube and into Tobys food bowl. Then a digital camera then takes a photo of him and sends it back to Nat on Twitter, so he knows Toby has been fed.

一位愛狗人士發明了一種高科技喂食方法：用推特給愛犬喂食！30歲的計算機迷奈特莫·里斯給自己的愛犬設計了一套推特喂食系統，只要發一條推特，狗狗就不會餓肚子了。

無論何時只要納特給FeedToby這個賬號發送信息，自動喂食器就會自動落下食物，這樣他的狗狗托比就能吃到食物。

納特是位計算機顧問，每天有大部分時間都要離家去上班，沒法親自給托比喂食。不過現在有了這個新發明，他在世界上任何角落都能給愛犬喂食了。

納特說：“托比當然喜歡這種進食方式啦！剛開始它不知道是怎么回事，現在它聽到聲音就會乖乖地坐在機器底下，搖著尾巴等著食物掉下來。”

納特設計的喂食器里裝著壓碎的狗糧餅干，但數量不會特別多，因為他擔心收到的信息太多使四歲的托比吃不消。只要在推特上收到信息，裝置里就會有一份壓碎的狗糧順著管道掉下來。

納特還在家里安裝了一個數碼攝像機，這樣他在工作的地方也能看到托比在位于米爾福德港市的家中享用美食的情況。納特目前正在考慮為這個設計申請專利。

不過有個問題是親朋好友都太喜歡這個推特喂食器了，他們也加入了給托比喂食的行列中。所以納特設置了一些限制，要不托比就該變成大胖狗了。

納特表示：“人們都太熱情了，一天到晚都通過推特給托比喂食。所以我將喂食器限制在上午9點到晚上9點之間操作。我目前在考慮做一個升級版本，在給它喂食前先稱稱體重，別讓它長太多肉。”

推特喂食器是這樣工作的：

只要有人給賬號FeedToby發送信息，一個被稱為“Nanode微控制器”的迷你電腦就會接收到此信息。微控制器與一個從惠普Deskjet 500家用打印機上取下的小馬達相連。

一旦迷你電腦接收到信息，蜂鳴器就會嗡嗡作響，托比聽到聲音后奔過去，坐在那臺奇妙裝置下方的管道邊等著。小馬達開始工作，狗糧儲存倉下面的活動門就會打開。狗糧餅干隨即順著管道落入托比的碗中。攝像機會同時拍下托比進食的照片并通過推特傳給納特，這樣納特就知道托比已經開始進食了。