Scrambling to find the mute key when an annoying video starts playing or when someone walks into your office can be a hassle. With an Arduino, you can build a device that lets you control your computer with just a hand gesture. In a recent guide by DevicePlus, they show how to use hand motion to automatically mute your computer.
or this guide, we’re going to build on two of our previous guides covering ultrasonic sensors and the HID-project library. The HC-SR05 we’ll be using is a sensor that uses ultrasonic sound waves to detect how close an object is. We can combine this with the HID-project library which allows you to use your Arduino as a mouse and keyboard and send basic commands like pausing media, opening apps like the calculator, or, as we’ll be doing in this guide, muting your system audio.
In order to use this library without an external shield, you’ll need an Arduino that’s based on the ATmega32u4 chipset. For our purposes, we’re going to use an Arduino Leonardo, instead of the usual Arduino Uno, as this board has the necessary chipset, natively supports USB communication, and has a micro USB port which makes it a little easier to find a cable you can use to connect to your computer.
Read more about the construction and use on DevicePlus
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Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
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