If you've been involved with IT in any capacity in recent years, you've probably heard the term "Internet of Things," or IoT. According to Gartner, IoT is at the top of the hype cycle, meaning a lot of people are excited about it, but not much real development is happening yet. While less than a billion devices were connected to the Internet in 2009, Gartner predicts that there will be 26 billion IoT devices installed in 2020, generating $300 billion in revenue for manufacturers and service providers and making a $1.9 trillion impact on the global economy.

In a nutshell, IoT is about using smart devices to collect data that is transmitted via the Internet to other devices. It's closely related to machine-to-machine (M2M) technology. While the concept had been around for some time, the term "Internet of Things" was first used in 1999 by Kevin Ashton, who was a Procter & Gamble employee at the time.

Since then, the idea has spread rapidly and widely. A survey conducted by ARM found that more than 75 percent of enterprises are either already using IoT in some capacity or exploring ways to do so. And 96 percent of those surveyed expected to be using IoT by 2016.


Development Tools

1. Arduino
Arduino is both a hardware specification for interactive electronics and a set of software that includes an IDE and the Arduino programming language. The website explains that Arduino is "a tool for making computers than can sense and control more of the physical world than your desktop computer." The organization behind it offers a variety of boards, starter kits, robots and related products for sale, and many other groups have used Arduino to build IoT-related hardware and software products of their own.

Eclipse is sponsoring several different projects surrounding IoT. They include application frameworks and services; open source implementations of IoT protocols, including MQTT CoAP, OMA-DM and OMA LWM2M; and tools for working with Lua, which Eclipse is promoting as an ideal IoT programming language. Eclipse-related projects include Mihini, Koneki and Paho. The website also includes sandbox environments for experimenting with the tools and a live demo.

3. Kinoma
Owned by Marvell, the Kinoma software platform encompasses three different open source projects. Kimona Create is a DIY construction kit for prototyping electronic devices. Kimona Studio is the development environment that works with Create and the Kinoma Platform Runtime. Kimona Connect is a free iOS and Android app that links smartphones and tables with IoT devices.

Designed for building remote monitoring, fleet management and smart grid applications, Mainspring is an open source framework for developing M2M applications. It capabilities include flexible modeling of devices, device configuration, communication between devices and applications, validation and normalization of data, long-term data storage, and data retrieval functions. It's based on Java and the Apache Cassandra NoSQL database.

Built on Node.js, Node-RED describes itself as "a visual tool for wiring the Internet of Things." It allows developers to connect devices, services and APIs together using a browser-based flow editor. It can run on Raspberry Pi, and more than 60,000 modules are available to extend its capabilities.

Hardware

This microcontroller combines the ease of an Arduino-based board with Linux. It includes two processors—the ATmega32u4 (which supports Arduino) and the Atheros AR9331 (which runs Linux). Other features include Wi-Fi, Ethenet support, a USB port, micro-SD card slot, three reset buttons and more. They are available for purchase from the Arduino website.

BeagleBoard offers credit-card sized computers that can run Android and Linux. Because they have very low power requirements, they're a good option for IoT devices. Both the hardware designs and the software they run are open source, and BeagleBoard hardware (often sold under the name BeagleBone) is available through a wide variety of distributors.

8. Flutter
Flutter's claim to fame is its long range. This Arduino-based board has a wireless transmitter that can reach more than a half mile. Plus, you don't need a router; flutter boards can communicate with each other directly. It includes 256-bit AES encryption, and it's easy to use. Both the hardware and the software are completely open source, and the price for a basic board is just $20.

Local Motors is a car company that manufactures open source car designs on a small scale. They collaborated with IBM on an IoT-connected vehicle that they showed off at a conference last spring. Much of the open source software and design specifications for the prototype are available for download from the link above.

As you might guess from its name, Microduino offers really small boards that are compatible with Arduino. In fact, these boards are about the size of a quarter and can be stacked together to create new things. All the hardware designs are open source, and core modules start at just $8 each. It was funded by a Kickstarter campaign that raised $134,563.



11. OpenPicus
This company offers a line of programmable modules and kits for connecting devices to the cloud and the Internet of Things. Its platform and hardware are open source, but its products can be used to create closed source commercial products. The company also offers its development services for hire.

12. Pinoccio
Arduino-compatible Pinnoccio boards (which the company calls "Scouts") connect to each other in a low-power mesh network. They include a built-in rechargeable battery that can connect to solar panels or any USB power supply. The organization also offers Pinoccio HQ, a GUI for monitoring the activities of the scouts, and ScoutScript, an easy-to-use scripting language for controlling the devices. A starter kit costs $197.

13. RasWIK
Made by a company called Ciseco, RasWIK is short for the Raspberry Pi Wireless Inventors Kit. It allows anyone with a Raspberry Pi to experiment with building their own Wi-Fi-connected devices. It includes documentation for 29 different projects or you can come up with one of your own. There is a fee for the devices, but all of the included code is open source, and you can use it to build commercial products if you choose.

14. SODAQ
Short for "Solar-Powered Data Acquistion," SADAQ offers Arduino-compatible boards with Lego-like plug-in modules. The website includes a number of tutorials, making it a suitable for beginners. And the solar panel makes it a good choice for logging environmental data in various locations where power and Internet connections might not be available. A basic board starts at $39.

15. Tessel
Tessel aims to make hardware development easier for software developers with this JavaScript-enabled microcontroller that plugs into any USB port. You can also connect it to additional modules to add accelerometer, ambient light and sound, camera, Bluetooth, GPS and/or nine other capabilities. One board and a module starts at $99 with additional modules available for $25. All the software and hardware designs are fully open source.

16. UDOO
This Arduino-compatible board can also run Android or Linux (a distribution called UDOObuntu) from its second processor. It boasts that it is four times as powerful as a Raspberry Pi. Multiple tutorials and projects are available on the website, and it also offers a "Made by UDOOers" section where people can show off their creations. Prices start at $99 for a basic board.

Home Automation Software

17. OpenHAB
OpenHAB lets the smart devices you already have in your home talk to one another. It's vendor- and hardware-neutral, running on any Java-enabled system. One of its goals is to allow users to add new features to their devices and combine them in new ways. It's won several awards, and it has a companion cloud computing service called my.openHAB.

This project includes both software components and network protocols. It promises to find all the Internet-connected things in your house and bring them together so that you can control them. It supports a long list of devices, including Nest thermostats, Samsung Smart Air Conditioners, Insteon LED Bulbs, Roku, Google Chromecast, Pebble smartwatches, Goji smart locks and much more. It's written in Node.js and can fit on a Raspberry Pi.

Middleware

19. IoTSyS
This IoT middleware provides a communication stack for smart devices. It supports multiple standards and protocols, including IPv6, oBIX, 6LoWPAN, Constrained Application Protocol and Efficient XML Interchange. Several videos on the website show how it works in action.

20. OpenIoT
The OpenIoT website explains that the project is "an open source middleware for getting information from sensor clouds, without worrying what exact sensors are used." It aims to enable cloud-based "sensing as a service," and has developed use cases for smart agriculture, intelligent manufacturing, urban crowdsensing, smart living and smart campuses. Its backers include Athens Information Technology (AIT), École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), the Fraunhofer Institute for Optronics, System Technology and Image Exploitation IOSB, SENSAP Microsystems AE, AcrossLimits, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), the University of Zagreb Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing, and the National University of Ireland, Galway.

Operating Systems

21. AllJoyn
Originally created by Qualcomm, this open source operating system for the Internet of Things is now sponsored by one of the most prominent IoT organizations—The AllSeen Alliance, whose members include the Linux Foundation, Microsoft, LG, Qualcomm, Sharp, Panasonic, Cisco, Symantec and many others. It includes a framework and a set of services that will allow manufacturers to create compatible devices. It's cross-platform with APIs available for Android, iOS, OS X, Linux and Windows 7.

22. Contiki
Contiki describes itself as "the open source OS for the Internet of Things." It connects low-power microcontrollers to the internet and supports standards like IPv6, 6lowpan, RPL and CoAP. Other key features include highly efficient memory allocation, full IP networking, very low power consumption, dynamic module loading and more. Supported hardware platforms include Redwire Econotags, Zolertia z1 motes, ST Microelectronics development kits and Texas Instruments chips and boards. Paid commercial support is available.

23. Raspbian
While the Raspberry Pi was intended as an educational device, many developers have begun using this credit-card-sized computer for IoT projects. The complete hardware specification is not open source, but much of the software and documentation is. Raspbian is a popular Raspberry Pi operating system that is based on the Debian distribution of Linux.


24. RIOT
RIOT bills itself as "the friendly operating system for the Internet of Things." Forked from the FeuerWhere project, RIOT debuted in 2013. It aims to be both developer- and resource-friendly. It supports multiple architectures, including MSP430, ARM7, Cortex-M0, Cortex-M3, Cortex-M4, and standard x86 PCs.

25. Spark
Spark is a distributed, cloud-based IoT operating system. The same company also offers easy-to-use hardware development kits and related products that start at just $39 (and the hardware designs are also open source). It includes a Web-based IDE, a command-line interface, support for multiple languages, and libraries for working with many different IoT devices. It has a very active user community, and a lot of documentation and online help are available.

Monitoring

26. Freeboard
Freeboard aims to let users create their own dashboards for monitoring IoT deployments. The code is freely available on GitHub or you can try the service for free if you make your dashboard public. Low-priced plans are also available for those who want to keep their data private. Sample dashboards oon the site show how they can be used to track air quality, residential appliances, distillery performance or environmental conditions in a humidor.

Printing

Exciting offers an open source kit for experimenting with IoT printing. It makes it possible to build your own small printer and use that printer to print out information obtained from various IoT devices. For example, it could print out a list of daily reminders, the weather report, etc. And in a interesting twist, if you want to contact the project owners, you can draw a picture that will be printed on the IoT printer in their office.

Platforms and Integration Tools

This project offers a machine-to-machine (M2M) communication framework for connecting devices to the Internet of Things. It includes easy-to-use Web-based management software for creating networks, applying security rules and monitoring devices. The website offers sample projects built with DeviceHub, and it also has a "playground" section that allows users to use DeviceHub online to see how it works.

Devicehub.net describes itself as "the open source backbone for the Internet of Things." It's a cloud-based service that stores IoT-related data, provides visualizations of that data and allows users to control IoT devices from a Web page. Developers have used the service to create apps that track health information, monitor the location of children, automate household appliances, track vehicle data, monitor the weather and more.

The group behind this project is working on a variety of tools for integrating multiple IoT-related sensor networks and protocols. The primary project is a Smart Object API, but the group is also working on an HTTP-to-CoAP Semantic mappin , an application framework with embedded software agents and more. They also sponsr a meetup group in Silicon Valley for people who are interested in IoT development.

31. Mango
Mango bills itself as "the world's most popular open source Machine-to-Machin (M2M) software." Web-based, it supports multiple platforms. Key features include support for multiple protocols and databases, meta points, user-defined events, import/export and more.

32. Nimbits
Nimbits can store and process a specific type of data—data that has been time- or geo-stamped. A public platform as a service is available, or you can download the software and deploy it on Google App Engine, any J2EE server on Amazon EC2 or on a Raspberry Pi. It supports multiple programming languages, including Arduino, JavaScript, HTML or the Nimbits.io Java library.

OpenRemote offers four different integration tools for home-based hobbyists, integrators, distributors, and manufacturers. It supports dozens of different existing protocols, allowing users to create nearly any kind of smart device they can imagine and control it using any device that supports Java. The platform is open source, but the company also sells a wide variety of support, ebooks and other tools to aid in the design and product development process.

34. SiteWhere
This project provides a complete platform for managing IoT devices, gathering data and integrating that data with external systems. SiteWhere releases can be downloaded or used on Amazon's cloud. It also integrates with multiple big data tools, including MongoDB and ApacheHBase.

ThingSpeak can process HTTP requests and store and process data. Key features of the open data platform include an open API, real-time data collection, geolocation data, data processing and visualizations, device status messages and plugins. It can integrate multiple hardware and software platforms including Arduino, Raspberry Pi, ioBridge/RealTime.io, Electric Imp, mobile and Web applications, social networks and MATLAB data analytics. In addition to the open source version, a hosted service is also available.

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