For 8 years now I have had an idea lodged in the back of my cranium! An idea that took years of countless “what if scenarios” and “if I only had a ______ ” statements. Well I have finally made the jump from cobwebbed dream to tangible reality! I bring you the “KitchenMate ®©™.” (Cue Fanfare)
The KitchenMate is a touch screen PC with a barcode scanner and a custom user interface. The Graphical front-end and database back-end is all coded in Visual Basic .net and some C# .net. It was designed and modeled after the many other touch screen devices on the market today. It has a custom on-screen keyboard for data entry, multiple icon screens and it talks!
The software has several current features and a few planned features either not implemented or still in a testing phase. The current features include:
- Food Database – linked by UPC
- Kitchen inventory tracking
- Batch add and remove processes
- Auto Generated Shopping List – based on Quantity on Hand
- Calendar (event listing planned but not implemented yet)
- 5 Kitchen Timers
- Recipe Database – linked to items in food database
- Calculator
- Unit Conversion Calculator
- Weight Watchers Points Calculator
- Dining Out Guide – Restaurant items nutritional database
- Current Weather Conditions
- Weather Forecast – 5-day
- Touchscreen Compatible Web Browser – built off of the Firefox Engine
- White Board Messaging and Notes system
Some Planned Features:
- Media Player (Music, Movies, and Playlists)
- Twitter Integration
- Facebook Integration?? – Maybe.
- Photo Viewer/Photo Frame – currently just using screensaver
- Event Listings in Calendar – potentially synced with Google calendar
- and more……
KitchenMate (Touch Screen Kitchen PC) from GoJimi.com on Vimeo.
Components List:
- AMD Althon XP 2 ghz PC – $0 – Junk Found in my Basement
- 15″ Touch Screen Commercial LCD – $70 – ebay used
- MetroLogic Barcode scanner MS806i – $20 – Craiglist used
- Custom Barcode Connectivity box – $0 – Junk Found in my Basement
- Cabinet (Wood, Paint and Materials) – $100 – Hardware/Lumber Yard (mostly 1/2″ MDF)
Grand Total = $190
Custom connectivity box build photos:
(the box is a plastic cigarette case from a gas station – $0.99)
Cabinet build photos:
Internal workings build photos:
The Software is designed to work with any barcode scanner that is OPOS compatible, which is almost all commercial grade scanners. The software will be made available for download at a later date. I am still working out a few bugs as well as adding some additional functionality. Everything runs on top of Windows XP as a Shell replacement currently. I have plans to begin coding and testing for Windows 7 functionality so that I can incorporate some multitouch capabilities. Keep an eye on my blog for updates and info.
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17 users responded in this post
So cool!
Does this Althon have an internal fan? Isn’t that nosy to be on in the kitchen all the time?
This is killer! I will be looking for parts now, I cant wait for the software for this! Great job!! This would be such a time saver! I do wonder if you could run this on an arduino and a solid state drive for cost – noise – heat?
I’ve been attempting a similar idea, and have the hardware in place. Of course, that’s the easy part. Getting it to work together is always the challenge. Great job on the build!
Well done! Been looking for something like this. Any idea when you release a version? Ready to purchase and or contribute to the cause!
Thanks for all the comments.
@guysoft – It has a fan and is slightly noisy though not as loud as the Central Air or the fridge…. however I am looking into a small Intel Atom board that is passive cooled as well as a solid state drive for the fun of it…. should make it completely silent.
I will hopefully have the software available for download soon. A lot is hard coded that I have to make into options and there are a few bugs I need to work out. Keep an eye out here for updates.
It does look Daunting to enter everything.
Just think though. Once companies jump on board, and you can update bar codes from across the net, all that crap could be immediately downloaded and in your database.
It’s a coming.
Of course then people will be hacking into your kitchen to pull the old “is your refrigerator” running joke. Expect for now, it will be driving down the road, and they’ll be haxor stealing your beer.
hmm…
Pair this up with a few more wireless screens around the house, say at the front door, and some RFID tags on your watch, keychain or necklace, and the white board system could be awesome. You walk in the door and it says hello $name and asks if you would like to hear your message, and so forth, then tells you you’re low on Mountain Dew, or that the refrigerator ran away with your smartphone and all the beer.
Excellent this is exactly what I wanted to do. Is it possible to display .pdf files for cook books that you have ?
Also could it run an app where you can shuffle the items in the database to create a breakfast, lunch or dinner meal?
and best of all if it could read the .pdf like an apple app does so you do not have to stop to read the cook book but just listen to it
These are thoughts I had in my head as I love to cook a lot and hate stopping to read the cook book.
None the less I am going to follow this closely I love it
First off, let me just say you have done an awesome job! This is the exactly what I want for my kitchen!
Secondly, I may have an idea that could help you out. I have an app on my Android phone called calorie counter. Here is a link to it: http://www.fatsecret.com/connected/android . It gives you all the nutritional information as well as the serving size and user submitted pictures of the item. You can either search for them by name, or you can use the phone’s camera to scan the barcode. If you could somehow get access to this database, it would eliminate the need to manually input the info yourself.
I am looking forward to future devolpements from you.
I would love to get a copy of this for a tablet pc we have in the kitchen, complete with bar code scanner. My interface (basically just web pages) really stinks. Any chance you are gonna share this with the world??
Hi there -
Absolutely love what you have done here. I am in the process of doing a similar thing. I have all the hardware and its all setup (I purchased a HP 21.5″ touch screen for the job) but am needing a software package to run it.
Is there any chance of being able to get a copy of this? when are you going to make it available?
Hey,
I love the concept, I too have been thinking of doing something similar, hopefully getting an old touch screen to try it out with, will you be releasing the software at all? Keep up the good work.
So where are the updates? is the software ready for download now? i need to build this for my wife! she’d love me even more if i did!!
I am very interested in the KitchenMate. Do you have a release date? I’d love a copy.
Please tell me that this project isn’t dead!!
This would make life for my family so much easier.
Thanks
CM
I love this I do hope its not dead
I have recently bought a barcode scanner, a small PC and a touch screen monitor for exactly the same idea, only to find now no one does software for this type of project. I almost gave up then saw the KitchenMate. This is exactly what I was looking for. Jimi, did you ever release the software? I am desperate to get hold of it
Dave
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