Show HN: I made a desk toy for people in long-distance relationships

[_shantaram]

Hello Hacker News! I've spent the last 6 months or so designing and building this, The Attention Button. It's an IoT desk toy that lets you send a quick nudge to whoever you hold dear, letting them know you're thinking of them. Like a direct line to their attention. It is my first major electronics project and I have learnt so much making it. I'd love to hear what you guys think!

[perryraskin]

Reminds me of that old Apple Watch feature that’s been lost to time https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/gadgets/heart-heart-apple-watch...

[Tinos]

Pretty cute. How'd you get them to pair overseas?

[_shantaram]

So, the website is essentially an HTTP interface for managing an MQTT broker. You create an account, make a "room" (application concept, not part of mqtt), and then put your account name and the room secret phrase into the device (it throws up a captive portal). The device then uses these to connect to the broker to an MQTT topic that's sha256(secret) and from there it's just simply passing messages between devices.

[Tinos]

So neat! Thanks for sharing