Quick Start

The best way to discover Iottly is through the Getting Started project, which comes pre-loaded in every new account. It includes an Elastic Pi — a virtual device already connected to the platform — so you can explore all features without any physical hardware.

The demo simulates a simple scenario: an Elastic Pi is virtually connected to temperature and humidity sensors and regularly reads values from them.

Step 1 — Check the Elastic Pi in Device Configuration

Open the Device Configuration panel. You should see your Elastic Pi listed with a connected status.

Every device registered in Iottly gets a Unique ID (used as the MQTT username for authentication) and its MAC address is recorded to allow re-registration after a factory reset.

Step 2 — Explore the Management Scripts

Open the Management Scripts panel. This is where the Python code that runs on the device lives.

The code is split into two sections:

global section — helpers and variables

def read_data_from_sensor(sensortype):
    """simulates the reading of a sensor randomly generating values"""
    if sensortype == "temperature":
        # randomly generate temperature value
        return round_reading(random.uniform(30, 50))
    elif sensortype == "humidity":
        # randomly generate humidity value
        return round_reading(random.uniform(20, 80))

This function simulates sensor readings by generating random values. In a real deployment it would read from actual hardware (GPIO, I2C, serial, etc.).

loop section — the main device loop

def loop():
    """the main loop of your device, running on a dedicated process"""
    # polls temperature and humidity every 5 sec,
    # storing them in global variables (defined in the global section)
    temp_value.value = read_data_from_sensor("temperature")
    hum_value.value  = read_data_from_sensor("humidity")
    time.sleep(5)

The loop function runs continuously in a dedicated process. Here it polls both sensors every 5 seconds and stores the readings in shared global variables.

Step 3 — Send a remote command

Open the Messages panel. A command called read_sensor_data has already been defined:

{"read_sensor_data": {"sensortype": "<temperature|humidity|both>"}}

• read_sensor_data is the message type — it identifies what the command does.
• sensortype is a keyword that accepts three values: temperature, humidity, or both.

Iottly automatically generated the handler function for this command:

def read_sensor_data(command):
    """
    Handle the read_sensor_data command.
    Format: {"read_sensor_data": {"sensortype": "<temperature|humidity|both>"}}
    """
    cmdpars = command["read_sensor_data"]

    if cmdpars["sensortype"] == "temperature":
        sensor_data_reading = {"temperature": temp_value.value}
    elif cmdpars["sensortype"] == "humidity":
        sensor_data_reading = {"humidity": hum_value.value}
    elif cmdpars["sensortype"] == "both":
        sensor_data_reading = {
            "temperature": temp_value.value,
            "humidity":    hum_value.value,
        }

    message = {"sensor_data_reading": sensor_data_reading}
    send_msg(message)  # send the reply over MQTT

Step 4 — Test it from the Console

Open the Console panel. Because the read_sensor_data message was defined in the Messages panel, Iottly has already created an interactive command button for it here.

Click read_sensor_data and choose a sensortype. You should see the reply appear in the Logs panel — newer messages are at the bottom.

Try it yourself: add a temperature alarm

Paste this snippet inside the loop function, just before time.sleep:

if temp_value.value > 48:
    alarm   = {"description": "temperature too high", "temp_value": temp_value.value}
    message = {"ALARM": alarm}
    send_msg(message)

Then click Flash over-the-air to deploy the new code to the Elastic Pi. After the agent restarts you will see alarm messages in the Console panel whenever the randomly generated temperature exceeds 48°.

Make the threshold configurable remotely

Want to change the alarm threshold without redeploying? You can do it entirely remotely:

1. Create a new command in the Messages panel, e.g. set_alarm_threshold

   

2. Add a global variable for the threshold in the global section:

   Threshold = multiprocessing.Value('d', 45.0)
   

3. Fill the generated handler set_alarm_threshold with:

   limit = cmdpars["threshold"]
   Threshold.value = float(limit)
   change = {"new_threshold_value": Threshold.value}
   send_msg(change)
   

4. Update the loop to use the variable instead of the hardcoded value:

   if temp_value.value > Threshold.value:
   

5. Flash over-the-air and test from the Console.

Next steps

• Configuration — install the agent on a physical device
• API Overview — integrate Iottly into your backend
• Full tutorials on iottly.github.io ↗