Part 4. Using JavaScript with hardware in other environments

This part of the book explores some other environments in which you can use JavaScript to control hardware, and it looks toward the future.

You’ll start in chapter 10 by looking at JavaScript and JavaScript-like environments on highly constrained devices, prototyping some experiments with the Espruino Pico and Kinoma Element devices.

Both chapters 10 and 11 walk through a set of reusable steps for getting to know new platforms, quickly. In chapter 11, we’ll turn our attention to beefier hardware: general-purpose single-board computers (SBCs) that have onboard I/O capabilities. You’ll get up and running with the Raspberry Pi 3 and BeagleBone Black and adapt some Johnny-Five experiments to run on both platforms.

Chapter 12 provides a taste of some other pieces of the IoT ecosystem and examines what’s possible from within a web browser. You’ll use a cloud service to package and deploy a Johnny-Five application to a BeagleBone Black, and you’ll explore the leading edge of Web Bluetooth and the Physical Web with the Espruino Puck.js device.

When you’re finished with this part of the book, your JavaScript on Things toolkit will be well-stocked, and you’ll be ready to strike out on your own into the brave, inspiring world of JavaScript and embedded systems.