# Getting physical aka physical buttons

**URL:** <https://forum.beeminder.com/t/getting-physical-aka-physical-buttons/515>\
**Category:** Akrasia\
**Created:** [February 15, 2015, 7:22am UTC](https://forum.beeminder.com/t/getting-physical-aka-physical-buttons/515 "2015-02-15T07:22:00Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 99

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**Author:** ![nikana](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/forum.beeminder.com/nikana/32/1567_2.png) [@nikana](https://forum.beeminder.com/u/nikana)\
**Post date:** [December 4, 2017, 9:20am UTC](https://forum.beeminder.com/t/getting-physical-aka-physical-buttons/515/99 "2017-12-04T09:20:56Z")

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So right now, the options are

- [hacking](https://github.com/cincodenada/dash_hack) at the Dash for $5 (for US&UK Amazon Prime subscribers)
- [pebblebee.com](http://pebblebee.com) is 30$ (bundles of several are out of stock)
- [qblinks.com](http://qblinks.com) is 35$
- [DIY](https://www.stavros.io/posts/emergency-food-button/) costs dimes and time
- [flic.io](http://flic.io) at 35$ (23 per for 8)
- [1btn](https://www.tindie.com/products/Knewron/1btn-open-source-wifi-connected-iot-button/) is 45$ and open-source.

And all of them hopefully should talk to a bluetooth/wifi device and make their way via IFTTT to Beeminder.  
Does that sound right ? Is anyone around actively using any of these options besides [drtall](http://forum.beeminder.com/t/getting-physical-aka-physical-buttons/515/67?u=nikana), [cincodemaya](http://forum.beeminder.com/t/getting-physical-aka-physical-buttons/515/94?u=nikana), [patimen](http://forum.beeminder.com/t/getting-physical-aka-physical-buttons/515/53?u=nikana) and [adamwolf](http://forum.beeminder.com/t/getting-physical-aka-physical-buttons/515/49?u=nikana) ?

I have personally got the same 1$ “bluetooth button” as @insti. It is really a bluetooth “keyboard” with 2 keys, a big `VolumeUp` key labelled iOS and a small `Enter` key labelled android (which are used on respective platforms to take pictures in camera mode, which is the device stated purpose). So it takes a little bit of tinkering to distinguish **its** Enter key from your normal keyboard’s Enter key if you want to use both buttons. I got the `VolumeUp` one to record timestamps to a log file, and it works well (across walls and 10m).

The bluetooth connection isn’t entirely reliable over moving the laptop out of range and back, or the shutter button waking up from sleep, so it’s not quite “press it without checking”-reliable just yet. I just now set it up to push through IFTTT to Beeminder, there’s only a ~7s latency, including manually refreshing the goal webpage. It also gets consecutive keypresses right (e.g. pressing it thrice pushes 3 datapoints), from some gentle testing.

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