http://www.toomuchcoffee.com/index.php?...highlight=

This is just too cool! I never heard of it until now. Hope its not old news...

Oh my! Incredible logging tools. Not there yet but I can definitely see it coming.

Any software in Mac format that you are aware of?

Thanks,

Bob

It's Java, so it works on any java supported platform (or should). I have a Dell mini 10 running MacOS and it seems to work. I'm going to test it out using its OCR tomorrow. I have a hottop P so it should be interesting.

Yeah, I think the author uses mac as well. It works on both platforms.

Well, it runs. But I can only get so far with my built in web cam. It's very awkward trying to point my laptop screen at the roaster's LCD screen. I'm looking for an external webcam that will work.

I finally got a webcam for my Dell Mini. I've recently moved and forgot to update my amazon account info, so it got sent to the wrong coast and took a while to get to me.

Anway, after fiddling a bit, I was able to get it to read the hottop screen.
Basically you point your camera at the LCD screen and open up the camera software (in my case it's Mac OS X, so I just used photo booth). The software reads the lower right portion of you computer display, so you have to place the camera software window showing the LCD screen in front, and on the lower right of the screen. Then you have to adjust the camera so the temp display fills the "Captured image" box. Below it is a "Processed image" box that the software uses to convert using OCR. If you put another window in front of the camera display software window, the logging software will try to process it, so you need to make sure that no windows are obscuring it.

I started a roast to get the temp to display and it took just a few minutes to line up the camera with the LCD display to get a good image. There's plenty of time in the warm up phase to do this. Logging begins when you hit the "load beans" button in the "Log" tab. I used the Hottop P default profile:

Roast Logger Copyright ? T. R. Coxon (GreenBean TMC).
Roast started at 09:15:57 08/01/2011
Elapsed time , T1 , T2 , Event type
00:00,165, ,Beans loaded
00:05,163, ,timer
00:10,163, ,timer
00:15,162, ,timer
00:20,162, ,timer
~
09:00,282, ,timer
09:05,282, ,timer
09:10,284, ,timer
09:15,284, ,timer
09:20,286, ,timer

There are 5 preset "events" that you trigger by clicking a button:
Load Beans
First crack start and end
Second crack start and end

16:20,392, ,timer
16:23,392, ,First crack start
16:25,394, ,timer

Increments are 5 seconds by default, but you can choose via pulldown 10,15,30 and 60 seconds

The log is saved in .csv format. Here's the graph:


It will log 2 temp sources, using either OCR or DMM, or a combination of the two (T1/T2). The graph shows the First crack start as the teal intersection, and First crack end as the red intersection.

It's pretty simple, but then again, so was my first roaster (air popper).