In an attempt to improve the daily routines for the kids I built a small ESP32-based device that lets us plan tasks for the upcoming week. The kids can log in with their own RFID card, check off their tasks, and see what they’ve earned in terms of rewards for the weekend – usually screen time, but other reward types are supported too.
I know the same could be achieved with pen and paper, but where’s the fun in that? In practice the kids actually enjoy using it, which is kind of the point.
The device features a 2.8” touch display with a retro pixel art UI, a web interface for configuration, WiFi setup via access point, battery monitoring, and OTA updates – all for around 35€ in parts.
I heavily relied on AI (Claude by Anthropic) for this project. Without it I would probably never have started at all.
There’s no openHAB integration yet, but I’m thinking an MQTT interface could be interesting – for example pushing task completion events or weekly scores. If you have ideas I’d love to hear them!
If anyone is interested I “released” a new firmware version with the following features today, I guess this will be the final state of this project as I don’t plan to add any more features:
Dr. Pi the clever octopus quiz mode – tasks can require a quiz before being checked off
AI-generated questions – via the Anthropic API, with selectable model
Manual question entry – no API key needed, edit directly in the web UI
Replay & reset – completed quizzes can be replayed; tasks can be reset individually
Redesigned web interface – tabbed layout (Plan / Kids / Rewards / Misc), inline editing, quiz editor as a modal, settings as a bottom sheet
