Here’s how iStrategyLabs is tracking office dogs on Slack

Wednesday was #NationalPuppyDay (happy belated #NationalPuppyDay), which, as far as hashtag holidays go, seems pretty cool.
It also made the perfect occasion for D.C.’s iStrategyLabs team to introduce a project they’ve been working on — PAW. PAW (Puppies at Work) is so fabulously tech-startup-office-culturey. It’s an open-source, Slack-integrated system that allows you to keep track of office dogs via chips that attach to the collar and a network of Raspberry Pi sensors housed in cute, mini fire hydrant enclosures.
https://twitter.com/istrategylabs/status/712632968997695488
Samya Behary, who led the project, told Technical.ly it has very utilitarian roots. “One day, one of my co-workers couldn’t find her dog and we sent out a search party in and around the office to find her,” Behary said. “Fortunately, she only meandered down to the parking garage and did not escape, but it got the wheels turning.”
The big question: “How could we keep track of our dogs without having to follow them around all day long?”
PAW is iStrategyLabs’ answer to that question.
It involves chips (called Kibbles!) that attach to the dogs collar and act like a passive key fob, checking them into they building and monitoring their location around the office. It involves raspberry pi, to pick up the signal, and it involves a dashboard showing the location and status of each dog.
But on the user side, at least according to this sleek video, it looks like a streamline, nifty office hack. Not to mention a way to give peace of mind to dog owners in the workplace.
Need to keep track of puppies in your office? “We’d love to talk to people who are interested in PAW and help to get it setup in their office,” Behary told Technical.ly.