Uber Slippers Whisk You Home Like Dorthy

While there may be no magic slippers to transport you home like Dorthy from the Wizard of Oz, technology has now brought us the next best thing: a pair of shoes that hail an Uber via a heel-mounted button.

When the button is pressed three times in succession — ideally by clicking the shoes’ heels together — the device summons a driver to come take you home.

The build — which is the brainchild of Hannah Joshua — consists of an Arduino Uno and a 1Sheeld board, stuffed into the platform at the shoe’s toe, while a 9V battery pack is embedded into the generous heel. The 1Sheeld enables the Uno connect to the user’s smartphone with GPS and access the Internet through its mobile data connection.

The code itself is fairly simple, sending an http request to Uber’s API to order a ride — only when a wearer makes three heel clicks in under 1.5 seconds, helping to avoid any accidental triggers.

You can check it out in the video below, and find more details over on GitHub.