The Nerdiest IT Proposal You Might Ever Read (by Dan)

A few weeks ago a friend of mine messaged me on Facebook, telling me about this “incredibly nerdy” proposal his friend just executed to his girlfriend. Naturally, I was all over it – I LOVE anything nerdy. And let me just tell you – this totally took the cake. My friend briefly explained it (it included a LOT of acronyms and TONS of techie words I did not understand) but I was totally hooked. He said, “It’s basically the purest IT geek proposal I’ve ever seen.” Enough said. A very special thanks to Dan for taking the time to write out all the details of his nerdy, IT proposal and including some fun pictures of the execution!

The Nerdiest & Geekiest IT Proposal You Might Ever Read

First, a little “How They Met” action (from Dan!):

Well this is embarrassing… Heather and I met… in a bar…. In Las Vegas…. We were there for incredibly different reasons, but somehow found each other on a dance floor at the Toby Keith’s bar (neither of us are country fans either). She was by far the most beautiful girl out there dancing. She claims that she came up to me. I say I went up to her. Whatever that case is, I just feel so lucky that we met each other (but, for real, I went up to her first!). For some reason, she never got tired of my horrible dance moves and I got her number before she returned home to Idaho. We texted for about a month before I even saw her face again on FaceTime. She decided to come visit me in DC about a month later and the rest is pretty much history (All I can say is thank god for FaceTime and Southwest Airlines!) I knew immediately that she was the one for me and, given the small odds at which we met each other, I knew I couldn’t risk waiting to marry her. A little over a year later we are happily engaged to be married on August 3, 2014.

And now for the AWESOME Proposal:

The Set Up: Over the previous few months, I had written pieces of software in the form of birthday cards, games to play, and other random apps. Anything I wrote, I had Heather use or test. So this seemed like the best method to get her to play along with the proposal and not see it coming. She was to start off by logging into the software game I had created for her and was told that if she could get through the ten phases, I would give her a prize. I decided to do it on a Sunday since that is our favorite day of the week. We usually just hang out all day together and just enjoy each other’s company.

How It Worked : There were two main parts to the proposal: a software interface on her computer and a hidden box that housed the hardware and ring. The box was designed to just look like a random piece of furniture on my desk as to not draw any attention to it.

The software interface was used not only as a game for her to play, but also secretly as a communications channel to the proposal box. When she reached the end of the game, the software sent a specific email behind the scenes to the box. The box was powered by a Raspberry Pi, which waited for this email. When it finally received it, it activated servos, which opened the box and presented the ring. Since Heather loves photos and is all about capturing the moment, also hidden inside the box was a camera module, which automatically snapped three photos after the box had opened.

After she realized what was going on, and screamed in terror as the box jumped open at her (those servos are loud!), she said yes! I told her it wasn’t official, though, until she selected “yes” in the software. Little did she know, doing so automatically took those three photos and emailed and text messaged them to all of our friends and family. When her phone exploded with congratulatory texts, she again screamed in terror and slapped me for sending those photos of her without her knowing. (We were still in lounge clothes because it was Sunday, whoops!)

How freaking AWESOME is THIS!? And now check out that stunner of a ring:

So while I barely understood half the verbiage in this proposal, I think we can all agree that it’s one of the most awesomely executed geeky IT proposal ever. Thanks SO much to Dan for taking the time to share his pictures and write out the details!

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