Don’t you hate it when something that was working stops? You can safely bet that it’s because, somewhere along the way, something has been ‘improved’. I needed to make a change to the code running on a couple of IoT room thermometers. These are built around the Adafruit Huzzah ESP8266 board (the non-Feather version). And they’ve been running flawlessly for months…. Read more »
In the previous two posts, we set up an ESP32 development board with an IR receiver to read codes sent by a remote control. Now it’s time to add MQTT capability. I chose the PubSubClient library – available in the Arduino IDE library manager – because it claims compatibility with the ESP32. When I looked closer, it turns out that… Read more »
In the first part, I outlined my plan to build an infrared receiver to act as a hub for IoT devices in the home. Here, we’ll take a closer look at house the receiver works. Here’s what is required for this initial stage of the project: An ESP32 development board. I’m using a DOIT device, which costs around $14. A… Read more »
How many remote controllers do you have in the house? One for the TV, one for the DVR, one for the Blu Ray player… There are five remotes sitting on the coffee table in our living room. Plus another couple scattered around the house, controlling table lamps and other TVs. And do you know what? This post isn’t even about… Read more »
Success! The Go code I’d been struggling with is working, although it also required changes to the C++ code running on the ATMEGA328PB. Here’s a quick overview of how the process works. On the SmartParallel, the ATMEGA328PB code sits in a loop watching for incoming data on the serial port. It also monitors the state of the printer by frequently… Read more »
The principle of ‘one step at a time’ is very sound. The more changes you make at once, the more places there are for bugs to hide. And that’s why this project has been progressing slowly – or not at all – just lately. Finally, though, I feel like it might be back on track. A quick recap: SmartParallel is… Read more »
My Zolatron 64 homebrew 6502 computer project has stalled of late. But it is high on the list of things to restart once I get current projects out of the way. And a recent development has inspired me to look at it again. If you’ve been here before, you’ll know that my plan was to first build a kit –… Read more »