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  • Author Author: kevjose
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Smart ID Card #3

kevjose

I decided to get started with the Wyolum BADGEr as I wait for the Arduino Yun replacement. Getting started did not take long because the BADGEr is fairly well documented in at the Wyolum website. Unfortunately, element14 does not carry the Wyolum BADGEr but the good news is that it does carry the dev board (from Adafruit) on which the the BADGEr is built. Hence all the tutorials and code work just as well with the dev board for element14. (In fact some of them we actually written for the dev board, they just work with BADGEr too.image

 

For any one wishing to get started with the BADGEr, you would require an FTDI breakout (I used Adafruit FTDI friend) and a microSD card (which is provided with the BADGEr). If you plan to use the dev board from Adafuit you would need to connect it to an Arduino board which also has an SD or a microSD card connected to it, this is required because there not enough memory in even the Arduino Mega to hold the frame buffer for the screen. For some reason, the whole screen is to be updated in one go, so the frame is to be buffered in full on the Arduino. A very good work around of this issue has been implemented in the EPD (E paper display) library which uses the SD card as the frame buffer. It is also to be kept in mind that BADGEr is essentially an Arduino Mini and so you must hit RESET when the code starts uploading. (In the excitement of receiving the board, I had forgotten about this and I wasted a day agonizing over the fact that the code wouldn't upload).

 

I was raking my over what layout the ID card should have. The picture on the right is what I could come up with and as you can see I am not much of an Interface Designer. Currently the plan is to display the picture and permanent personal details on the left and the update-able info like lectures and homework deadlines on the right. Please leave any suggestions you may have about the layout in the comments, I could really use some second opinion on this.

 

I have started working on the NRF24L01+ RF links and currently, I have been able to successfully run sample code and also some basic code to send over data saved in EEPROM of the Arduino. The plan is to interface the NRF24L01+ with an Arduino Mini or a bareboned Uno on a perfboard and then interface that with BADGEr over I2C. Next post will cover the RF chip interfacing. I am hoping that the Yun will be here by then and so I can begin with the Internet end of things. Please leave you suggestions in the comments.

Thanks.

Kevin