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  • Author Author: Former Member
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Using the ESP8266 the easy way

Former Member

As far as I am concerned the ESP8266 is a bit of a game changer for the internet an microcontrollers and so I have put it together with the ByPic (the what?). Okay I will start again. ByPic is an interactive language that works through a serial interface using a simple USB to serial converter: So:

image

Will give:

image

Really, this is the output from the Mini-Max, pressing 11 will use the HTTP protocol to get the head sent by google that contains the current date and time. What is shown as the main menu is an interface to the underlying library. To use the library direct then press 0 to get out of the main menu and yo gen an OK prompt.

This is an example of a session:

wf_start()    result = Nothing, this will initialise the hardware

mode(1)  result = 10

join("yourssid","yourpassword") result = 1 if okay. This is the SSID and password to the network you oen, i.e your home or work network. 

info()  result = a list of information, if there are errors then try rst(), you must have an IP address at this point if not it means that it can't connect with the given network so is the SSID and password correct?

get("www.google.com","/",80)  result = 1 if okay or time out if the page was too big to fit into the serial buffer. If it says there is no connection with the site then check the spelling of google and also make sure there is an IP address using info.

see1()  will show the received data which will be the 'head' data from the google server.

 

Of course that is just one way of using this wonderful device. If you have less then £20 to spare you could get an evaluation kit which will do all of the above. If you just want to see how it works in detail the tutorial is here. And the library for the ESP8266 is here. The software contains a HTTP client and also a HTTP server.

I hope you find it interesting.

Parents

  • Personally I have reservations about the ESPxxxx since while it looks interesting, it may be hard to use conveniently without a library of code (since it's a pain building up and parsing AT command strings) - so higher-level functions such as the ones listed will help, like a companion to the ESP.

    That's pretty interesting that the commands can be directly interpreted in real time over the serial port when typed.

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  • Personally I have reservations about the ESPxxxx since while it looks interesting, it may be hard to use conveniently without a library of code (since it's a pain building up and parsing AT command strings) - so higher-level functions such as the ones listed will help, like a companion to the ESP.

    That's pretty interesting that the commands can be directly interpreted in real time over the serial port when typed.

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