The Python on Microcontrollers Newsletter: subscribe for free

The Python for Microcontrollers Newsletter is the place for the latest news involving Python on hardware (microcontrollers AND single board computers like Raspberry Pi).

This ad-free, spam-free weekly email is filled with CircuitPython, MicroPython, and Python information (and more) that you may have missed, all in one place!

You get a summary of all the software, events, projects, and the latest hardware worldwide once a week, no ads! You can cancel anytime.

11,435 subscribers and growing

Try our spam-free newsletter today! 

It arrives about 11 am Monday (US Eastern time) with all the week’s happenings.

And please tell your friends, colleagues, students, etc.

Please sign up > > >

The Python on Microcontrollers Newsletter: subscribe for free

The Python for Microcontrollers Newsletter is the place for the latest news involving Python on hardware (microcontrollers AND single board computers like Raspberry Pi).

This ad-free, spam-free weekly email is filled with CircuitPython, MicroPython, and Python information (and more) that you may have missed, all in one place!

You get a summary of all the software, events, projects, and the latest hardware worldwide once a week, no ads! You can cancel anytime.

11,435 subscribers and growing

Try our spam-free newsletter today! 

It arrives about 11 am Monday (US Eastern time) with all the week’s happenings.

And please tell your friends, colleagues, students, etc.

Please sign up > > >

Radio Shack logos over the years #ShackToberFest

RadioShack is an American consumer electronics brand originally created as such a chain of stores in 1921 under the name “The Radio Shack Corporation.” Radio Shack used a number of logos over the years.  Logopedia has a list of them.

On the heels of #SepTandy, Adafruit is celebrating #ShackToberFest, a celebration of all things Radio Shack and Tandy. Tag your social media posts #ShackToberFest!

Intricate Lighting Circuit Sequencing #VintageLighting

Like an old player piano this light sequencer uses a large drum and physical contacts. Looks like a bit of a fire hazard but its fascinating to see!

From thatwasDope on YouTube

You can learn more about this method from this post on Nandita Palchouchuri

Around 1960-65, as a result of the ingenuity of pioneers like Sridhar Das and a handful of others ,festive decorations using large electric bulbs began to emerge.They were created in order to embellish the temporary Cloth Temples(Pandal)that house the deity Goddess Jagadhatri and Goddess Durga during the Dushehra festival, each year.

With passing years these panels have become very intricate and cleverly designed and occupy a very integral part in the making of the Durga festival ,diwali ,wedding marquees etc. A large number of contractors building these light panels now thrive in Bengal largely centred around Chandannagar.

And a good discussion on the forum here: Identifying a vintage lighting sequencer method

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Thankfully if you want to create an impressive lighting display you won’t need to rely on such an elaborate set-up.

• LIGHTSHIP: LED Animation over WiFi
• SmartMatrix Remote Controlled LED Art Display

Feather RP2040 SCORPIO

We just love sticking NeoPixels anywhere and everywhere. When we saw the new “PIO” feature of the RP2040 from Raspberry Pi, we knew it would be perfect for driving huge numbers of NeoPixels. So we created the Adafruit Feather RP2040 SCORPIO specifically for NeoPixel (WS2812-compatible) control, but also good for various other PIO-based projects that want to take advantage of the Feather pinout with an additional 8 consecutive outputs (or inputs).

Transform a Raspberry Pi RP2040 into a FIDO Passkey

Pol Henarejos’ Pico FIDO project transforms a Raspberry Pi Pico into an integrated FIDO Passkey, functioning like a standard USB Passkey for authentication.

The demonstrations use a Pimoroni TINY2040 and the central LED is used to indicate the status of the ley.

Security Considerations

Pico FIDO is an open platform, so exercise caution. The flash memory contents can be easily dumped, potentially revealing private/master keys. It is not feasible to encrypt the content, meaning at least one key (the master key) must be stored in clear text. If the Pico is stolen, the private and secret keys can be accessed.

See more, including the code, on GitHub.

Using LEDs to Make Sculptures #ArtTuesday

LEDs are affecting the world of art installations, fine art, and the performing arts. You can start at home with projects like Dano Wall’s Glue Stick Light Pipe Sculpture using Circuit Playground Express or you can explore the work being done by artists all over the world. Here’s more from the Interactive/Immersive:

Interactive art installations are reshaping how we experience creativity, and challenging traditional art forms. It’s not just about looking at art; it’s about being a part of it and being totally immersed in it (like the Immersive Van Gogh exhibit you might have heard about).

In this blog post, we’ll explore six intriguing examples of interactive art. From interactive digital art installations that responds to your touch, to collaborations blending human and artificial intelligence and 3D installation art or projection mapping, these interactive and experiential art pieces offer a unique interaction with contemporary art, where the distinction between viewer and creator becomes less defined.

See more!

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Every Tuesday is Art Tuesday here at Adafruit! Today we celebrate artists and makers from around the world who are designing innovative and creative works using technology, science, electronics and more. You can start your own career as an artist today with Adafruit’s conductive paints, art-related electronics kits, LEDs, wearables, 3D printers and more! Make your most imaginative designs come to life with our helpful tutorials from the Adafruit Learning System. And don’t forget to check in every Art Tuesday for more artistic inspiration here on the Adafruit Blog!

Stationery themed hotel room in Japan #ArtTuesday

JetPens shared this video on Youtube! They also have an excelent Kokuyo Campus Factory Tour where you can see how the iconic Kokuyo Campus Notebooks are made

We got the chance to visit a stationery themed hotel room in Japan! The walls were decorated with Kokuyo stationery products, and there were even plushies that looked like huge erasers and rulers! If you visit Japan, be sure to check out Villa Fontaine Haneda Airport Garden Hotel.

CircuitPython 9.2.0 Released!

From the GitHub release page:

This is CircuitPython 9.2.0, the latest minor revision of CircuitPython, and is a new stable release.

WARNING for nRF52 boards only: If your board has an nRF52 UF2 bootloader whose version is before 0.6.1, you will not be able to load CircuitPython 8.2.0 and later, due to increased size of the firmware. See these instructions for updating your bootloader.

Highlights of this release

• Fix RP2350 cache invalidation for PSRAM.

Notable changes in 9.2.0 from 9.1.x

• Raspberry Pi RP2350 support.
• Update to Espressif ESP-IDF V5.3.1, including new I2C driver.
• Merge MicroPython updates from v1.22.2 and v1.23.
• Espressif BLE improvements.
• Add math.dist().
• _eve updates.
• New busio.I2C.probe() and bitbangio.I2C.probe() methods to check for a single device address.
• ESP32-S3: implement sdioio.
• New audiodelays and audiofilters modules. These modules are experimental, and the API may change.
• Incompatible change: Change default hostname for all Espressif boards to the ESP-IDF default, which is espressif.
• Incompatible change: Use default hostname for mDNS. Fix mDNS collision mangling.

Incompatibility warnings

• Change default hostname for all Espressif boards to the ESP-IDF default, which is espressif. Previous board-specific names were not applied consistently. Use wifi.radio.hostname to set a custom hostname.
• Use default hostname for mDNS. Fix mDNS collision mangling. DNS hostnames will be different.

Download from circuitpython.org

Firmware downloads are available from the downloads page on circuitpython.org. The site makes it easy to select the correct file and language for your board.

Installation

To install follow the instructions in the Welcome to CircuitPython! guide. To install the latest libraries, see this page in that guide.

Try code.circuitpython.org or the latest version of the Mu editor for creating and editing your CircuitPython programs and for easy access to the CircuitPython serial connection (the REPL).

Documentation

Documentation is available in readthedocs.io.

Port status

CircuitPython has a number of “ports” that are the core implementations for different microcontroller families. Stability varies on a per-port basis. As of this release, these ports are consider stable (but see Known Issues below):

• atmel-samd: Microchip SAMD21, SAMx5x
• cxd56: Sony Spresense
• espressif: Espressif ESP32, ESP32-S2, ESP32-S3, ESP32-C2, ESP32-C3, ESP32-C6
• nordic: Nordic nRF52840, nRF52833
• raspberrypi: Raspberry Pi RP2040, RP2350
• stm: ST STM32F4 chip family

These ports are considered alpha and will have bugs and missing functionality:

• broadcom: Raspberry Pi boards such as RPi 4, RPi Zero 2W
• espressif: ESP32-P4 (currently no USB support)
• litex: fomu
• mimxrt10xx: NXP i.MX RT10xxx
• renode: hardware simulator
• silabs: Silicon Labs MG24 family
• stm: ST non-STM32F4 chip families

Changes since 9.2.0-rc.0

Fixes and enhancements

Port and board-specific changes

Broadcom

Espressif

i.MX

nordic

renode

RP2

• Fix RP2350 cache invalidation for PSRAM. #9759. Thanks @dhalbert.

SAMx

SiLabs

Spresense

STM

Individual boards

Documentation changes

• Add note about different _bleio implementations. #9758. Thanks @dhalbert.

Build and infrastructure changes

• Remove version restrictions on Python cryptography library. #9757. Thanks @jepler.

Translation additions and improvements

New boards since 9.2.0-rc.0

Known issues

• See https://ift.tt/ghPIb41 for other issues, including issues still to be addressed for:
  • 9.2.0
  • 9.x.x
  • 10.0.0
  • long term
• Native-code .mpy files are not working. This capability is currently enabled only on the winterbloom_sol board.

Thanks

Thank you to all who used, tested, and contributed toward this release, including the contributors above, and many others on GitHub and Discord. Join us on the Discord chat to collaborate.

Creating the Harriet Tubman commemorative coin

Creating the Harriet Tubman commemorative coin –

The 2024 Harriet Tubman Commemorative Coin Program recognizes the bicentennial of Harriet Tubman’s birth and her lifework that spans beyond liberation. Hear from voices across the U.S. Mint about the creation of this collection, showcasing significant periods in Tubman’s pursuit of social justice and representing different eras of her extraordinary life.

Read more & video.

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Related:

• How to 3D Print molds for custom Stamps.
• Hey Steven Mnuchin, making Harriet Tubman $20s seems totally OK.

Use Your Pi for Retro Games

If you are deeply regretting letting go of some of your older game consoles, it’s time to wipe those tears away and get your Pi ready for Retrom. PiMyLifeUp shares.

Retrom is a relatively new software designed to be a central place to host all your games. While this game library focuses on retro games, it still works as a good hub for your more modern games.

One of the neatest things about Retrom is that it will automatically scrape your folders for your games. As long as they are organized in a way the software expects, it will build out and fetch information about each of your retro games.

Retrom even features a sleek web interface that you can use to easily browse and manage your retro game library. You can even download your games to your local machine with just a click of a button.

Scaring People with AI: Raspberry Pi Ai Camera SONY IMX500. Halloween Setup! #piday #raspberrypi #ElectronicHalloween

The Raspberry Pi makes for some fun Halloween projects. Eugene Tkachenko uses a Pi 5 and an AI Camera to craft up some scares.

In a quiet suburban neighborhood, October had arrived, and the air buzzed with Halloween excitement. At the same time, a new Raspberry Pi AI camera came into my hands, and that means it’s time to scare someone. People often fear AI because they believe it will take away jobs, but this time, it will help me create a new kind of fear.

Checkout the GitHub and Instructable for full details

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Each Friday is PiDay here at Adafruit! Be sure to check out our posts, tutorials and new Raspberry Pi related products. Adafruit has the largest and best selection of Raspberry Pi accessories and all the code & tutorials to get you up and running in no time!

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HAPPY HALLOWEEN! All month we’ll be bringing you ideas and projects for an Electronic Halloween!

Working on a project for Halloween this year? Share it with us in the comments below, the Adafruit forums, Facebook, Discord, Instagram or Twitter [aka X]– (tag your posts #ElectronicHalloween). You can also send us a blog tip!

Get inspired with the Halloween Gift Guide

Using Retrom to Manage Your Retro Game Library on Raspberry Pi @Raspberry_Pi #PiDay #RaspberryPi

What is the purpose of nostalgia? Do we turn to our old favorites to escape a chaotic present? Do we re-visit old haunts, old meal, old TV show, old movies, to find a new script for our lives? In the case of video games, some turn to retro games for a simpler, more direct approach to game mechanics. Why struggle through the 135th patch for the latest AAA video game when you can settle down to the 8-bit sounds of a Nintendo classic, or the two-color adventures of an Atari 2600 game?

If retro gaming is your jam and Raspberry Pi is your tool, have a look at Retrom, a new-ish software that could be the central place to host your games. Here’s more from PiMyLifeUp:

One of the neatest things about Retrom is that it will automatically scrape your folders for your games. As long as they are organized in a way the software expects, it will build out and fetch information about each of your retro games.

Retrom even features a sleek web interface that you can use to easily browse and manage your retro game library. You can even download your games to your local machine with just a click of a button.

See more!

Raspberry Pi Pico enhances a vintage Radio Shack microcomputer kit #RaspberryPi #ShackToberFest @Raspberry_Pi

Don Wilcher uses a Raspberry Pi Pico to build an adjustable clock with an LED display then integrate the clock with a vintage Radio Shack Science Fair Microcomputer Trainer programmed to function as a 7-bit binary counter.

Long before the Heathkit 6800 microcomputer learning system, the Arduino Uno, or the Basic Stamp, there was Radio Shack’s Science Fair Microcomputer Trainer kit. Introduced in 1985, this easy-to-program kit was intended to teach users how microcomputers worked.

In this project article, we’ll upgrade this vintage microcomputer by building and adding an adjustable Raspberry Pi Pico clock with an LED display. After assembling the hardware, we’ll program the trainer to operate as a 7-bit binary counter. Before any of that, though, let’s spend some time learning about the trainer’s features—and, in particular, about the TMS1100 microcontroller at its core.

Don adds a Raspberry Pi Pico programmed in MicroPython, making an adjustable digital clock.

Read the details in the post here.

On the heels of #SepTandy, Adafruit is celebrating #ShackToberFest, a celebration of all things Radio Shack and Tandy. Tag your social media posts #ShackToberFest!

 

CircuitPython 9.2.0 Release Candidate 0 Released!

From the GitHub release page:

This is CircuitPython 9.2.0-rc.0, a release candidate for 9.2.0 final. This release is believed to be stable, and is meant for testing before the final release of 9.2.0.

WARNING for nRF52 boards only: If your board has an nRF52 UF2 bootloader whose version is before 0.6.1, you will not be able to load CircuitPython 8.2.0 and later, due to increased size of the firmware. See these instructions for updating your bootloader.

Highlights of this release

• New audiodelays and audiofilters modules. These modules are experimental, and the API may change.
• Bug fixes.

Notable changes in 9.2.0 from 9.1.x

• Raspberry Pi RP2350 support.
• Update to Espressif ESP-IDF V5.3.1, including new I2C driver.
• Merge MicroPython updates from v1.22.2 and v1.23.
• Espressif BLE improvements.
• Add math.dist().
• _eve updates.
• New busio.I2C.probe() and bitbangio.I2C.probe() methods to check for a single device address.
• ESP32-S3: implement sdioio.
• New audiodelays and audiofilters modules. These modules are experimental, and the API may change.
• Incompatible change: Change default hostname for all Espressif boards to the ESP-IDF default, which is espressif.
• Incompatible change: Use default hostname for mDNS. Fix mDNS collision mangling.

Incompatibility warnings

• Change default hostname for all Espressif boards to the ESP-IDF default, which is espressif. Previous board-specific names were not applied consistently. Use wifi.radio.hostname to set a custom hostname.
• Use default hostname for mDNS. Fix mDNS collision mangling. DNS hostnames will be different.

Download from circuitpython.org

Firmware downloads are available from the downloads page on circuitpython.org. The site makes it easy to select the correct file and language for your board.

Installation

To install follow the instructions in the Welcome to CircuitPython! guide. To install the latest libraries, see this page in that guide.

Try the latest version of the Mu editor for creating and editing your CircuitPython programs and for easy access to the CircuitPython serial connection (the REPL).

Documentation

Documentation is available in readthedocs.io.

Port status

CircuitPython has a number of “ports” that are the core implementations for different microcontroller families. Stability varies on a per-port basis. As of this release, these ports are consider stable (but see Known Issues below):

• atmel-samd: Microchip SAMD21, SAMx5x
• cxd56: Sony Spresense
• espressif: Espressif ESP32, ESP32-S2, ESP32-S3, ESP32-C2, ESP32-C3, ESP32-C6
• nordic: Nordic nRF52840, nRF52833
• raspberrypi: Raspberry Pi RP2040, RP2350
• stm: ST STM32F4 chip family

These ports are considered alpha and will have bugs and missing functionality:

• broadcom: Raspberry Pi boards such as RPi 4, RPi Zero 2W
• espressif: ESP32-P4 (currently no USB support)
• litex: fomu
• mimxrt10xx: NXP i.MX RT10xxx
• renode: hardware simulator
• silabs: Silicon Labs MG24 family
• stm: ST non-STM32F4 chip families

Changes since 9.2.0-beta.1

Fixes and enhancements

• Fix default values for wifi.Radio.start_dhcp_client(). #9751. Thanks @dhalbert.
• Add audiofilters module. #9744. Thanks @dcooperdalrymple.
• Improve _bleio.Connection.bind() validation, error messages, and documentation. #9732. Thanks @dhalbert.
• Add errno.EROFS and errno.ENOSPC. #9731. Thanks @dhalbert.
• adafruit_pixelbuf: allow modifying transmit buffer to control brightness on TM1814 RGB strips. #9730. Thanks @jepler.
• Fix keypad.ShiftRegisterKeys.key_count value. #9719. Thanks @dhalbert.
• Add audiodelays module. #9640. Thanks @gamblor21.

Port and board-specific changes

Broadcom

Espressif

• Disable hardware stack guard while crashes it causes are investigated. #9748. Thanks @dhalbert and MicroPython folks.
• Disable ipv6 RDNSS: LWIP overwrites ipv4 DNS servers. #9713. Thanks @jepler.

i.MX

nordic

renode

RP2

• Explicitly invalidate cache lines on RP2350. #9752. Thanks @tannewt and @earlephilhower.
• Document picodvi differences between RP2040 and RP2350. #9740. Thanks @tannewt.
• Fix assignment to wifi.radio.dns. #9727. Thanks @jepler.

SAMx

SiLabs

Spresense

STM

Individual boards

Documentation changes

• Correct documentation of wifi.Network.authmode. #9725. Thanks @bablokb.
• Improve keypad.ShiftRegisterKeys documentation. #9717. Thanks @aseanwatson.

Build and infrastructure changes

• Update to use macos-12 and ubuntu-24.04 for CI runs. #9720. Thanks @dhalbert.
• Support frozen modules that use a src/ directory. #9673. Thanks @bablokb.

Translation additions and improvements

• Thanks for translations:
  • @andibing (English – UK)
  • @Atalanttore (German)
  • @hexthat (Chinese – Pinyin)
  • @Sokromatrix (German)
  • @wtuemura (Portugese – Brazil)

New boards since 9.2.0-beta.1

• cezerio dev ESP32C6. #9724. Thanks @cezer-io.
• Solder Party ESP32-Pr Stamp XL. #9715. Thanks @solderparty (@arturo182).

Known issues

• See https://ift.tt/Kf42Nrz for other issues, including issues still to be addressed for:
  • 9.2.0
  • 9.x.x
  • 10.0.0
  • long term
• Native-code .mpy files are not working. This capability is currently enabled only on the winterbloom_sol board.

Thanks

Thank you to all who used, tested, and contributed toward this release, including the contributors above, and many others on GitHub and Discord. Join us on the Discord chat to collaborate.

The Kanachord Plus keyboard #Japanese #RaspberryPi @Raspberry_Pi @Hackaday

Mac Cody has created the KanaChord Plus keyboard, which supports an astounding 6,165 Kanji as well as 6,240 of the most common Japanese words that contain Kanji. This is all in addition to supporting the Kana characters, which make up the rest of Japanese writing.

It uses color in order to indicate character type, Kana mode, and even provide error feedback.

The project is powered by a Raspberry Pi Pico. Cody used an Adafruit NeoKey 5×6 Ortho Snap-Apart keyboard PCB and 30 Cherry MX switches.

Check out the thoroughly detailed project on GitHub. Via Hackaday.

Driving TM1814 addressable LEDs #LED Pixels #AdafruitLearningSystem @Adafruit

jepler’s ready to light up your world with a new CircuitPython driver for TM1814 adressable LED pixels:

TM1814 is a four-channel constant current LED driver. Similar to the NeoPixel’s WS2812B, TM1814 uses one data line to control a string of daisy chained LEDs.

However, TM1814 is not compatible with the WS2812B, so it needs different software to drive it. Adafruit publishes Adafruit_CircuitPython_TM1814, a software library for CircuitPython that runs on RP2040 and RP2350 microcontrollers, including the Feather RP2040, Feather RP2350, Raspberry Pi Pico, and Raspberry Pi Pico 2.

Key facts about TM1814:

• TM1814 works with LED supply voltages up to 24V, vs about 5V for NeoPixels. A particular LED strip will have a design voltage, often 12V; refer to the LED strip supplier’s details and do not exceed them.
• TM1814 often controls more than one LED package. For instance, a 12V strip is likely to have 3 RGBW LEDs for every 1 TM1814. These 3 LEDs will all have the same color and act as a “single pixel” in your code.
• There is an overall LED current control, selectable from 6.5mA to 38mA in 0.5mA steps, that applies to all TM1814 in a strip
• TM1814 is designed for RGBW designs, while NeoPixel has both 3-color and 4-color variants
• TM1814 will display a test pattern when not actively driven by a microcontroller
• The waveform is very similar to an inverted NeoPixel waveform, but not exactly

Read more at Driving TM1814 addressable LEDs

Color Chart Re-Created with Cars #ArtTuesday

If you ever decide to become a theatrical lighting desigenr or painter or makeup artist, you may at some point coma cross an astonishing book called The Interactions of Color. Written by Josef Albers, the book teaches readers to see colors in an entirely new way. What do the gradtions of shading look like? What do red and blue look like when set down side by side? Albers lays out the interactions of color in a unique way. But even Albers doesn’t quite do what Fred Battle pulls off in his 2019 work, Solara. Here’s more from COLOSSAL:

For his 2019 installation “Solara,” the artist painted the exteriors of 144 dilapidated vehicles from the 60s to 90s with vibrant colors. Hoods, roofs, and trunks shine once again with bold hues corresponding to an RGB color value, their codes written on the bonnet.

“I decided to create this color chart by observing the action of the sun on the horizontal surfaces of these cars,” Battle wrote. “As each of these cars has had its proper life as an object, then applying one specific color on each reveals its singularity, its personal and particular use.”

See the project!

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Every Tuesday is Art Tuesday here at Adafruit! Today we celebrate artists and makers from around the world who are designing innovative and creative works using technology, science, electronics and more. You can start your own career as an artist today with Adafruit’s conductive paints, art-related electronics kits, LEDs, wearables, 3D printers and more! Make your most imaginative designs come to life with our helpful tutorials from the Adafruit Learning System. And don’t forget to check in every Art Tuesday for more artistic inspiration here on the Adafruit Blog!

Meet the Italian ‘Fruit Detective’ Who Investigates Centuries-Old Paintings for Clues About Produce That Has Disappeared From the Kitchen Table

This recent piece from Smithsonian Magazine explores the loveliest intersection between science and art. Dalla Ragione is an Italian scientist who earned a PhD in biodiversity from the University of Perugia. Specifically, she’s a tree fruit expert who puts 15th and 16th paintings in at the center of her research.

Her nonprofit, Archeologia Arborea, is helping farmers and governments around the world preserve and even bring back into cultivation all manner of forgotten fruits. In the process, Dalla Ragione has become a globally renowned fruit detective, by recognizing in her country’s Renaissance artworks not only exceptional examples of cultural patrimony but also hidden messages from a bygone era of genetic abundance that can offer clues about how to recover what was seemingly lost.

Read the full piece here.

And for more fruit-forward content, check out these guides from our Learn System:

• FruitBox Sequencer: Musically Delicious Step Pattern Generator
• Circuit Playground Express: Piano in the Key of Lime
• Circuit Playground Fruit Drums

Bringing Junked Fighter Joysticks Back to Life – The MagPi Issue 146 #CircuitPython @TheMagPi @Raspberry_Pi

 

The MagPi Magazine Issue 146 features a Pico kit to bring junked joysticks back to life.

One of the many great things about the EMF Camp events (www.emfcamp.org) is the swap shop tent where all kinds of things are brought to be sold and exchanged.

On one of my many visits there I found a slightly worn (but very heavy) pair of joysticks which looked as if they had been part of a professional simulator at some point. In this article, I’ll talk about how I reverse engineered them to create a fully fledged flight simulator controller. Along the way I happened to create a Pico program that makes it easy to use any input device as a USB joystick.

A Raspberry Pi Pico was the perfect thing to use here as it has great IO options and support for working in Python. I needed to configure it to announce itself as a game controller over USB, and then adapt my code to run on the Pico and send the appropriate messages to the PC.

Fortunately, CircuitPython has great support for making custom devices like this. First, we need to define how we want our device to appear over USB, and write some Python to make sure this is registered whenever the Pico connects over USB.

Read More, Download PDF pp 76-81, buy The MagPi now, subscribe

Portable Pi 84 – The MagPi Issue 146 #CircuitPython @TheMagPi @Raspberry_Pi

The MagPi Magazine Issue 146 features the Portable Pi 84 project.

It is to those bygone laptops that Michael Mayer has turned when creating his own portable classic. Named the Portable Pi 84 – by virtue of being driven by a Raspberry Pi 4 computer – it takes inspiration from the machines that had very clear central hinges. It also sports a fun, red colouring and has a widescreen display that is more than large enough to be productive.

This little device includes a mechanical keyboard that, Michael says: was his primary motivation for making his retro marvel. Having first cut his teeth learning BASIC on a Sharp PC-1260, he quickly became a fan of portable computers and snapped up many more. But when, in recent years, he sought to revive his interest in such machines, he said he’s been left disappointed.

“I have tried Raspberry Pi and Linux-compatible portables and laptops but I’ve never been really satisfied with their keyboards,” he says.

Unlike the laptops that were available in the 1980s and 1990s, Michael’s contemporary version packs a real punch thanks to the use of a Raspberry Pi 4 Model B computer. He is considering making use of Raspberry Pi 5 in the future for greater power.

The ortholinear mechanical keyboard has 47 keys and it uses the Raspberry Pi Pico W running KMK firmware powered by CircuitPython. It’s possible to fit any keycap or switch to this keyboard, but Michael bought an inexpensive set of blanks from Amazon.

Read More, Download PDF pp 20-23, buy The MagPi now, subscribe

Adafruit’s Anne Barela on Tom’s Hardware PiCast Tuesday @TomsHardware @anne_engineer @Raspberry_Pi

Tuesday October 22nd (tomorrow) at 2pm ET / 7pm BST, Tom’s Hardware: The Pi Cast will feature Adafruit engineer Anne Barela (@anne_engineer on Twitter, @anneb on BlueSky) to talk about her awesome PyDOS handheld.

Anne’s build merges the software from the 1980s with the hardware of the 2000s to create a fun and quirky DOS-like compatible. We love the BlackBerry form factor, and that the carrier board is designed for Adafruit Feather board, including the new Raspberry Pi RP2350-based board: the Adafruit Feather RP2350.

You can read more about CircuitPython-based PyDOS project here.

Anne has documented the build over at Adafruit.

And see Anne’s other builds on the Adafruit Learning System and Adafruit Playground Notes as well as her own blog.

Go Behind the Scenes of Beetlejuice Beetlejuice’s Stop-Motion Art

Warner Bros. Entertainment allows viewers a behind the scenes look at the stop-motion art of Beetlejuice Beetlejuice with Tim Burton, Tommy Harper, Ian Mackinnon, Glenn Holberton, Chris Tichborne, Andy Biddle, Malcolm Hadley, Beth Jupe, Paul Davies, Kevin Scillitoe, Fabrice Pieton and Anna Pearson on YouTube.

Learn more about Stop Motion Animation from John Park in the Adafruit Learning System

Raspberry Pi Pico Spider Robot

Tom’s Hardware shares the details of robot wiz Kevin McAleer’s new Pico-powered spider robot.

This spider is still technically a work in progress but he shared lots of juicy info about its design in a recent video — plenty to indulge in. The design schematics show it’s built around a Raspberry Pi Pico but McAleer assures you could use an Arduino Nano in its place. It works by detecting people with ultrasonic sensor eyes (HC-SR04). When someone gets close, its arms wiggle open and closed. It also has LED strips inside its body that can be programmed to change colors.

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Each Friday is PiDay here at Adafruit! Be sure to check out our posts, tutorials and new Raspberry Pi related products. Adafruit has the largest and best selection of Raspberry Pi accessories and all the code & tutorials to get you up and running in no time!

This Spooky Raspberry Pi Halloween eye uses AI to stalk you around the room #piday #raspberrypi #electronichalloween

Nice Pi find from Tom’s Hardware just in time for Halloween:

Poke080 shared a demo video of the Halloween eye in action. In it, we get a good look at the eye’s movement and ability to track targets. It’s illuminated from the inside with RGB LEDs to glow red, occasionally flashing green. It could theoretically be programmed to say anything but in the video, we hear a nice welcoming “Happy Halloween!”

See more! and check out the project from Poke08 on reddit and demo on YouTube

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Each Friday is PiDay here at Adafruit! Be sure to check out our posts, tutorials and new Raspberry Pi related products. Adafruit has the largest and best selection of Raspberry Pi accessories and all the code & tutorials to get you up and running in no time!

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It’s Saving time! Subscribers to the Newsletter get 15% off The Halloween Gift Guide with the Code HALLOWEEN15

Working on a project for Halloween this year? Share it with us in the comments below, the Adafruit forums, Facebook, Discord, Instagram or Twitter [aka X]– (tag your posts #ElectronicHalloween). You can also send us a blog tip!

Air Quality Monitor Project @Raspberry_Pi #PiDay #RaspberryPi

Here’s a project that brings a matteter sensor together with a Raspnerry Pi to create a DIY filtration system. Here’s more from Joyce Lin via hackster.io:

Connect a particulate matter sensor to a Raspberry Pi to trigger a DIY air filtration system. The PMS7003 particulate sensor measures the air quality and transmits data in a serial stream from the transmitter pin (TX) to the receiver pin (RX pin) on the Raspberry Pi.

See project!

Tandy 1000 keyboard to USB with CircuitPython #ShackToberFest

A new Adafruit Playground Note shows how to adapt a Tandy 1000 keyboard for use on modern computers using CircuitPython and an Adafruit QT Py RP2040 microcontroller board.

Check it out here > > >

“The Starry Night” Follows Laws of Physics That Weren’t Discovered Yet #ArtTuesday

Science and art have always been inextricably linked. Before ‘art’ and ‘science’ were subjects in a text book scientist and artists were one and the same.

Fascinating discovery in Physics of Fluids. Van Gogh, knowingly or not, accurately depicted fluid mechanics. Laws of physics that wouldn’t be proven for decades. This depiction isn’t only on the broad strokes either: “On a microscopic scale, the scientists found that the brushstrokes and the visual effects of the paints’ viscosity also align with Batchelor’s law”

Did he know? Was it keen observation, intuition or coinidence?

Via Hyperallergic:

The research team examined the length of, space between, and varying luminance of van Gogh’s brushstrokes from each of the 14 whirling eddies in “The Starry Night,” and found that the composition intrinsically observes Richardson–Kolmogorov’s cascade picture of turbulence, specifically Kolmogorov’s −5/3 Power Law. Put simply, this predicts that turbulent flows experience energy cascades during which larger eddies transfer some of their energy into smaller ones, and that those, in turn, transfer their energy into even smaller eddies, and so on.

Read more! And in the paper Hidden turbulence in van Gogh’s The Starry Night

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Add some real motion to Starry Night, and lights! With the Circuit Playground Express and Adafruit CRICKIT for Circuit Playground Express using Living Starry Night Painting on Learn.Adafruit

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Every Tuesday is Art Tuesday here at Adafruit! Today we celebrate artists and makers from around the world who are designing innovative and creative works using technology, science, electronics and more. You can start your own career as an artist today with Adafruit’s conductive paints, art-related electronics kits, LEDs, wearables, 3D printers and more! Make your most imaginative designs come to life with our helpful tutorials from the Adafruit Learning System. And don’t forget to check in every Art Tuesday for more artistic inspiration here on the Adafruit Blog!

Early Home Computers in the work of Lola Dupre #ArtTuesday

Onc day Americans woke up to discover that home computers sat on their desks. These home computers soon brought with them the world wide web, smuggling the entire world into suburban homes from Portland, Maine to Portland, Oregon. Home computers transformed our families, our relationships, our the way we make our decisions. Nowadays we walk around with proof of that complete transformation in the form of smart phones. The work of painter Lola Dupre helps us remember just how strange home computers really are. Here’s more from COLOSSAL:

[Lola Dupre] continues her disorienting manipulations with a pair of early Apple desktops, ships with enough stories to rival a high-rise, and a cow so bloated she needs eight legs to stand. Each work pushes the limits of legibility as limbs and common objects undergo exaggerated distortions.

See Dupre’s work here!

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Every Tuesday is Art Tuesday here at Adafruit! Today we celebrate artists and makers from around the world who are designing innovative and creative works using technology, science, electronics and more. You can start your own career as an artist today with Adafruit’s conductive paints, art-related electronics kits, LEDs, wearables, 3D printers and more! Make your most imaginative designs come to life with our helpful tutorials from the Adafruit Learning System. And don’t forget to check in every Art Tuesday for more artistic inspiration here on the Adafruit Blog!

Engineezy’s Marble Machine Makes Pixel Art

Engineezy uses a color sensor and stepper motor to detect and sort different color marbles in their pixel art marble machine

Learn how to make glowy pixel based art in the Adafruit Learning System:

• 32×32 Square Pixel Art Animation Display
• LED Matrix Display for Bitmap Pixel Art and Animation
• MakeCode Arcade Pixel Art Sprites
• LED Glasses Custom Animated Graphics with Sprites
• 
  Matrix Portal RGB Display Handbag
• Matrix Portal Money-Sensing Tip Jar

NEW GUIDE: DIY Turbo Button Controller #Hacks #AdafruitLearningSystem @Adafruit

In this project, you’ll use a Feather RP2040 USB Host to listen for a specific button combination from your attached gamepad to trigger “turbo mode” aka rapidly sending A button presses. Otherwise, the Feather acts as a passthrough for your controller, sending all of your gamepad inputs as pressed.

Read more at DIY Turbo Button Controller

Raspberry Pi Pico enhances a vintage Radio Shack microcomputer kit #RaspberryPi #RadioShack @AllAboutCircuit #ShackToberFest

Don Wilcher uses a Raspberry Pi Pico to build an adjustable clock with an LED display then integrate the clock with a vintage Radio Shack Science Fair Microcomputer Trainer programmed to function as a 7-bit binary counter.

Long before the Heathkit 6800 microcomputer learning system, the Arduino Uno, or the Basic Stamp, there was Radio Shack’s Science Fair Microcomputer Trainer kit. Introduced in 1985, this easy-to-program kit was intended to teach users how microcomputers worked.

In this project article, we’ll upgrade this vintage microcomputer by building and adding an adjustable Raspberry Pi Pico clock with an LED display. After assembling the hardware, we’ll program the trainer to operate as a 7-bit binary counter. Before any of that, though, let’s spend some time learning about the trainer’s features—and, in particular, about the TMS1100 microcontroller at its core.

Don adds a Raspberry Pi Pico programmed in MicroPython, making an adjustable digital clock.

Read the details in the post here.

On the heels of #SepTandy, Adafruit is celebrating #ShackToberFest, a celebration of all things Radio Shack and Tandy. Tag your social media posts #ShackToberFest!

 

Turn Your Pi into a Wi-Fi Router

PiMyLifeUp shares how to turn your Raspberry Pi into a Wi-Fi router using Pi-Fi.

PiFi is a distribution that makes setting up your Raspberry Pi as a speedy OpenWrt-based Wi-Fi router significantly easier. It is definitely a project you will want to consider using if you want a super portable travel router.

OpenWrt, for those who do not know, is an open-source operating system with a focus on network routing. It has become a popular choice for anyone wanting to set up their very own router. PiFi utilizes its own customized version with improvements to work better on the Raspberry Pi and be controllable through their app.

Read more.

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Each Friday is PiDay here at Adafruit! Be sure to check out our posts, tutorials and new Raspberry Pi related products. Adafruit has the largest and best selection of Raspberry Pi accessories and all the code & tutorials to get you up and running in no time!

Haunted House Using a Raspberry Pi #piday #raspberrypi #ElectronicHalloween

With some sensors, servos and of course a Raspberry Pi, you can create some spooky effects. Hack into store bought props to induce the ultimate chills.

NetworkChuck set up a haunted house to scare his daughters. The power of the Pi lets you set the level of scares. He goes through 1,2,3….and 4!

This is my Raspberry Pi Haunted house. In this video, I’m going to show you how to program your Raspberry Pi in Python to scare EVERYONE for Halloween. For a solid basic scare, all you’ll need is a Raspberry Pi and some speakers. For more advanced users….you’re going to have some fun.

See more!

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Learn all about PIR Motion Sensor to create your own motion triggered props like Erin St Blaine’s Fog Machine with Motion Sensor and Adafruit IO

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It’s Saving time! Subscribers to the Newsletter get 15% off The Halloween Gift Guide with the Code HALLOWEEN15

Working on a project for Halloween this year? Share it with us in the comments below, the Adafruit forums, Facebook, Discord, Instagram or Twitter [aka X]– (tag your posts #ElectronicHalloween). You can also send us a blog tip!

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Each Friday is PiDay here at Adafruit! Be sure to check out our posts, tutorials and new Raspberry Pi related products. Adafruit has the largest and best selection of Raspberry Pi accessories and all the code & tutorials to get you up and running in no time!

WALKPi Breadboard Version @Raspberry_Pi #PiDay #RaspberryPi

For most a walkman is a hopelessly dated piece of personal musical equipment, fit for the technological cemetery. But makers no gadget is without its use-value or inspirational power. The WALKPi takes its inspiration from the dearly departed Walkman, re-made DIY-style for makers Here’s more from via instructables:

Similar to a traditional walkman, WalkPi is an audio player setup that plays audio files stored on an SD card by pairing a Raspberry Pi Pico with the DFMini Player. It has an SSD1306 OLED screen, an interactive menu with various buttons for selecting tracks, volume controls, and additional functions.

…

The Raspberry Pi Pico, the project’s brain, is linked to the DF Mini Player, a compact, inexpensive MP3 module that has a simplified output directly to the speaker.

See project!

Raspberry Pi Face Recognition Treasure Box

Check out our Raspberry Pi Face Recognition Treasure Box learn guide in the adafruit learning system! Tony DiCola shared this video on Youtube!

Face recognition is an exciting field of computer vision with many possible applications to hardware and devices. Using embedded platforms like the Raspberry Pi and open source computer vision libraries like OpenCV, you can now add face recognition to your own maker projects! In this project I’ll show you how to build a treasure box which unlocks itself using face recognition running on a Raspberry Pi.

Check out the full guide!

CircuitPython 9.2.0 Beta 1 Released!

From the GitHub release page:

This is CircuitPython 9.2.0-beta.1, a beta release for 9.2.0. It has known bugs that wil be fixed before the final release of 9.2.0.

WARNING for nRF52 boards only: If your board has an nRF52 UF2 bootloader whose version is before 0.6.1, you will not be able to load CircuitPython 8.2.0 and later, due to increased size of the firmware. See these instructions for updating your bootloader.

Highlights of this release

• New busio.I2C.probe() and bitbangio.I2C.probe() methods to check for a single device address.
• Use new ESP-IDF I2C driver.
• ESP32-S3: implement sdioio.
• Incompatible change: Change default hostname for all Espressif boards to the ESP-IDF default, which is espressif. Previous board-specific names were not applied consistently. Use wifi.radio.hostname to set a custom hostname.
• Incompatible change: Use default hostname for mDNS. Fix mDNS collision mangling.

Notable changes in 9.2.0 from 9.1.x

• Raspberry Pi RP2350 support.
• Update to Espressif ESP-IDF V5.3.1, including new I2C driver.
• Merge MicroPython updates from v1.22.2 and v1.23.
• Espressif BLE improvements.
• Add math.dist().
• _eve updates.
• New busio.I2C.probe() and bitbangio.I2C.probe() methods to check for a single device address.
• ESP32-S3: implement sdioio.
• Incompatible change: Change default hostname for all Espressif boards to the ESP-IDF default, which is espressif.
• Incompatible change: Use default hostname for mDNS. Fix mDNS collision mangling.

Incompatibility warnings

• Change default hostname for all Espressif boards to the ESP-IDF default, which is espressif. Previous board-specific names were not applied consistently. Use wifi.radio.hostname to set a custom hostname.
• Use default hostname for mDNS. Fix mDNS collision mangling. DNS hostnames will be different.

Download from circuitpython.org

Firmware downloads are available from the downloads page on circuitpython.org. The site makes it easy to select the correct file and language for your board.

Installation

To install follow the instructions in the Welcome to CircuitPython! guide. To install the latest libraries, see this page in that guide.

Try the latest version of the Mu editor for creating and editing your CircuitPython programs and for easy access to the CircuitPython serial connection (the REPL).

Documentation

Documentation is available in readthedocs.io.

Port status

CircuitPython has a number of “ports” that are the core implementations for different microcontroller families. Stability varies on a per-port basis. As of this release, these ports are consider stable (but see Known Issues below):

• atmel-samd: Microchip SAMD21, SAMx5x
• cxd56: Sony Spresense
• espressif: Espressif ESP32, ESP32-S2, ESP32-S3, ESP32-C2, ESP32-C3, ESP32-C6
• nordic: Nordic nRF52840, nRF52833
• raspberrypi: Raspberry Pi RP2040, RP2350
• stm: ST STM32F4 chip family

These ports are considered alpha and will have bugs and missing functionality:

• broadcom: Raspberry Pi boards such as RPi 4, RPi Zero 2W
• espressif: ESP32-P4 (currently no USB support)
• litex: fomu
• mimxrt10xx: NXP i.MX RT10xxx
• renode: hardware simulator
• silabs: Silicon Labs MG24 family
• stm: ST non-STM32F4 chip families

Changes since 9.2.0-beta.0

Fixes and enhancements

• Incompatible change: Use default hostname for mDNS. Fix mDNS collision mangling. #9699. Thanks @tannewt.
• Fix epaperdisplay to handle delays properly when two_byte_sequence_length=True. #9694. Thanks @sola85.
• Fix crash when printing DeepSleepRequest exception, used internally by alarm. #9692. Thanks @jepler.
• Fix internal check for connected BLE workflow, which was preventing deep sleep on some BLE boards. #9679. Thanks @dhalbert.
• New busio.I2C.probe() and bitbangio.I2C.probe() methods to check for a single device address. #9671. Thanks @dhalbert.
• Add slight delay in KeyMatrix scanning to allow time for signal setting. #9665. Thanks @SeanCline.
• Update to tinyusb v0.17.0. #9664. Thanks @samblenny.
• Fix MP3Decoder infinite loop when file ends in a partial frame. #9653. Thanks @eric321.

Port and board-specific changes

Broadcom

Espressif

• Save space when copying default hostname. #9677. Thanks @RetiredWizard.
• Fix BLE Characteristic deinit checking. #9676. Thanks @dhalbert.
• Switch to using new ESP-IDF I2C driver. #9671. Thanks @tannewt and @dhalbert.
• Incompatible change: Change default hostname for all Espressif boards to the ESP-IDF default, which is espressif. #9656. Thanks @RetiredWizard.
• ESP32-S3: implement sdioio. #9641. Thanks @jacobcrigby and @RetiredWizard.
• Remove ESP_CONSOLE_UART settings for ESP32-S3 666 display boards. #9583. Thanks @RetiredWizard.

i.MX

nordic

renode

RP2

• Move RP2040 divider wrapper to RAM. #9698. Thanks @tannewt.
• Fix os.uname() values for RP2350. #9683. Thanks @dhalbert.
• Fix rotaryio on RP2350. #9682. Thanks @jepler.
• Clear any pending interrupt flag in rp2pio. #9680. Thanks @jepler.

SAMx

SiLabs

Spresense

STM

Individual boards

• Adafruit Feather RP2350: Add board.IO4 and board.IO7. #9668. Thanks @tannewt.
• Datanoise PicoADK V2. #9696. Thanks @DatanoiseTV.
• Makerfabs TFT7: Allow specifying CIRCUITPY_DISPLAY_WIDTH in settings.toml. #9654, #9634. Thanks @RetiredWizard.
• Sunton ESP32 2432S028: Allow specifying CIRCUITPY_DISPLAY_ROTATION in settings.toml. #9654, #9627. Thanks @RetiredWizard.

Documentation changes

• Fix floppyio documentation formatting. #9658. Thanks @jepler.
• Correct memorymap.AddressRange example. #9639. Thanks @jepler.

Build and infrastructure changes

• Use MP_PROPERTY_GETTER, etc. everywhere. #9684. Thanks @diamant3.
• Keep PYTHONPATH setting when running tests. #9655. Thanks @jepler.

Translation additions and improvements

• Thanks for translations:
  • @andibing (English – UK)
  • @diamant3 (Filipino)
  • Kamborio (weblate user) (Spanish)
  • @wtuemura (Portugese – Brazil)

New boards since 9.2.0-beta.0

• Espressif ESP32-S# LCD EV Board v1.5. #9608. Thanks @sanhu88.
• Makerdiary iMX RT1011 Nano Kit. #9645. Thanks @makerdiary.
• Maker Go C6 SuperMini. #9687. Thanks @bill88t.
• Sunton ESP32 8048S050 [ESP32-S3]. #9661. Thanks @sanhu88.

Known issues

• See https://ift.tt/0sAt2lU for other issues, including issues still to be addressed for:
  • 9.1.x
  • 9.2.0
  • 9.x.x
  • 10.0.0
  • long term
• Native-code .mpy files are not working. This capability is currently enabled only on the winterbloom_sol board.

Thanks

Thank you to all who used, tested, and contributed toward this release, including the contributors above, and many others on GitHub and Discord. Join us on the Discord chat to collaborate.