Public Access
mangavalkandClaude Opus 5.5
e9f3c16c78
Each page in a schedule block, and each rule that adds its page to the rotation, has a "skip in slow mode" checkbox. While slow mode is on those pages are left out of the rotation; when none of the block's pages are left, the chosen page is shown. The rotation keeps its own timers. Schedule format version 5; version 4 is converted when read and stored again in version 5 on the next save. Version 2.18.0. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
3.1 KiB
3.1 KiB
How it works
- ESP32 boot. The ESP32 connects to WiFi and starts ArduinoOTA. After a crash it
runs only OTA for 15 seconds, and after repeated crashes it goes to safe mode. Bad OTA
firmware is rolled back automatically, see
Keeping OTA alive. It then switches the display relay on, waits for
the Nano's
READYmessage (at most 3 s), shows "Connecting...", starts NTP and connects to MQTT. - Clock. Once the time is synced, the ESP32 sends a new frame whenever the screen
changes, mostly once a minute:
- 08:00–23:30: the page: the chosen page (by default the built-in Clock page,
Pikachu with a thought bubble showing
HH:MM, yawning from 17:00), or what the schedule and rules pick. - Game of Life (a page element): the ESP32 runs the board (
logic/life) and sends a frame per generation with only the changed dots. Like scrolling text, the next frame waits until the Nano has received and flipped the last one, so a busy board runs slower than the chosen speed. Only the shown page runs; it pauses while the display is off. Still or repeating boards are found by comparing a hash of the board with the last 16 generations. With the hidden margin, gliders that leave the area are cleared at the outer edge, and leftovers that stay put in the margin are cleared after 12 generations, so a glider gun keeps running cleanly. - Slow mode (a switch in Home Assistant and the web UI, for less noise): the display only changes every 1, 2, 5, 10, 15, 20, 30 or 60 minutes, on the clock (15 minutes = :00, :15, :30 and :45). 30 seconds after each update the relay turns the display off; the dots keep the image. Page changes wait for the next update too, except for rules with "show at once in slow mode": while their page is shown, the display works normally. Schedule pages and rotation rules with "skip in slow mode" are left out of the rotation (none left in the block: the chosen page).
- 23:31–08:00: the screen is cleared (or shows the off image chosen in the web UI) and power is cut after 30 seconds.
- 08:00–23:30: the page: the chosen page (by default the built-in Clock page,
Pikachu with a thought bubble showing
- Home Assistant: switches, dropdowns and sensors over MQTT, see Home Assistant.
- Nano. The Nano reads commands from the serial line and updates its frame buffer.
On
Dit flips only the dots that changed, in small steps so it never stops reading the serial port. Every 2 minutes (Settings, "Dot refresh") it flips every dot once more to fix dots that did not flip. - Frame check. After a frame the ESP asks the Nano for a checksum of its image and compares it with what it sent. When they differ (lost bytes can shift the picture), the Nano doesn't answer, or it restarted, the ESP sends the whole image again. It also does that every 10 minutes (Settings, "Image resync"); only dots that differ flip, so normally nothing changes. The counts are on the System tab.
The serial protocol is described in src/nano/README.md.