mangavalkandClaude Opus 5.5
0166d0ee46
The stopwatch counted with millis(), so it started at 0 after every restart and would overflow after 49 days. It now keeps the real start time (UTC ms) and the time counted before a pause, stored in NVS (system/stopwatch_store) on every change, so it keeps counting while the display is off or restarting. Stop pauses, Start continues, and the Stopwatch tab can set the start to a date and time (local, summer time by mktime) to count from, e.g. days since an event. Start, stop and set need the synced time. New page formats: 12d 4:05:09 and 3w 2d. Version 2.19.0, tested on the display over OTA (set start, future and invalid dates refused, pause, restart). Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
12 KiB
Web UI
Open http://<ESP32 IP>/ (e.g. http://10.1.1.198/) in a browser. At the top is a live
view of the display: it shows what the dots show right now, updated every 1.5 s. Each tab
has its own address, e.g. http://10.1.1.198/#schedule; #pages/<page name> opens a page
in the editor.
The screenshots are made with python tools/make_webui_screenshots.py (Edge or Chrome in
headless mode).
Show
Choose what the display shows during the day: a dynamic page (e.g. the built-in Clock: Pikachu with the time) or any bitmap (not the icons), and what is left on the dots when the display switches off. With a schedule, a page chosen here (or with the Home Assistant "Mode" dropdown) is shown until the next block starts; "Back to schedule" ends it earlier. Bitmaps that pages or rules use are in their own subsection.
Pages
Dynamic pages: a background per time of day, a bitmap or an icon (e.g. Pikachu from 00:00, yawning Pikachu from 17:00) with up to 16 elements on top. The preview is drawn by the ESP32, so it is exactly what the display shows; drag the elements on it, or select one and use the arrow keys. The Clock page (Pikachu, the default) and the Game of Life page are normal pages that can be changed; their Reset button brings back the original. See the pictures of the pages.
| Element | Options |
|---|---|
| Clock | 08:05, 8:05, optionally with seconds |
| Date | 7 formats, Dutch or English (do 15 okt, 15 oktober, donderdag, ...), today or up to 7 days ahead (the weekdays of a forecast) |
| Home Assistant value | An entity or attribute (also a path into lists, e.g. forecast.1.temperature), text before and after. Shown as a number (multiplier, decimals, auto unit 1257 W → 1.3 kW, without minus sign), a duration (2h 21m, 2:21:00, 2:21, 2 uur), a time from an HA timestamp (23:07, do 23:07, 15-10 23:07, over 34 min) or with own texts per state (printing=Bezig, standby=Klaar) |
| Text | Up to 32 characters |
| Countdown | To a date and time: smart (12 dagen, 5 uur, 34 min, 0:45), days, 12d 04:05, with seconds; a text when it has passed |
| Stopwatch | 4:05, 0:04, 0:04:05, 12d 4:05:09, 3w 2d; started in the Stopwatch tab or Home Assistant |
| Image | An icon (or a bitmap) at a position, fixed or chosen by a Home Assistant state (weer + cloudy = the icon weer cloudy, weer default when there is none) |
| Progress bar | Filled from the left by a Home Assistant number: value x multiplier / "full at" (a percentage: full at 100). Width, height, with or without a frame. Optionally the percentage on top (e.g. 42%, rounded down, in the chosen font): its dots invert the bar, so it stays readable on the filled and the empty part; left out when it doesn't fit inside (Small needs a height of 7 with a frame) |
| Game of Life | Conway's Game of Life in an area (the whole display by default), one per page. Start: random dots (density %), one pattern, or the patterns whose names start with a text (e.g. life_) in turn or in random order, in the middle or at a random place. Edges: wrap around, dead, or a hidden margin (the world is 16 dots larger on every side, so gliders fly out of view and disappear). Speed in generations per second. It restarts when it stops changing (still, or repeating within 16 generations) and/or after a number of generations, after running on for a few seconds (an empty board at once) |
Every element has a position, alignment, font and overlay (on top, box that clears the
dots behind it, inverted). Entity ids can contain {plex_user}, replaced by the Plex user
of the Home Assistant tab (e.g. sensor.{plex_user}_state). Texts can scroll in a window at a chosen speed (0.05-30 dots per second, e.g. 0.25 = one dot every 4 s) and can contain
the degree sign. Fonts: Small (3x5), Normal (5x7), Large (5x7 doubled), Full height (19 dot
digits), and your own: upload a TTF/OTF, choose the height in dots, the browser converts
it.
Each page can have its own refresh effect (e.g. Clock: sparkle, Weather: wipe), or use the
one from Settings. It is used when the page appears and for its own changes, like the
clock's minutes. A schedule block that switches instantly and rules still switch
instantly; "small changes only" and the effect time stay global settings. The ESP32 sends
it to the Nano without storing it in the Nano's EEPROM (E with flag 2), so switching
pages often doesn't wear the EEPROM.
Schedule
What is shown when, every day: blocks from a start time until the next block, each with up to 6 pages or bitmaps that rotate (each for its own time, 5 s to 1 hour), switching with the refresh effect or instantly.
Rules bring a page to the front from a Home Assistant state (an entity or attribute, =,
is not, above, below): they show it while the state is true, add it to the rotation
while it is true, or show it for a while when it becomes true. Each rule is read at its own
interval (2-600 s) and can be limited to some of the blocks. The first rule that shows a
page wins. A rule can leave a page chosen by hand alone (untick "also over a page chosen by
hand"): it then waits until that pick ends (the next block or "Back to schedule"). A rule
with "show at once in slow mode" ticked brings its page right away in
slow mode, and the display works normally while that page is shown.
Pages in a block, and rules that add their page to the rotation, can be left out while slow mode is on ("skip in slow mode"). When that leaves none of a block's pages, the chosen page is shown instead. The display schedule (Settings) still decides when the display is on.
Stopwatch
Start, stop and reset the stopwatch that pages can show (also in Home Assistant). It counts in real time from its start, so it keeps counting while the display is off or restarting (it is stored in NVS), and can run for years. Stop pauses it, Start continues. Set start makes it count from a date and time you pick (e.g. days since an event). Start and Set start need the synced time.
Bitmaps
All bitmaps with a preview: show one as the page, send it live, open it in the editor, export or delete it. The built-in one (Nintendo) can't be deleted, nor can a bitmap that a page, the schedule or a rule uses. "Make icon" turns a bitmap that is only part of pages into an icon.
Icons
Small images (1 x 1 up to 84 x 19 dots, each its own size) for dynamic pages: an Image element, or a background (drawn at the top left). Icons are never shown on their own, so they are not in the page lists (Show, Schedule, rules, Home Assistant "Mode"). Each icon shows its size and the pages that use it. The editor: draw dots, change the size (the dots stay at the top left), crop to the dots, clear, invert, load an image (scaled to the icon size), show it on the display. "Make bitmap" turns an icon into a full screen bitmap. The two Pikachus of the Clock page are built into the firmware: they are stored as icons at boot and can be edited, the firmware keeps the originals.
Game of Life patterns: 17 famous patterns from LifeWiki
(glider, the three spaceships, a copperhead turned to fly sideways, the Gosper glider gun,
pulsar, pentadecathlon, queen bee shuttle, figure eight, Kok's galaxy, beacon and the
methuselahs R-pentomino, acorn, diehard, thunderbird and pi-heptomino). Add adds one as
an icon named life_..., Add all adds the missing ones. A Game of Life element starts with
one of them, or goes through all icons whose names start with life_, also the ones you
draw yourself. The patterns live in the web page (RLE text), not in the firmware.
Firmware 2.10.0 made icons of all uploaded bitmaps that only pages used (backgrounds and images, not shown by the schedule, a rule, the chosen page or the off image), once, after the new firmware was marked as good. They keep their names and land on the same dots, so the pages didn't change.
Draw / Live
Draw on an 84 x 19 canvas (click or drag), or load an image: it is converted in the browser (threshold, invert, dithering, fit / fill / stretch). "Show on display now" sends it to the display right away (live mode); with "live while drawing" every change appears on the dots. Save it as a bitmap with a name, or as an icon (only the area with dots).
Settings
The display schedule (on/off, when the display is on, when it switches off); slow mode (also a Home Assistant switch: the display only changes every 1-60 minutes, on the clock, and is switched off in between, for less noise); the "No WiFi" screen; the flip time, the pause after each pulse, pulses per dot and the refresh effect (instant, sparkle, wipe, rain, from the middle out, diagonal, spiral, flip all then reveal, push, random; optionally only for small changes like the clock's minutes; pages can choose their own effect); how often every dot is flipped again ("Dot refresh", default 2 min) and how often the whole image is sent again ("Image resync", default 10 min; 0 switches either off); test patterns; the status LED.
Home Assistant
MQTT: on/off, broker, port, user, password (changing these restarts the ESP32; an empty
broker uses secrets.h). The URL and long-lived access token for the values on dynamic
pages and the rules (REST API, plain http; empty URL: http://<broker>:8123). The Plex
user for {plex_user} in entity ids. See Home Assistant.
System
Firmware status, uptime, WiFi, storage; restart; start the recovery app.
Loop: how busy the ESP32 is: loop() passes per second and the average and longest
pass over the last 10 s (and the longest since boot; a Home Assistant request can take a
few seconds). loop() never sleeps, so a CPU percentage would always say 100 %.
Frame check: how many checks of the Nano's image matched, differed or got no answer,
how often the image was repaired, Nano restarts and ERR replies (with the last one).
Memory: free heap now and the lowest since boot.
Backup: export everything (settings, the schedule and rules, your bitmaps, icons, pages and fonts; the MQTT password and HA token only when ticked) to one JSON file, and import a file: choose which items and which parts of the settings. Imported items are added (a taken name gets a number) unless you give them an existing name. Pages, bitmaps and icons also have their own Export button, e.g. to share one page (with the bitmaps, icons and fonts it uses).
Good to know
Live mode shows the image at once, also at night or before the time is known. It ends with "Back to normal", or 30 minutes after the last image. The Home Assistant Power switch still wins: when it is off, nothing is shown.
Bitmaps, icons, pages and fonts are stored on the ESP32 (LittleFS, 320 KB; up to 200 bitmaps, 200 icons, 50 pages, 20 fonts). Pages, bitmaps and icons share their names. They need the new flash layout from the one-time installation; before that, only the built-in ones are available.
Moving pages (scrolling text, seconds, a running stopwatch) send a frame whenever the
content moves, without the refresh effect (D1, needs the Nano firmware from version
2.5.0), and only the dots that changed, not faster than the Nano can flip them: with 3
pulses and a 300 µs gap a 1-dot scroll step of a line of text takes about 0.1-0.2 s.
Settings are stored in the ESP32's NVS. The defaults are the original behaviour. There is no login: anyone on your WiFi can use the page, as with OTA.