pitrix

What is pitrix?

pitrix is a software to run on an ESP8266 microncontroller connected to a LED matrix. It will display the time and a few other nice effects and stuff.

pitrix fetches the current time via NTP, is controllable via MQTT and can be flashed over-the-air, so you don't need to disassemble your nice-looking LED matrix everytime you want to update the software.

Effects

Name	Description	Image
bell	An example for a blinking sprite. Can be used for home automation, for example.
big_clock	A big clock. Seconds are moving around the edge.
big_dynamic	Big squares appearing in sequential colors.
clock	The small clock at the bottom. Usually used by other effects to integrate a clock.
cycle	Meta effect: Cycles through some of the other effects.	-
confetti	Random pixels lighting up in sequential colors and fading out again.
dvd	The bouncing-around dvd logo we all know and love. High chance of hitting cordners because of the low resolution of the LED panel.
fire	Fireplace-like effect. Needs more tweaking.
firework	Firework-like effect. Needs more work.
gol	Conway's Game of Life.
matrix	That green effect from The Matrix.
multi_dynamic	Space is divided in 2x2 squares which are changing their color random-sequentially.
pixel_clock	A clock using single pixels to display the current time.
rainbow_matrix	Like matrix, but not just green but displaying a rainbow across the columns.
random_matrix	Like matrix, but with random colors and random directions.
sinematrix3	Colorful pastel images, slowly moving about.
single_dynamic	2x2 squares random-sequentially changing their color one after another.
snake	Snake. Without self-collision detection or AI.
twirl	A colorful twirl.

How to use

Checkout the code, rename include/config.sample.h to include/config.h and edit it to match your preferences / environment.

Then compile and flash it, preferably using PlatformIO.

Control it

Currently, control is possible via MQTT and / or HTTP REST API. To use MQTT, you have to define MQTT_ENABLE and configure your MQTT sever's credentials. MQTT_TOPICis set ininclude/config.hand defaults topitrix`.

To use the HTTP REST API, you have to define HTTP_SERVER_ENABLE and set a port number to listen on (80 is set by default).

Possible commands / topics are:

• MQTT_TOPIC/mode / POST /mode lets you select an effect to show. See src/effects.cpp for a list. Default effect is cycle, which will cycle through some of the available effects. Another effect is off, which will just display black, effectively turning the display off. (pitrix stays running, so you can turn it on again by simply selecting another mode.)
• MQTT_TOPIC/brightness / POST /brightness sets the brightness of the display. Valid values are between 1 (darkest possible setting) and 255 (maximum brightness).
• MQTT_TOPIC/reboot / POST /reboot reboots pitrix. Send any value.

You can set retained values to have pitrix read them at startup, effectively setting a default effect or brightness. (Do NOT set a retained value for MQTT_TOPIC/reboot unless you want pitrix to reboot all the time.)

Monitor it

The current status ("ONLINE" or "OFFLINE") of pitrix will be set at MQTT_TOPIC/status.

If you enabled MQTT_REPORT_METRICS, metrics are sent via MQTT every 15 seconds:

• MQTT_TOPIC/free_heap contains the free heap memory in Bytes.
• MQTT_TOPIC/uptime contains the uptime of pitrix in seconds.
• MQTT_TOPIC/fps contains the currently reached frames per second.

If you enabled HTTP server, you can always make GET requests to /free_heap, /uptime or /fps to get those values.

If you enabled DEBUG, log messages will be sent to MQTT_TOPIC/log.

Aknowledgements

Libraries

Library	Author	Link
PubSubClient	knolleary	https://pubsubclient.knolleary.net/
FastLED (with small modifications)	Daniel Garcia & Mark Kriegsman	https://fastled.io
NTPClient (with modifications)		https://github.com/arduino-libraries/NTPClient
ESP8266WebServer		https://github.com/esp8266/Arduino/tree/master/libraries/ESP8266WebServer
ESPAsyncTCP	me-no-dev	https://github.com/me-no-dev/ESPAsyncTCP

Inspirations and stuff

• This whole project was inspired by https://github.com/orithena/Arduino-LED-experiments/tree/master/Ribba16x16_v2_ESP32. The sinematrix3 effect was also taken from there.
• The firework effect was heavily inspired (aka copied) from https://gist.github.com/kriegsman/68929cbd1d6de4535b20
• The sines effect is based upon https://github.com/atuline/FastLED-Demos/blob/master/sinelon/sinelon.ino