Tutorial – Arduino and ILI9325 colour TFT LCD modules

Learn how to use inexpensive ILI9325 colour TFT LCD modules in chapter fifty of a series originally titled “Getting Started/Moving Forward with Arduino!” by John Boxall – A tutorial on the Arduino universe. The first chapter is here, the complete series is detailed here.

Introduction

Colour TFT LCD modules just keep getting cheaper, so in this tutorial we’ll show you how to get going with some of the most inexpensive modules we could find. The subject of our tutorial is a 2.8″ 240 x 320 TFT module with the ILI9325 LCD controller chip. If you look in ebay this example should appear pretty easily, here’s a photo of the front and back to help identify it:

There is also the line “HY-TFT240_262k HEYAODZ110510″ printed on the back of the module. They should cost less than US$10 plus shipping. Build quality may not be job number one at the factory so order a few, however considering the cost of something similar from other retailers it’s cheap insurance. You’ll also want sixteen male to female jumper wires to connect the module to your Arduino.

Getting started

To make life easier we’ll use an Arduino library “UTFT” written for this and other LCD modules. It has been created by Henning Karlsen and can be downloaded from his website. If you can, send him a donation – this library is well worth it. Once you’ve downloaded and installed the UTFT library, the next step is to wire up the LCD for a test.

Run a jumper from the following LCD module pins to your Arduino Uno (or compatible):

• DB0 to DB7 > Arduino D0 to D7 respectively
• RD > 3.3 V
• RSET > A2
• CS > A3
• RW > A4
• RS > A5
• backlight 5V > 5V
• backlight GND > GND

Then upload the following sketch – Example 50.1. You should be presented with the following on your display:

If you’re curious, the LCD module and my Eleven board draws 225 mA of current. If that didn’t work for you, double-check the wiring against the list provided earlier. Now we’ll move forward and learn how to display text and graphics.

Sketch preparation

You will always need the following before void setup():

#include "UTFT.h"

UTFT myGLCD(ILI9325C,19,18,17,16); // for Arduino Uno

and in void setup():

myGLCD.InitLCD(orientation); 
myGLCD.clrScr();

with the former command, change orientation to either LANDSCAPE to PORTRAIT depending on how you’ll view the screen. You may need further commands however these are specific to features that will be described below. The function .clrScr() will clear the screen.

Displaying Text

There are three different fonts available with the library. To use them add the following three lines before void setup():

extern uint8_t SmallFont[];
extern uint8_t BigFont[];
extern uint8_t SevenSegNumFont[];

When displaying text you’ll need to define the foreground and background colours with the following:

myGLCD.setColor(red, green, blue); 
myGLCD.setBackColor(red, green, blue);

Where red, green and blue are values between zero and 255. So if you want white use 255,255,255 etc. For some named colours and their RGB values, click here. To select the required font, use one of the following:

  myGLCD.setFont(SmallFont); // Allows 20 rows of 40 characters

  myGLCD.setFont(BigFont); // Allows 15 rows of 20 characters

  myGLCD.setFont(SevenSegNumFont); // allows display of 0 to 9 over four rows

Now to display the text use the function:

 myGLCD.print("text to display",x, y);

where text is what you’d like to display, x is the horizontal alignment (LEFT, CENTER, RIGHT) or position in pixels from the left-hand side of the screen and y is the starting point of the top-left of the text. For example, to start at the top-left of the display y would be zero. You can also display a string variable instead of text in inverted commas.

You can see all this in action with the following sketch – Example 50.2, which is demonstrated in the following video:

Furthremore, you can also specify the angle of display, which gives a simple way of displaying text on different slopes. Simply add the angle as an extra parameter at the end:

  myGLCD.print(“Hello, world”, 20, 20, angle);

Again, see the following sketch – Example 50.2a, and the results below:

Displaying Numbers

Although you can display numbers with the text functions explained previously, there are two functions specifically for displaying integers and floats.

You can see these functions in action with the following sketch – Example 50.3, with an example of the results below:

Displaying Graphics

There’s a few graphic functions that can be used to create required images. The first is:

myGLCD.fillScr(red, green, blue);

which is used the fill the screen with a certain colour. The next simply draws a pixel at a specified x,y location:

myGLCD.drawPixel(x,y);

Remember that the top-left of the screen is 0,0. Moving on, to draw a single line, use:

myGLCD.drawLine(x1,0,x2,239);

where the line starts at x1,y1 and finishes at x2,y2. Need a rectangle? Use:

myGLCD.drawRect(x1,y2,x2,y2); // for open rectangles

myGLCD.fillRect(x1,y2,x2,y2); // for filled rectangles

where the top-left of the rectangle is x1,y1 and the bottom-right is x2, y2. You can also have rectangles with rounded corners, just use:

myGLCD.drawRoundRect(x1,y2,x2,y2); // for open rectangles

myGLCD.fillRoundRect(x1,y2,x2,y2); // for filled rectangles

instead. And finally, circles – which are quite easy. Just use:

myGLCD.drawCircle(x,y,r); // draws open circle
myGLCD.fillCircle(x,y,r); // draws a filled circle

where x,y are the coordinates for the centre of the circle, and r is the radius. For a quick demonstration of all the graphic functions mentioned so far, see Example 50.4 – and the following video:

Displaying bitmap images

If you already have an image in .gif, .jpg or .png format that’s less than 300 KB in size, this can be displayed on the LCD. To do so, the file needs to be converted to an array which is inserted into your sketch. Let’s work with a simple example to explain the process. Below is our example image:

Save the image of the puppy somewhere convenient, then visit this page. Select the downloaded file, and select the .c and Arduino radio buttons, then click “make file”. After a moment or two a new file will start downloading. When it arrives, open it with a text editor – you’ll see it contains a huge array and another #include statement – for example:

Past the #include statement and the array into your sketch above void setup(). After doing that, don’t be tempted to “autoformat” the sketch in the Arduino IDE. Now you can use the following function to display the bitmap on the LCD:

myGLCD.drawBitmap(x,y,width,height, name, scale);

Where x and y are the top-left coordinates of the image, width and height are the … width and height of the image, and name is the name of the array. Scale is optional – you can double the size of the image with this parameter. For example a value of two will double the size, three triples it – etc. The function uses simple interpolation to enlarge the image, and can be a clever way of displaying larger images without using extra memory. Finally, you can also display the bitmap on an angle – using:

myGLCD.drawBitmap(x,y,width,height, name, angle, cx, cy);

where angle is the angle of rotation and cx/cy are the coordinates for the rotational centre of the image.

The bitmap functions using the example image have been used in the following sketch – Example 50.5, with the results in the following video:

Unfortunately the camera doesn’t really do the screen justice, it looks much better with the naked eye.

Running out of space or I/O? Use an Arduino Mega

By now you may have noticed that the library for the LCDs uses up a fair amount of memory, which could be a problem. And using bitmaps eats up memory as well.  And the I/O requirements are quite heavy. The solution is to use an Arduino Mega or compatible board – as they have up to eight times the sketch memory available. However the wiring is a little different – so when using a Mega, run a jumper from the following LCD module pins to your Mega (or compatible):

• DB0 to DB7 > Mega D22 to D29 respectively
• RD > 3.3 V
• RSET > D41
• CS > D40
• RW > D39
• RS > D38
• backlight 5V > 5V
• backlight GND > GND

You will also need to change the line

UTFT myGLCD(ILI9325C,19,18,17,16);  // for Uno

to

UTFT myGLCD(ILI9325C,38,39,40,41);  // for Mega

What about the SD card socket and touch screen?

The SD socket didn’t work, and I won’t be working with the touch screen at this time.

Conclusion

So there you have it – an incredibly inexpensive and possibly useful LCD module. Thank you to Henning Karlsen for his useful library, and if you found it useful – send him a donation via his page.

In the meanwhile have fun and keep checking into tronixstuff.com. Why not follow things on twitter, Google+, subscribe  for email updates or RSS using the links on the right-hand column? And join our friendly Google Group – dedicated to the projects and related items on this website. Sign up – it’s free, helpful to each other –  and we can all learn something.

Review – LBE “Magpie” Arduino-compatible board

In this article we review the “Magpie” Arduino Uno-compatible board from Little Bird Electronics.

Introduction

Finally I’m back at the office and have a pile of things to write about. Starting with the subject of this review – the “Magpie” board from Little Bird Electronics in Australia. It seems that a new Arduino-compatible board enters the market every week, thanks to the open-source nature of the platform and the availability of rapid manufacturing. However the Magpie isn’t just any old Arduino Uno knock-off, it has something which helps it stand out from the crowd – status LEDs on every digital and analogue I/O pin. You can see them between the stacking header sockets and the silk-screen labels. For example:

and for the curious, the bottom of the Magpie:

At first glance you might think “why’d they bother doing that? I could just wire up some LEDs myself”. True. However having them on the board speeds up the debugging process as you can see when an output is HIGH or LOW – and in the case of an input pin, whether a current is present or not. For the curious the LEDs are each controlled by a 2N7002 MOSFET with the gate connected to the I/O pin, for example:

An LED will illuminate as long as the gate voltage is higher than the threshold voltage – no matter the status of the particular I/O pin. And if an I/O pin is left floating it may trigger the LED if the threshold voltage is exceeded at the gate. Therefore when using the Magpie it would be a good idea to set all the pins to LOW that aren’t required for your particular sketch. Even if you remove and reapply power the floating will still be prevalent, and indicated visually – for example:

Nevertheless you can sort that out in void setup(), and then the benefits of the LEDs become apparent. Consider the following quick demonstration sketch:

// LBE Magpie board LED demo - John Boxall 18 March 2013
// usual blink delay period
int d=100;
void setup()
{
 // digital pins to outputs
 for (int a=0; a<14; a++)
 {
 pinMode(a, OUTPUT);
 }
 pinMode(A0, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(A1, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(A2, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(A3, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(A4, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(A5, OUTPUT); 
}
void allOn()
// all LEDs on
{
 for (int a=0; a<14; a++)
 {
 digitalWrite(a, HIGH);
 }
 digitalWrite(A0, HIGH);
 digitalWrite(A1, HIGH);
 digitalWrite(A2, HIGH);
 digitalWrite(A3, HIGH);
 digitalWrite(A4, HIGH);
 digitalWrite(A5, HIGH);
}
void allOff()
// all LEDs on
{
 for (int a=0; a<14; a++)
 {
 digitalWrite(a, LOW);
 }
 digitalWrite(A0, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A1, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A2, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A3, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A4, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A5, LOW);
}
void clockWise(int r, int s)
// blinks on and off each LED clockwise
// r - # rotations, s - blink delay 
{
 allOff();
 for (int a=0; a<r; a++)
 {
 for (int b=13; b>=0; --b)
 {
 digitalWrite(b, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(b, LOW);
 }
 digitalWrite(A5, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A5, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A4, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A4, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A3, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A3, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A2, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A2, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A1, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A1, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A0, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A0, LOW);
 delay(s);
 }
}
void anticlockWise(int r, int s)
// blinks on and off each LED anticlockwise
// r - # rotations, s - blink delay 
{
 allOff();
 for (int a=0; a<r; a++)
 {
 for (int b=0; b<14; b++)
 {
 digitalWrite(b, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(b, LOW);
 }
 digitalWrite(A0, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A0, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A1, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A1, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A2, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A2, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A3, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A3, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A4, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A4, LOW);
 digitalWrite(A5, HIGH);
 delay(s);
 digitalWrite(A5, LOW);
 delay(s);
 }
}
void loop()
{
 anticlockWise(3,50);
 clockWise(3,50);
 for (int z=0; z<4; z++)
 {
 allOn();
 delay(100);
 allOff();
 delay(100);
 }
}

… and the results are demonstrated in the following video:

Apart from the LEDs the Magpie offers identical function to that of an Arduino Uno R2 – except the USB microcontroller is an Atmel 16U2 instead of an 8U2, and the USB socket is a mini-USB and not the full-size type.  For the curious you can download the Magpie design files from the product page.

Conclusion

If you’re often experimenting or working with the Arduino’s I/O pins and find yourself wiring up LEDs for testing purposes – the Magpie was made for you. Having those LEDs on the board really does save you if in a hurry to test or check something.

In the meanwhile have fun and keep checking into tronixstuff.com. Why not follow things on twitter, Google+, subscribe  for email updates or RSS using the links on the right-hand column? And join our friendly Google Group – dedicated to the projects and related items on this website. Sign up – it’s free, helpful to each other –  and we can all learn something.

 The Magpie board used in this article was a promotional consideration supplied by Little Bird Electronics.

Introducing Goldilocks – the Arduino Uno-compatible with 1284p and uSD card

[Update 19/03/2013 - the project is now fully funded. When the boards arrive we'll do a full review]

Introduction

It’s a solid fact that there are quite a few variations on the typical Arduino Uno-compatible board. You can get them with onboard wireless, GSM, Zigbee and more – however all with their own issues and specific purposes. But what if you wanted a board that was physically and electrically compatible with an Arduino Uno – but with much more SRAM, more EEPROM, more flash, more speed – and then some? Well that (hopefully) will be a possibility with the introduction of the “Goldilocks” board on Pozible by Phillip Stevens.

What’s Pozible?

Pozible is the Australian version of Kickstarter. However just like KS anyone with a credit card or PayPal can pledge and support projects.

What’s a Goldilocks board?

It’s a board based around the Atmel ATmega1284p microcontroller in an Arduino Uno-compatible physical board with a microSD card socket and a few extras. The use of the ’1284p gives us the following advantages over the Arduino Uno, including:

• 16 kByte SRAM = 8x Uno SRAM – so that’s much more space for variables used in sketches – great for applications that use larger frame buffers such as Ethernet and image work;
  
• 2 kByte EEPROM = 2 x Uno EEPROM – giving you more space for non-volatile data storage on the main board;
• 128 kByte flash memory = 4 x Uno – giving you much, much more room for those larger sketches;
• Two programmable USARTS – in other words, two hardware serial ports – no mucking about with SoftwareSerial and GSM or GPS shields;
• Timer 3 – the ’1284p microcontroller has an extra 16-bit timer – timer 3, that is not present on any other ATmega microcontroller. Timer 3 does not have PWM outputs (unlike Timer 0, Timer 1, and Timer 2), and therefore is free to use as a powerful internal Tick counter, for example in a RTOS. freeRTOS has already been modified to utilise this Timer 3;
• JTAG interface – yes – allowing more advanced developers the opportunity to debug their code;
• better PWM access – the 1284p brings additional 8-bit Timer 2 PWM outputs onto PD, which creates the option for 2 additional PWM options on this port. It also removes the sharing of the important 16-bit PWM pins with the SPI interface, by moving them to PD4 & PD5, thus simplifying interface assignments;
• Extra I/O pins – the 1284p has additional digital I/O pins on the PB port. These pins could be utilised for on-board Slave Select pins (for example), without stealing on-header digital pins and freeing the Arduino Pin 10 for Shield SPI SS use exclusively;

Furthermore the following design improvements over an Arduino Uno:

• adding through-holes for all I/O – allowing you to solder directly onto the board whilst keeping header sockets;
• replicate SPI and I2C for ease of use;
• microSD card socket – that’s a no-brainer;
• link the ATmega16u2 and ATmega1284p SPI interfaces – this will allow the two devices to work in concert for demanding multi-processing applications, involving USB and other peripherals;
• Fully independent analogue pins, including seperate AVCC and GND – helps reduce noise on the ADC channels for improved analogue measurement accuracy;
• move the reset button to the edge of the board – another no-brainer
• clock the board at 20 MHz – that’s an extra 4 MHz over a Uno. And the use of a through hole precision crystal (not a SMD resonator) allows the use of after market timing choices, eg 22.1184 MHz for more accurate UART timings.

What does it look like? 

At the moment the board mock-up looks like this:

If funding is successful (and we hope it will be) the Goldilocks will be manufactured by the team at Freetronics. Apart from being a world-leader in Arduino-compatible hardware and systems, they’re the people behind the hardware for Ardusat and more – so we know the Goldilocks will be in good hands.

Will it really be compatible?

Yes – the Goldilocks will be shipped pre-programmed with an Arduino compatible boot-loader, and the necessary Board description files will be available to provide a 100% compatible Arduino IDE experience.

Conclusion

If you think this kind of board would be useful in your projects, you want to support a good project – or both, head over to Pozible and make your pledge. And for the record – I’ve put my money where my mouth is

Please note that I’m not involved in nor responsible for the Goldilocks project, however I’m happy to promote it as a worthwhile endeavour. In the meanwhile have fun and keep checking into tronixstuff.com. Why not follow things on twitter, Google+, subscribe  for email updates or RSS using the links on the right-hand column? And join our friendly Google Group – dedicated to the projects and related items on this website. Sign up – it’s free, helpful to each other –  and we can all learn something.

Review: GorillaBuilderz LeoShield

Introduction

Some of you may be using an Arduino Leonardo board, taking advantage of the newer ATmega32U4 microcontroller for various reasons. And rightly so – there’s the extra analogue I/O, virtual USB and the microUSB socket so you can use your phone charger cable. However with the new microcontroller comes a few changes to the board pinouts – I2C and SPI have moved. So if you have a nice Ethernet shield or something using I2C – you’re basically out of luck… until now. The problem has been solved nicely by the team at GorillaBuilderz have created their LeoShield:

Use

You simply place it on the Leonardo, and then the older legacy shield on top. The LeoShield redirects the I2C pins back to A4 and A5, and also sends the SPI lines back to D11~D13. For example, our Ethernet shield:

The ICSP pins are also extended from the Leonardo to the LeoShield, for example:

however when inserting the LeoShield into your Leonardo, take care lining up all the pins before pushing the shield down. There is also the large prototyping area which has 5V , 3.3V and GND rails across the full width for convenience. The sticker on the rear of the shield is to insulate against any large items that may come in contact from the host board, however you can peel it off to realise the complete prototyping space.

Conclusion

It’s simple and it works – so if you need to use an older Arduino shield with a Leonardo the choice is simple – get yourself a Leoshield.

Disclaimer - The Leoshield was a review product received from GorillaBuilderz.

Thanks for reading tronixstuff.com. I’ve got some new tutorials coming up very soon, and a lot of existing posts are curently being updated – so follow things on twitter, Google+, subscribe  for email updates or RSS using the links on the right-hand column. And join our friendly Google Group – dedicated to the projects and related items on this website. Sign up – it’s free, helpful to each other –  and we can all learn

First Look – the Arduino Leonardo

Introduction

Recently the Arduino Leonardo was released, and I’ve finally got my hands on one. Some have claimed that the Leonardo as the successor to the Arduino Uno board, however that is somewhat subjective.  In this article we have a look for ourselves and examine the differences between the Uno boards that we’re used to and the new Leonardo.

The board

Here it is unwrapped from the cardboard packet:

It uses the same physical footprint as the Uno, so no surprises there:

 Now to travel around the board and see what’s new. First is the microcontroller – we have the Atmel ATmega32U4:

There are several pros and cons to using the 32U4. The pros include:

• More analogue inputs. As well as the usual A0~A5, digital pins 4,6,8,9,10 and 12 can be configured as A6~A11
• It handles USB. So no more external USB controller MCU or the old FTDI chip. Supposedly this saves money, however the retail price in some markets don’t reflect this
• More PWM pins – well one more. They’re now on D3, 5, 6, 9, 10, 11 and 13
• There is a little more SRAM than the Uno, it is now 2.5 kB
• SPI has moved – they’re now wired to the ICSP pins. So you now have D10~D13 seperate to SPI

And the cons:

• SPI has moved – they’re now wired to the ICSP pins. So if you have any shields that use SPI – too bad, they’re out. The most common example of this will be Ethernet shields – you’ll need to modify them with some jumper leads to contact the ICSP pins
• I2C has moved over to D2+3. So if you have any shields using I2C – they’ll need to be modified
• Less flash memory – the bootloader uses 4 kB of the 32 kB flash (the Uno used 0.5 kB)

However you can get an adaptor shield to use older Arduino shields with the Leonardo.

For MCU to Arduino pin mapping, see here. Next, for more on the USB side of things – as the 32U4 takes care of USB – take heed of the following notes from arduino.cc:

Since the Leonardo does not have a dedicated chip to handle serial communication, it means that the serial port is virtual– it’s a software routine, both on your operating system, and on the Leonardo itself. Just as your computer creates an instance of the serial port driver when you plug in any Arduino, the Leonardo creates a serial instance whenever it runs its bootloader. The Leonardo is an instance of USB’s Connected Device Class (CDC) driver.

This means that every time you reset the board, the Leonardo’s USB serial connection will be broken and re-established. The Leonardo will disappear from the list of serial ports, and the list will re-enumerate. Any program that has an open serial connection to the Leonardo will lose its connection. This is in contrast to the Arduino Uno, with which you can reset the main processor (the ATmega328P) without closing the USB connection (which is maintained by the secondaryATmega8U2 or ATmega16U2 processor).

There are some other changes to the board. Moving on, the next change is the USB socket. Do you recognise this socket?

Yes – micro USB. Thankfully (!) a growing number of mobile phones use this type for charging and USB connection, so you may already have a matching cable. Note that the Leonardo doesn’t include a cable, so if you’re an iPhone user – order yourself a cable with your Leonardo.

Next, the LEDs have been moved to the edge of the board. You can see them in the above image to the right of the USB socket. No more squinting through shields at strange angles to check the TX/RX lights. However this isn’t a new invention, our friends at Freetronics have been doing this for some time. Furthermore, the reset button has been moved to the corner for easier access.

There are also seperate connectors for the I2C bus – next to AREF, which should make modifying existing shields a little easier:

 Finally, due to the reduction in components and shift to SMD – there is what could almost be called a large waste of space on the board:

A few extra user LEDs wouldn’t have been a bad idea, or perhaps circuitry to support Li-Po rechargeable batteries. However the argument will be “that’s what a protoshield is for”. Just saying… As for the rest of the hardware, the specifications can be found here.

Finally, the Leonardo is available in two versions – with and without headers. This makes it easier to embed the Leonardo into fixed applications as you can directly solder to the various I/O pins. An alternative to this would instead be the Freetronics LeoStick, as it is much smaller yet fully compatible.

Software

First – you need to drag yourself into Arduino IDE v1.0.1. Note you can run more than one version of the IDE on the same machine if you don’t mind sharing the same preferences file. Next, the Leonardo doesn’t reset when you open the serial monitor window (from arduino.cc) -

That means you won’t see serial data that’s already been sent to the computer by the board, including, for example, most data sent in the setup() function. This change means that if you’re using any Serial print(), println() or write() statments in your setup, they won’t show up when you open the serial monitor. To work around this, you can check to see if the serial port is open like so:

 // while the serial stream is not open, do nothing:

   while (!Serial) ;

Using the 32U4, you also have two serial ports. The first is the emulated one via the USB, and the second is the hardware UART on digital pins 0 and 1. Furthermore, the Leonardo can emulate a USB keyboard and mouse – however with a few caveats. There is a section on the Leonardo homepage that you should really read and take note of. But this emulation does sound interesting, and we look forward to developing some interesting tools to take use of them, so stay tuned.

Conclusion

There is nothing wrong with the Leonardo board, it works as described. However you could consider this a virtual “line in the sand”, or a new beginning. Due to the changes in the pinouts shields will need to be redesigned, and for those of you still programming in Arduino v23 – it’s time to get up to speed with v1.0.1. If you need the special USB functions, keyboard and/or mouse emulation, or are happy with the changes and can get one for less than the cost of a Uno – great.

Here’s a video from the main man Massimo Banzi:

However if you’re looking for your first Arduino board – this isn’t the board for you right now. There are too many incompatible shields out there, and the inability to cheaply replace the microcontroller will see some beginners burn out their first couple of boards rendering them useless. Get yourself an Arduino Uno or compatible board such as the Freetronics Eleven.

In conclusion, classifying the Leonardo board as good or bad is not a simple decision. It may or may not be an improvement – depending on your needs. Right now – for beginners, this is not the board for you. For those who understand the differences between a Uno and Leonardo, sure – no problem. Frankly, I would get a LeoStick instead.  At the end – it’s up to you to make an informed decision.

If you have any comments, leave them below. Thanks to Little Bird Electronics for the use of the Arduino Leonardo board.

In the meanwhile have fun and keep checking into tronixstuff.com. Why not follow things on twitter, Google+, subscribe  for email updates or RSS using the links on the right-hand column? And join our friendly Google Group – dedicated to the projects and related items on this website. Sign up – it’s free, helpful to each other –  and we can all learn something.

Arduino and FFD51 Incandescent Displays

In this article we examine another style of vintage display technology – the incandescent seven-segment digital display. We are using the FFD51 by the IEE company (data sheet.pdf) – dating back to the early 1970s. Here is a close-up of our example:

You can see the filaments for each of the segments, as well as the small coiled ‘decimal point’ filament at the top-right of the image above.  This model has pins in a typical DIP format, making use in a solderless breadboard or integration into a PCB very simple:

It operates in a similar manner to a normal light bulb – the filaments are in a vacuum, and when a current is applied the filament glows nicely. The benefit of using such as display is their brightness – they could be read in direct sunlight, as well as looking good inside.  At five volts each segment draws around 30mA. For demonstration purposes I have been running them at a lower voltage (3.5~4V), as they are old and I don’t want to accidentally burn out any of the elements. Using these with an Arduino is very easy as they segments can be driven from a 74HC595 shift register using logic from Arduino digital out pins. (If you are unfamiliar with doing so, please read chapters four and five of my tutorial series). For my first round of experimenting, a solderless breadboard was used, along with the usual Freetronics board and some shift register modules:

Although the modules are larger than a DIP 74HC595, I like to use these instead. Once you solder in the header pins they are easier to insert and remove from breadboards, have the pinouts labelled clearly, are almost impossible to physically damage, have a 100nF capacitor for smoothing and a nice blue LED indicating power is applied.

Moving forward – using four shift register modules and displays, a simple four-digit circuit can be created. Note from the datasheet that all the common pins need to be connected together to GND. Otherwise you can just connect the outputs from the shift register (Q0~Q7) directly to the display’s a~dp pins.

Some of you may be thinking “Oh at 30mA a pin, you’re exceeding the limits of the 74HC595!”… well yes, we are. However after several hours they still worked fine and without any heat build-up. However if you displayed all eight segments continuously there may be some issues. So take care. As mentioned earlier we ran the displays at a lower voltage (3.5~4V) and they still displayed nicely. Furthermore at the lower voltage the entire circuit including the Arduino-compatible board used less than 730mA with all segments on –  for example:

 For the non-believers, here is the circuit in action:

Here is the Arduino sketch for the demonstration above (download):

// IED FF1 incandescent display demonstration
// using four displays connected to four 74HC595s

int clockPin = 7;
int latchPin = 8;
int dataPin = 9;
int dd=400;

// array for anodes (to display 0~9)
// the bits represent segments a~dp from left to right
// if you add one to the number (or turn on the last bit) the decimal point turns on
byte numbers[]={
 B11111100, // digit zero
 B01100000,
 B11011010,
 B11110010,
 B01100110,
 B10110110,
 B10111110,
 B11100000,
 B11111110,
 B11110110}; // digit nine

void setup()
{
 pinMode(clockPin, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(latchPin, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(dataPin, OUTPUT);
}

void allOn()
// turns on all segments of all displays. Used for testing
{
 digitalWrite(latchPin, LOW);
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, 255); // digit 4 
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, 255); // digit 3 
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, 255); // digit 2
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, 255); // digit 1
 digitalWrite(latchPin, HIGH);
}

void clearDigits()
{
 digitalWrite(latchPin, LOW);
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, 0);
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, 0); 
 digitalWrite(latchPin, HIGH);
}

void loop()
{ 
 for (int a=0; a<10; a++)
 {
 digitalWrite(latchPin, LOW);
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[a]); // digit 4 (add 1 for decimal point)
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[a]); // digit 3 
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[a]); // digit 2
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[a]); // digit 1
 digitalWrite(latchPin, HIGH);
 delay(dd);
 }

for (int a=0; a<10; a++)
 {
 digitalWrite(latchPin, LOW);
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[a]+1); // digit 4 (add 1 for decimal point)
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[a]+1); // digit 3 
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[a]+1); // digit 2
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[a]+1); // digit 1
 digitalWrite(latchPin, HIGH);
 delay(dd);
 }
}

Now for the prototype of something more useful – another clock. Time to once again pull out my Arduino-compatible board with onboard DS1307 real-time clock. For more information on the RTC IC and getting time data with an Arduino please visit chapter twenty of my tutorials. For this example we will use the first two digits for the hours, and the last two digits for minutes. The display will then rotate to showing the numerical day and month of the year – then repeat.

Operation is simple – just get the time from the DS1307, then place the four digits in an array. The elements of the array are then sent in reverse order to the shift registers. The procedure is repeated for the date. Anyhow, here is the sketch (download):

#include "Wire.h"
#define DS1307_I2C_ADDRESS 0x68

// note the digital pins of the arduino that are connected to the nixie driver
int clockPin = 7;
int latchPin = 8;
int dataPin = 9;

int clockArray[5]; // holds the digits to display
int a=0;

// the bits represent segments a~dp from left to right
// if you add one to the number (or turn on the last bit) the decimal point turns on
byte numbers[]={
 B11111100, // digit zero
 B01100000,
 B11011010,
 B11110010,
 B01100110,
 B10110110,
 B10111110,
 B11100000,
 B11111110,
 B11110110}; // digit nine

// Convert normal decimal numbers to binary coded decimal
byte decToBcd(byte val)
{
 return ( (val/10*16) + (val%10) );
}

// Convert binary coded decimal to normal decimal numbers
byte bcdToDec(byte val)
{
 return ( (val/16*10) + (val%16) );
}

void setDateDs1307(byte second, // 0-59
byte minute, // 0-59
byte hour, // 1-23
byte dayOfWeek, // 1-7
byte dayOfMonth, // 1-28/29/30/31
byte month, // 1-12
byte year) // 0-99
{
 Wire.beginTransmission(DS1307_I2C_ADDRESS);
 Wire.send(0);
 Wire.send(decToBcd(second)); // 0 to bit 7 starts the clock
 Wire.send(decToBcd(minute));
 Wire.send(decToBcd(hour)); 
 Wire.send(decToBcd(dayOfWeek));
 Wire.send(decToBcd(dayOfMonth));
 Wire.send(decToBcd(month));
 Wire.send(decToBcd(year));
 Wire.send(0x10); // sends 0x10 (hex) 00010000 (binary) to control register - turns on square wave
 Wire.endTransmission();
}

// Gets the date and time from the ds1307
void getDateDs1307(byte *second,
byte *minute,
byte *hour,
byte *dayOfWeek,
byte *dayOfMonth,
byte *month,
byte *year)
{
 // Reset the register pointer
 Wire.beginTransmission(DS1307_I2C_ADDRESS);
 Wire.send(0);
 Wire.endTransmission();
 Wire.requestFrom(DS1307_I2C_ADDRESS, 7);
 // A few of these need masks because certain bits are control bits
 *second = bcdToDec(Wire.receive() & 0x7f);
 *minute = bcdToDec(Wire.receive());
 *hour = bcdToDec(Wire.receive() & 0x3f); // Need to change this if 12 hour am/pm
 *dayOfWeek = bcdToDec(Wire.receive());
 *dayOfMonth = bcdToDec(Wire.receive());
 *month = bcdToDec(Wire.receive());
 *year = bcdToDec(Wire.receive());
}

void setup()
{
 byte second, minute, hour, dayOfWeek, dayOfMonth, month, year;
 pinMode(latchPin, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(clockPin, OUTPUT);
 pinMode(dataPin, OUTPUT);
 Wire.begin();

// Change these values to what you want to set your clock to.
 // You probably only want to set your clock once and then remove
 // the setDateDs1307 call.

second = 00;
 minute = 35;
 hour = 17;
 dayOfWeek = 5;
 dayOfMonth = 29;
 month = 4;
 year = 12;
 // setDateDs1307(second, minute, hour, dayOfWeek, dayOfMonth, month, year);
}

void showTime()
{
 byte second, minute, hour, dayOfWeek, dayOfMonth, month, year;
 getDateDs1307(&second, &minute, &hour, &dayOfWeek, &dayOfMonth, &month, &year);

 if (hour<10)
 {
 clockArray[1]=0;
 clockArray[2]=hour;
 }
 if (hour>9)
 {
 clockArray[1]=int(hour/10);
 clockArray[2]=hour%10;
 } 
 if (minute<10)
 {
 clockArray[3]=0;
 clockArray[4]=minute;
 }
 if (minute>9)
 {
 clockArray[3]=int(minute/10);
 clockArray[4]=minute%10;
 }
 displayArray();
}

void showDate()
{
 byte second, minute, hour, dayOfWeek, dayOfMonth, month, year;
 getDateDs1307(&second, &minute, &hour, &dayOfWeek, &dayOfMonth, &month, &year);

 if (dayOfMonth<10)
 {
 clockArray[1]=0;
 clockArray[2]=dayOfMonth;
 }
 if (dayOfMonth>10)
 {
 clockArray[1]=int(dayOfMonth/10);
 clockArray[2]=dayOfMonth%10;
 }
 if (month<10)
 {
 clockArray[3]=0;
 clockArray[4]=month;
 }
 if (month>10)
 {
 clockArray[3]=int(month/10);
 clockArray[4]=month%10;
 }
 displayArray();
}

void displayArray()
// sends the data from clockArray[] to the shift registers
{
 digitalWrite(latchPin, LOW);
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[clockArray[4]]); // digit 4 
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[clockArray[3]]); // digit 3 
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[clockArray[2]]+1); // digit 2 and decimal point
 shiftOut(dataPin, clockPin, LSBFIRST, numbers[clockArray[1]]); // digit 1
 digitalWrite(latchPin, HIGH);
}

void loop()
{
 showTime(); // display the time 
 delay(5000);
 showDate(); // display the date (day and month) for two seconds
 delay(2000);
}

and the clock in action:

So there you have it – another older style of technology dragged into the 21st century. If you enjoyed this article you may also like to read about vintage HP LED displays. Once again, I hope you found this article of interest. Thanks to the Vintage Technology Association website for background information.

Have fun and keep checking into tronixstuff.com. Why not follow things on twitter, Google+, subscribe  for email updates or RSS using the links on the right-hand column, or join our Google Group – dedicated to the projects and related items on this website. Sign up – it’s free, helpful to each other –  and we can all learn something.

Results – January 2012 Competition

Hello Readers

The January 2012 competition has now closed. For the curious, the questions and answers were:

Q – What does the acronym PWM mean?
A – Pulse-width modulation

Q – How many LEDs are contained in the Freetronics DMD?
A – 512

Q – How many digital I/O pins on an Arduino Mega2560?
A – 54

Q – What type of processor core does the PIC32 (from the Uno32 review) use?
A – MIPS (or to be more precise, 32-bit MIPS M4K Core)

Congratulations to Jack M. from the interesting state of South Australia! Jack has won the following prizes:

One v1.0 Akafugu Akafuino-X board as reviewed recently:

Jack’s Akafuino-X will have a companion on its journey which will be the Mayhew Labs “Go Between” Shield, as reviewed recently:

Thanks to Akafugu for offering the Akafuino-X prize!

The February 2012 competition will be announced soon, so in the meanwhile have fun and follow things on twitter, Google+, subscribe  for email updates or RSS using the links on the right-hand column, or join our Google Group – dedicated to the projects and related items on this website. Sign up – it’s free, helpful to each other –  and we can all learn something.

January 2012 Competition

Hello Readers

The competition has now ended and the winning entry will be announced shortly. Thank you to all those who entered, and of course to Akafugu for their prize this month.

It’s that time of the month again so we are running another competition. Our prize for this month consists of two items:

One v1.0 Akafugu Akafuino-X board as reviewed recently:

The winner’s Akafuino-X will have a companion on its journey which will be the Mayhew Labs “Go Between” Shield, as reviewed recently:

— *** How to Enter *** —

There will be four questions for you to answer spread across articles published between the 1st and 31st of January. So you will need to review older posts. At the end of January and once you have answers to all four questions, email the answers along with your full name, email address and postal address to competition at tronixstuff dot com with the subject heading January.

During the second week of February, all the correct entries will be collated and one randomly chosen. The first correct entry drawn will win the prize. Entries will be accepted until 03/02/2012 0005h GMT.

As with any other competition, there needs to be some rules:

• Incomplete entries will be rejected, so follow the instructions!
• The winners’ first name and country will be announced publicly;
• Entries that contain text not suitable for minors or insulting to the competition will be rejected (seriously – it happens);
• Prizes will be delivered via Australia Post domestic or regular international air mail. We take absolutely no responsibility for packages that go missing or do not arrive. If you live in an area with a “less than reliable” domestic postage system, you can pay for registered mail or other delivery service at your expense.
• Winners outside of Australia will be responsible for any taxes, fees or levies imposed by your local Governments (such as import levies, excise, VAT, etc.) upon importation of purchased goods;
• Prizes may take up to 45 days to be received;
• No disputes will be entered in to;
• Prizes carry no warranty nor guarantee – and are to be used or abused at entirely your own risk;
• Entries will be accepted until 03/02/2012 0005h GMT.

Thanks to Akafugu for offering the Akafuino-X prize!

So have fun and keep an eye out for the four competition questions spread through the January posts… In the meanwhile, follow things on twitter, Google+, subscribe  for email updates or RSS using the links on the right-hand column, or join our Google Group – dedicated to the projects and related items on this website. Sign up – it’s free, helpful to each other –  and we can all learn something.

Initial Review: Akafuino-X Microcontroller Board

Hello Readers

Time to get back to work for 2012 and in doing so we review another interesting product from a new company based in Japan – akafugu. From their website:

Akafugu Corporation is a small electronics company that operates out of Tokyo, Japan. We specialize in fun and easy to use electronic gadgets. Our goal is to provide products that not only make prototyping faster and easier, but are also perfect for incorporation in finalized products.

And with this in mind we examine the Akafuino-X microcontroller board:

The observant among you will notice the similarity to our usual Arduino Uno and compatible boards. However there are some differences which bring changes and improvements over the original Arduino design. The biggest point of difference is the microcontroller, the Akafuino uses an Atmel XMega32A4. The benefit of this over the normal ATmega328 is:

• Speed! 32 MHz – twice as fast as the ATmega328;
• Two-channel DAC (digital to analogue) converter – output analogue signals between 0V and Vcc straight from the board. A library is included with the new IDE to control them. The DAC uses digital pins seven and eight;
• Not one, two or even four, but five UARTs;
• Two I2C buses;
• Sixteen PWM pins – great for LED effects…

Thankfully the designers have detailed the extra I/O pins and other useful information on the rear of the board:

Other changes include:

• It’s a 3.3V board – so no 5V supply for you. However the inputs are tolerant to 5V;
• On-board real time clock. You can also add an optional 32.768 kHz crystal to increase accuracy – see the space on the board near the reset pin;
• A very refreshing red colour (note that ‘aka(i)’ ** is red in Japanese) and a happy puffer fish (‘fugu’) on the silk-screening
• And libraries for other Akafugu products such as the TWI Display module are available.

Getting started is easy, however due to the difference in hardware the Arduino IDE needs modification. But don’t panic – instead of modifying your existing v1.0 Arduino IDE – download and install the Akafuino-X version from here and run your usual and the Akauino-X IDE on the same machine (it’s ok to do this). You should also review the usage instructions here and note that this is a derivative of the v1.0 IDE. Furthermore at the time of writing the software side of things is still in beta, and can be monitored via Github - however don’t let this put you off, as the Akafuino-X has a lot of potential.

If you find any bugs in use the issue tracker in Github to let the team know.

In the meanwhile we’ve conducted a quick speed test – by running the same sketch on an Arduino Uno and also the Akafuino-X. The test is a whole lot of multiplication, nothing too scientific. At the end the duration of the exercise is shown in milliseconds. Here’s the code:

// Arduino Uno test
//
void setup()
{
 Serial.begin(9600);
}

unsigned long a,b,c,d,e;

void loop()
{
 a=millis();
 for (c=1; c<1000000; c++)
 {
   d=sq(c);
 }
 b=millis();
 e=b-a;
 Serial.print("Duration: ");
 Serial.print(e);
 Serial.println("ms");
 do {} while (1>0);
}

And here are the results of running the sketch four times on each board (click image to enlarge):

Our Akafuino-X beta only took 2704ms versus the Arduino Uno taking 4212ms. Very good so far.

Update! The team at akafugu have been experimenting with overclocking the Akafuino-X. And also check out the errata page. 

So there you have it, another contender in the Arduino-compatible board stakes. Considering the extra  I/O, PWM and bus connectivity the Akafuino-X is a very capable board. I look forward to the evolution of the IDE and will return with the Akafuino-X in an upcoming project. And we also have one to give away. So stay tuned! In the meanwhile the Akafuino-X and other goodies are available directly from akafugu.jp. 

Disclaimer – The parts reviewed in this article are a promotional consideration made available by akafugu.

Have fun and keep checking into tronixstuff.com. Why not follow things on twitter, Google+, subscribe  for email updates or RSS using the links on the right-hand column, or join our Google Group – dedicated to the projects and related items on this website. Sign up – it’s free, helpful to each other –  and we can all learn something.

** Yes I know it’s an i-type adjective

Tutorial: Arduino and multiple push-wheel switches

This is an addendum to chapter forty of a series originally titled “Getting Started/Moving Forward with Arduino!” by John Boxall – a series of articles on the Arduino universe. The first chapter is here, the complete series is detailed here. Any files from tutorials will be found here.

Updated 24/11/2012

This article continues with the push-wheel switches introduced in chapter 40. In the previous article, we learned how to read the value of a single digit using the digital pins of our Arduino. With this instalment we will examine how to read four digits – and not waste all those digital pins in the process. Instead, we will use the Microchip MCP23017 16-bit port expander IC that communicates via the I2C bus. It has sixteen digital input/output pins that we can use to read the status of each switch.

Before moving forward, please note that some assumed knowledge is required for this article – the I2C bus (parts one and two) and the MCP23017.

We first will describe the hardware connections, and then the Arduino sketch. Recall the schematic used for the single switch example:

When the switch was directly connected to the Arduino, we read the status of each pin to determine the value of the switch. We will do this again, on a larger scale using the MCP23017. Consider the pinout diagram:

We have 16 pins, which allows four switches to be connected. The commons for each switch still connect to 5V, and each switch contact still has a 10k pull-down resistor to GND. Then we connect the 1,2,4,8 pins of digit one to GPBA0~3; digit two’s 1,2,4,8 to GPA4~7; digit three’s 1,2,4,8 to GPB0~3 and digit four’s 1,2,4,8 to GPB4~7. For demonstration purposes we are using the Gravitech 7-segment shield as reviewed in the past.

Now how do we read the switches? All those wires may cause you to think it is difficult, but the sketch is quite simple. When we read the value of GPBA and B, one byte is returned for each bank, with the most-significant bit first. Each four bits will match the setting of the switch connected to the matching I/O pins.

For example, if we request the data for both IO banks and the switches are set to 1 2 3 4 – bank A will return 0010 0001 and bank B will return 0100 0011. We use some bitshift operations to separate each four bits into a separate variable – which leaves us with the value of each digit. For example, to separate the value of switch four, we shift the bits from bank B >> 4. This pushes the value of switch three out, and the blank bits on the left become zero. To separate the value for switch three, we use a compound bitwise & – which leaves the value of switch three.

Below is a breakdown of the binary switch values – it shows the raw GPIOA and B byte values, then each digit’s binary value, and decimal value:

So let’s see the demonstration sketch (download):

Example 40a

/*
 Example 40a - Read four pushwheel BCD switches via MCP23017, display on SAA1064/4-digit 7-segment LED display
 http://tronixstuff.wordpress.com | John Boxall CC by-sa-nc
 Using Arduino v1.0.1
 */

// MCP23017 pins 15~17 to GND, I2C bus address is 0x20
// SAA1064 I2C bus address 0x38

#include "Wire.h"

// for LED digit definitions
int digits[16]={
 63, 6, 91, 79, 102, 109, 125,7, 127, 111, 119, 124, 57, 94, 121, 113};

byte GPIOA, GPIOB, dig1, dig2, dig3, dig4;

void initSAA1064()
{
 //setup 0x38
 Wire.beginTransmission(0x38);
 Wire.write(0);
 Wire.write(B01000111); // 12mA output, no digit blanking
 Wire.endTransmission();
}

void setup()
{
 Serial.begin(9600);
 Wire.begin(); // start up I2C bus
 initSAA1064();
}

void loop()
{
 // read the inputs of bank A
 Wire.beginTransmission(0x20);
 Wire.write(0x12);
 Wire.endTransmission();
 Wire.requestFrom(0x20, 1);
 GPIOA=Wire.read(); // this byte contains the switch data for digits 1 and 2

// read the inputs of bank B
 Wire.beginTransmission(0x20);
 Wire.write(0x13);
 Wire.endTransmission();
 Wire.requestFrom(0x20, 1);
 GPIOB=Wire.read(); // this byte contains the switch data for digits 3 and 4
 // extract value for each switch
 // dig1 LHS, dig4 RHS
 dig4=GPIOB >> 4;
 dig3=GPIOB & B00001111;
 dig2=GPIOA >> 4;
 dig1=GPIOA & B00001111;
 // send all GPIO and individual switch data to serial monitor
 // for debug and interest's sake
 Serial.print("GPIOA = ");
 Serial.println(GPIOA, BIN);
 Serial.print("GPIOB = ");
 Serial.println(GPIOB, BIN);
 Serial.println();

Serial.print("digit 1 = ");
 Serial.println(dig1, BIN);
 Serial.print("digit 2 = ");
 Serial.println(dig2, BIN);
 Serial.print("digit 3 = ");
 Serial.println(dig3, BIN);
 Serial.print("digit 4 = ");
 Serial.println(dig4, BIN);
 Serial.println();

Serial.print("digit 1 = ");
 Serial.println(dig1, DEC);
 Serial.print("digit 2 = ");
 Serial.println(dig2, DEC);
 Serial.print("digit 3 = ");
 Serial.println(dig3, DEC);
 Serial.print("digit 4 = ");
 Serial.println(dig4, DEC);
 Serial.println();

// send switch value to LED display via SAA1064
 Wire.beginTransmission(0x38);
 Wire.write(1);
 Wire.write(digits[dig4]);
 Wire.write(digits[dig3]);
 Wire.write(digits[dig2]);
 Wire.write(digits[dig1]);
 Wire.endTransmission();
 delay(10);
 delay(1000);
}

And for the non-believers … a video demonstration:

So there you have it. Four digits instead of one, and over the I2C bus conserving Arduino digital I/O pins. Using eight MCP23017s you could read 32 digits at once. Have fun with doing that!

Have fun and keep checking into tronixstuff.com. Why not follow things on twitter, Google+, subscribe  for email updates or RSS using the links on the right-hand column, or join our Google Group – dedicated to the projects and related items on this website. Sign up – it’s free, helpful to each other –  and we can all learn something.