The ESP8266 controller is preprogrammed with the ability to connect to your local wifi network and be remotely controlled.

Provisioning

Initially, the controller does not know how to connect to your network, so it sets up its own network. Here is how to set it up:

Using your phone/laptop/tablet, connect to the network named something like “EDP_1002170403”. The password is the same as name of the node.

One you are connected, open up your browser and navigate to http://192.168.4.1. That should enter the provisioning page. Enter the SSID of your wireless network and the password, and click on connect.

If everything is working correctly, that will connect to your wireless network. You can find out the IP address by looking for the “EDP_…” name in your browser’s host table, or you can hook the esp board up to your computer and watch what it writes out the serial port when it boots.

Controlling via http

You can control the LEDs via http by sending textual commands to controller. The format looks like this:

http://[ip address]/message?content=[message]

Controlling vs UDP

If you want realtime control of the LEDs, http may have too much latency, which may result in unexpected pauses. The controller also supports communicating through UDP.

To connect via UDP, use the same IP address and pass commands directly. The internal controller code runs at 100 Hz; if you drive with UDP messages at 60 Hz everything should just work great.

Supported Messages

All commands are three letters long, followed by another character (the examples use an underscore (“_”), followed by numeric parameters.

The following commands are supported:

Alternate

Alternate between two colors.

alt_r1,g1,b1,r2,g2,b2,time

r1, g1, b1: the rgb values (0,255) for the first color (0-255)
r2, b2, b2: the rgb values for the second color
time: the time for each color

Example: alt_0,100,000,000,000,000,250

Blend to

Blend from the current color to a specified color

rgb_r,g,b,time

r, g, b: the rgb values (0,255) for the new color
time: the time for the blend

Example: rgb_255,255,255,1000

Color rotate

Rotate through a bunch of different colors.

col_speed,brightness

speed: the speed of the rotate
brightness: The brightness of the colors

Example: col_5000,200

Flash decay

fdc_decay,min,max

decay: the speed of the decay
min: the minimum pause before the next flash
max: the maximum pause before the next flash

Example: fdcx250,10,500

Full control

Full control is used to control the color of all the leds directly.

ind_chunk,data-bytes

chunk: the number of leds to apply each set of data to.
data-bytes: colors express as two digit HEX values in the format RRGGBB

Example: ind_011,000044440000004400

Each color in data-bytes will apply to 11 LEDs. The data-bytes contain 3 color values:

000044 – a blue value
440000 – a red value
000044 – a green value

Save

Save the current animation so that it will use that animation when rebooting.

s

Set pixel count

Set the number of pixels that the controller will use. This will result in a reboot of the controller.

n_count

count: the number of pixels

Example: n_13