neopixel/WS2812 driver

[rozek]

Hello!

Yesterday, I started using Kaluma on a RasPi Pico - and am really impressed by its performance!

Surprisingly, I could not find any driver for Neopixel or WS2812 LED Stripes and matrices - so I just made my own. You may find it on GitHub - use it in any way you like, it's MIT licensed.

Perhaps, if I'll find some more spare time, I'll also document the project I realized with that driver: s.th. like a "lava lamp" but with more colors and LEDs, of course. Thanks to RasPi Pico and Kaluma, everything worked (and works) like a charm.

Keep on with that good work!

With greetings from Germany,

Andreas Rozek

[niklauslee]

@rozek Wow, It's amazing! Using SPI for high-frequency signals is good idea! 👍 Thank you for sharing your work.

Actually we are preparing a neopixel driver based on RP2040's PIO (Programmable I/O). Current version of Kaluma do not support PIO, so we are working on it first.

Lastly, I just let you know that when you create a project on the Kaluma web, it can be imported by require() in other projects just like an NPM module. This is not well documented yet, we will do it later. (creating a release is required to be used as a module)

Thank you.

[rozek]

Well, actually I have to thank you for the marvellous Kaluma - my few lines of JS are nothing compared to your work.

Support for programmable IO would be an extremely valuable add-on.

Any kind of documentation of the "Kaluma web" (or an example to "reverse engineer") would also be welcome - I'd test it, create a release in the proper format and update my description accordingly.

[niklauslee]

Here is a PIO-based neopixel library.
https://kaluma.io/@niklauslee/neopixel

[rozek]

That's definitely the better approach!

However, I can't access your driver (although I already flashed firmware beta.7) - instead, I get the following error message

.hi
         ___
   _____/ . \   Welcome to Kaluma v1.0.0-beta.7
  /        __>  https://kaluma.io
 |/\________/
  \__@  v  v    Type '.help' for more info.
-----------------------------------------------

> 
> .flash -w
Transfer a file via YMODEM... (press 'a' to abort)
CCCCCCCCCCCCCCC
Done
> 
> .load
Error: Failed to load module: @niklauslee/neopixel
  at /Users/niklauslee/git/kaluma/src/modules/startup/startup.wrapped:0
  at <anonymous>:0
> 

[niklauslee]

@rozek Did you add a dependency to @niklauslee/neopixel to your project?

To use a third-party module:

1. Create a project
2. Open IDE for the project
3. Add a dependency (Go to Packages tab and search with neopixel keyword and press Add Dependency button)

[rozek]

I see, so I will need an account and be online in order to use your driver. Did not sign up yet...