Last Summer, I explored using the Raspberry Pi Pico as the basis of a cellular IoT device. That done, I wanted to try out WiFi connectivity. To do so, I ordered a Pimoroni PicoWireless.
Build a Raspberry Pi Pico WiFi IoT Device
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Tag Archives: Pico
Raspberry Pi Pico development on the iPad Pro: almost, but not quite there
I recently upgraded my ageing iPad to a new iPad Pro 11. This has a USB C port, and I immediately wondered if I could use this to connect a USB C equipped Raspberry Pi RP2040-based device like the Adafruit Feather RP2040, and do development on the iPad rather than a Mac. The answer is a cautious ‘yes’, provided you can work to a very specific limitation: your RP2040-side application environment has to be CircuitPython.
Program games on the Pimoroni PicoSystem
A wee while back I ordered a Pimoroni PicoSystem to try out. It’s a small handheld games console based on the Raspberry Pi RP2040 microcontroller, and it sports both classic joypad controls and a 240 x 240 16-bit colour display. I gave my first impressions in an earlier post. Here’s what I think after spending some time porting my Raspberry Pi Pico version of the 1980s 3D shooter Phantom Slayer to the unit.
First look: Pimoroni’s PicoSystem hackable handheld games console
I’ve had my eye on the PicoSystem, the Raspberry Pi RP2040-based games console platform, for some time. It surfaced back in the Spring and was long marked “coming soon”. But now it’s here, mine showed up yesterday while I was at work, and this morning I’ve been messing about with it.
How to build a cellular IoT device with the Raspberry Pi Pico — part two, the code
In part one, I described an IoT demo setup based on the Raspberry Pi Pico and the Waveshare Pico SIM7080G Cat-M1/NB-IoT cellular add-on board, and wrote about some of the design goals. Now it’s time to implement that design with some C++ code: a host application, drivers for the modem, the HT16K3-based display and the MCP9808 temperature sensor, and some third-party libraries to decode incoming commands formatted as JSON and encoded in base64 for easy SMS transmission.
How to build a cellular IoT device with the Raspberry Pi Pico — part one, the hardware
To turn the Raspberry Pi Pico into an Internet of Things (IoT) device, you need to add wireless connectivity. I thought I’d give it go, to see how straightforward it might be to connect the Pico to cellular networks and have a bare-metal app written in C++ run the show. For a modem, I chose to use Waveshare’s suitably sized Pico SIM7080G Cat-M1/NB-IoT.
How to pop up a Picoprobe from the Adafruit QT Py RP2040
A little while back I wrote about Adafruit’s QT Py RP2040 and how it makes a nice, compact Picoprobe. That’s a Raspberry Pi RP2040-based device used as a bridge between your computer and a target device for debugging work using Single Wire Debug (SWD). I first used the QT Py RP2040’s side-mounted GPIO pins, but SWD hosting is a great role for the device’s QT Stemma connector.
Raspberry Pi Pico proxies: the Pimoroni Tiny 2040 and the Adafruit QT Py RP2040
Having spent some time with the Raspberry Pi Pico, I thought it was time to try out some of the other RP2040-based development boards that have become available. When it launched the Pico, the Raspberry Pi Foundation said it would make its RP2040 microcontroller available to third-party board makers. Retailers Pimoroni and Adafruit were among the first to toss their caps into the ring. Their offerings: respectively, the Tiny 2040 and the QT Py RP2040.
Introducing C++ programming on the Raspberry Pi Pico
When I started programming the Raspberry Pi Pico, I used the C language because I’ve worked with it before. The Pico’s SDK also supports C++, but I’ve never used C++. When I started Mac programming in the early 1990s, C was the clear choice. By the time I needed to do object-oriented programming, Apple had bought NeXT and the way to do OOP on macOS was Objective-C not C++. The Pico has given me chance to join the party.
Enjoy some old school 3D arcade action — courtesy of the Raspberry Pi Pico
In the mid-1980s, I loved Phantom Slayer. Written for the Tandy Color Computer and made available for the Dragon 32, Phantom Slayer was a 3D maze shooter. Think a very basic version of Doom with colours but no textures. It wasn’t sophisticated, but it was quick and, more to the point, incredibly atmospheric.
smittytone messes with micros 