Tag: Improvements

Making the world a better place, one piece at a time

Raspberry Pi: White OLED Display

The white OLED displays measure 1.3 inches diagonally:

RPi OLED Display – white on black

They’re plug-compatible with their 0.96 inch blue and yellow-blue siblings.

All of them are absurdly cute and surprisingly readable at close range, at least if you’re as nearsighted as I am.

Some preliminary fiddling suggests a Primary Red filter will make the white displays more dark-room friendly than the yellow-blue ones. Setting the “contrast” to 1 (rather than the default 255) doesn’t (seem to) make much difference, surely attributable to human vision’s logarithmic brightness sensitivity.

I must conjure some sort of case atop a bendy wire mount for E-Z visibility.

2017-04-04
Monthly Science: Sonicare Recharge Intervals

After replacing the NiMH cells in my Sonicare toothbrush in July 2012, they delivered about 21 days = 21 brushings between charges. After a year, I laid a sheet of Geek Scratch Paper on the windowsill (*) and noted pretty nearly every recharge:

Sonicare recharge – 2013-10 – 2017-01

Anyhow, the original cells crapped out after 2-½ years, when these still delivered 13 days. After 4-½ years, they’re lasting 12 days between charges.

Color me surprised, because they’re 600 mA·h NiMH cells. The originals were 2000 mA·h cells, which you’d expect would last longer, but noooo.

No reason to change them yet, which is good news.

FWIW, I recently bought some cheap brush heads from the usual low-end eBay seller. The OEM brushes have colored bristles which fade to tell you when to change brushes, although I run ’em quite a bit longer than that. The cheap replacements have never-fading colored bristles and, I suspect, all the bristles are much too stiff. The dental hygienist says I’m doing great, so it’s all good.

Sonicare brush heads – cheap vs OEM

High truth: at best, you get what you pay for.

(*) Being that type of guy has some advantages, if you’re that guy. Otherwise, it’s a nasty character flaw.

2017-04-01
Quartz Resonator Test Fixture
A recent QEX article (Jan/Feb ~~2017~~ 2016; sorry ’bout that), Crystal Measurement Parameters Simplified, Chuck Adams K7QO) suggested a simplified version of the K8IQY crystal parameter test fixture would work just as well for low-frequency quartz resonators:

Quartz crystal resonance test fixture – schematic

The resistive pads eliminate the fussy toroids and their frequency dependence.

Tossing a handful of parts on a small proto board:

Quartz crystal resonance test fixture

I found two absurdly long hunks of RG-174 coax with BNC connectors, so that’s how it connects to the outside world; sacrificing a short SMA jumper would reduce the clutter, but that’s in the nature of fine tuning. At the frequencies this fixture will see, coax properties don’t matter.

I can’t think of a better way to mount those AT26 cans than by soldering the wire leads directly to a pin header; pushing them under spring clips seems fraught with peril, not to mention excessive stray capacitance.

Measure the actual in-circuit capacitance for the 33 pF cap (shown as 39 pF in the schematic, it’s not critical), which worked out to 34.6 pF. That’s the external series capacitance Cx.

The overall procedure, slightly modified from the original:
- Measure C0 with resonator in capacitance fixture
- Solder resonator to pins
- Remove jumper to put capacitor Cx in series
- Find series-resonant peak = Fc
- Install jumper to short Cx
- Find series-resonant peak = Fs < Fc
- Remember the peak amplitude
- Unsolder crystal
- Install suitable trimpot = Rm in socket
- Adjust trimpot to produce same output amplitude
Crunch the numbers to get the crystal’s motional parameters:

Rm = trimpot resistance
Lm = 1 / [4 π² (Fs + Fc) (Fs - Fc) (C0 + Cx)]
Cm = 1 / [(2 π Fs)² Lm]
Q = [2 π Fs Lm] / Rm

Then you’re done!
2017-03-28
AADE LC Meter: AT26 Crystal Capacitance Fixture

Crystals (or resonators) in AT26 packages have vanishingly small capacitances, so I conjured a little fixture for my AADE L/C Meter IIB (*) that holds them securely under little fingers snipped from an EMI shield:

AT26 crystal capacitance fixture – Cpar detail

The finger on the right sits atop a snippet of rectangular brass tube so it need not bend so far.

The base is a snippet of double-sided PCB with copper tape soldered around the edges. I drilled the holes slightly oversize and soldered copper tape there, giving the top foil a direct connection to the terminals. The raggedy slot looks like it came from a hacksaw; no false advertising there.

The meter reports 6.5 pF of stray capacitance and nulls it to zero as usual. Without the fixture, it shows 2.5 pF.

With the crystal in that position, the meter measures Cpar, the parasitic capacitance from both terminals to the can, which should be (roughly) twice the capacitance from either terminal to the can.

Two more clips measure C0, the plate-to-plate capacitance:

AT26 crystal capacitance fixture – C0 detail

The meter drive is about 200 mV at 700 kHz, far away from resonance. Assuming the resonator’s effective series resistance is 25 kΩ (tuning forks aren’t crystals!), it’s dissipating 1.5 µW (and less as the ESR goes up). That may be slightly hot for some resonators, but it’s surely survivable.

Some preliminary data on five 32.768 kHz crystals shows Cpar = 0.4 pF and C0 = 0.9 pF. I don’t trust those numbers very much, but they’re reproducible within 0.1-ish pF.

(*) Almost All Digital Electronics and its website vanished after the owner died; the meter continues to work fine. The cheap knockoffs flooding eBay and Amazon may get you close to the goal.

2017-03-27

Vacuum Tube Lights: Duodecar Rebuild

You’ll recall the LED atop the 21HB5A tube failed, shortly after replacing the bottom LED and rewiring the ersatz plate lead, which led me to rebuild the whole thing with SK6812 RGBW LEDs. So I printed all the plastic parts again, because the duodecar tube socket’s pin circle can fit into a hard drive platter’s unmodified 25 mm hole, then drilled another platter to suit:

The hole under the drill fits the 3.5 mm stereo socket for the ersatz plate lead, so it’s bigger than before.

I’ve switched from Arduino Pro Minis with a separate USB converter to Arduino Nanos with an on-board CH340 USB chip, because the fake FTDI chips on the converters are a continuing aggravation:

21HB5A base - interior — 21HB5A base – interior

Adding those wire slots to the sockets definitely helps tidy things up; the wires no longer need a crude cable tie anchoring them to the socket mounting screws.

I wanted to drive the LEDs from the A7 pin, rather than the A3 pin I’d been using on the Pro Minis, to keep the wires closer together, but it turns out that A6 and A7 can’t become digital output pins. So I used A5, although I may come to regret the backward incompatibility.

In any event, the 21HB5A tube looks spiffy with its new LEDs in full effect:

21HB5A with RBGBW LEDs - cyan violet phase — 21HB5A with RBGBW LEDs – cyan violet phase

I dialed the white LED PWM down to 32, making the colors somewhat pastel, rather than washed-out.

The Arduino source code as a GitHub Gist:

	// Neopixel mood lighting for vacuum tubes
	// Ed Nisley – KE4ANU – June 2016
	// September 2016 – Add Morse library and blinkiness
	// October 2016 – Set random colors at cycle end
	// March 2017 – RGBW SK6812 LEDs

	#include <Adafruit_NeoPixel.h>
	#include <morse.h>
	#include <Entropy.h>

	//———-
	// Pin assignments

	const byte PIN_NEO = A5; // DO – data out to first Neopixel

	const byte PIN_HEARTBEAT = 13; // DO – Arduino LED

	#define PIN_MORSE 12

	//———-
	// Constants

	// number of pixels
	#define PIXELS 2

	// index of the Morse output pixel and how fast it sends
	boolean Send_Morse = false;
	#define PIXEL_MORSE (PIXELS – 1)
	#define MORSE_WPM 10

	// lag between adjacent pixel, degrees of slowest period
	#define PIXELPHASE 45

	// update LEDs only this many ms apart (minus loop() overhead)
	#define UPDATEINTERVAL 50ul
	#define UPDATEMS (UPDATEINTERVAL – 1ul)

	// number of steps per cycle, before applying prime factors
	#define RESOLUTION 500

	//———-
	// Globals

	// instantiate the Neopixel buffer array

	Adafruit_NeoPixel strip = Adafruit_NeoPixel(PIXELS, PIN_NEO, NEO_GRBW + NEO_KHZ800);

	uint32_t FullWhite = strip.Color(255,255,255,255);
	uint32_t FullOff = strip.Color(0,0,0,0);
	uint32_t MorseColor;

	struct pixcolor_t {
	unsigned int Prime;
	unsigned int NumSteps;
	unsigned int Step;
	float StepSize;
	float Phase;
	byte MaxPWM;
	};

	unsigned int PlatterSteps;

	byte PrimeList[] = {3,5,7,13,19,29};

	// colors in each LED
	enum pixcolors {RED, GREEN, BLUE, WHITE, PIXELSIZE};

	struct pixcolor_t Pixels[PIXELSIZE]; // all the data for each pixel color intensity

	uint32_t UniColor;

	unsigned long MillisNow;
	unsigned long MillisThen;

	// Morse code

	char * MorseText = " cq cq cq de ke4znu";

	LEDMorseSender Morse(PIN_MORSE, (float)MORSE_WPM);

	uint8_t PrevMorse, ThisMorse;

	//– Figure PWM based on current state

	byte StepColor(byte Color, float Phi) {

	byte Value;

	Value = (Pixels[Color].MaxPWM / 2.0) * (1.0 + sin(Pixels[Color].Step * Pixels[Color].StepSize + Phi));

	// Value = (Value) ? Value : Pixels[Color].MaxPWM; // flash at dimmest points for debug

	return Value;
	}

	//– Select three unique primes for the color generator function
	// Then compute all the step parameters based on those values

	void SetColorGenerators(void) {

	Pixels[RED].Prime = PrimeList[random(sizeof(PrimeList))];

	do {
	Pixels[GREEN].Prime = PrimeList[random(sizeof(PrimeList))];
	} while (Pixels[RED].Prime == Pixels[GREEN].Prime);

	do {
	Pixels[BLUE].Prime = PrimeList[random(sizeof(PrimeList))];
	} while (Pixels[BLUE].Prime == Pixels[RED].Prime \|\|
	Pixels[BLUE].Prime == Pixels[GREEN].Prime);
	do {
	Pixels[WHITE].Prime = PrimeList[random(sizeof(PrimeList))];
	} while (Pixels[WHITE].Prime == Pixels[RED].Prime \|\|
	Pixels[WHITE].Prime == Pixels[GREEN].Prime \|\|
	Pixels[WHITE].Prime == Pixels[BLUE].Prime);


	printf("Primes: %d %d %d %d\r\n",Pixels[RED].Prime,Pixels[GREEN].Prime,Pixels[BLUE].Prime,Pixels[WHITE].Prime);

	Pixels[RED].MaxPWM = 255;
	Pixels[GREEN].MaxPWM = 255;
	Pixels[BLUE].MaxPWM = 255;
	Pixels[WHITE].MaxPWM = 32;

	unsigned int PhaseSteps = (unsigned int) ((PIXELPHASE / 360.0) *
	RESOLUTION * (unsigned int) max(max(max(Pixels[RED].Prime,Pixels[GREEN].Prime),Pixels[BLUE].Prime),Pixels[WHITE].Prime));
	printf("Pixel phase offset: %d deg = %d steps\r\n",(int)PIXELPHASE,PhaseSteps);


	for (byte c=0; c < PIXELSIZE; c++) {
	Pixels[c].NumSteps = RESOLUTION * Pixels[c].Prime; // steps per cycle
	Pixels[c].StepSize = TWO_PI / Pixels[c].NumSteps; // radians per step
	Pixels[c].Step = random(Pixels[c].NumSteps); // current step
	Pixels[c].Phase = PhaseSteps * Pixels[c].StepSize;; // phase in radians for this color

	printf(" c: %d Steps: %d Init: %d Phase: %d deg",c,Pixels[c].NumSteps,Pixels[c].Step,(int)(Pixels[c].Phase * 360.0 / TWO_PI));
	printf(" PWM: %d\r\n",Pixels[c].MaxPWM);
	}
	}

	//– Helper routine for printf()

	int s_putc(char c, FILE *t) {
	Serial.write(c);
	}

	//——————
	// Set the mood

	void setup() {

	pinMode(PIN_HEARTBEAT,OUTPUT);
	digitalWrite(PIN_HEARTBEAT,LOW); // show we arrived

	Serial.begin(57600);
	fdevopen(&s_putc,0); // set up serial output for printf()

	printf("Vacuum Tube Mood Light – RGBW\r\nEd Nisley – KE4ZNU – March 2017\r\n");

	Entropy.initialize(); // start up entropy collector

	// set up pixels

	strip.begin();
	strip.show();

	// lamp test: a brilliant white flash

	printf("Lamp test: flash white\r\n");

	for (byte i=0; i<5 ; i++) {
	for (int j=0; j < strip.numPixels(); j++) { // fill LEDs with white
	strip.setPixelColor(j,FullWhite);
	}
	strip.show();
	delay(500);

	for (int j=0; j < strip.numPixels(); j++) { // fill LEDs with black
	strip.setPixelColor(j,FullOff);
	}
	strip.show();
	delay(500);
	}

	// get an actual random number

	uint32_t rn = Entropy.random();

	printf("Random seed: %08lx\r\n",rn);
	randomSeed(rn);

	// set up the color generators

	SetColorGenerators();

	// set up Morse generator

	Morse.setup();
	Morse.setMessage(String(MorseText));
	MorseColor = strip.Color(255,random(32,64),random(16),0);

	PrevMorse = ThisMorse = digitalRead(PIN_MORSE);

	printf("Morse enabled: %d at %d wpm color: %08lx\n [%s]\r\n",Send_Morse,MORSE_WPM,MorseColor,MorseText);

	MillisNow = MillisThen = millis();

	}

	//——————
	// Run the mood

	void loop() {

	if (!Morse.continueSending()) {
	printf("Restarting Morse message\r\n");
	Morse.startSending();
	}
	ThisMorse = digitalRead(PIN_MORSE);

	MillisNow = millis();
	if (((MillisNow – MillisThen) >= UPDATEMS) \|\| // time for color change?
	(PrevMorse != ThisMorse)) { // Morse output bit changed?

	digitalWrite(PIN_HEARTBEAT,HIGH);

	if (Send_Morse && ThisMorse) { // if Morse output high, overlay flash
	strip.setPixelColor(PIXEL_MORSE,MorseColor);
	}
	PrevMorse = ThisMorse;
	strip.show(); // send out precomputed colors

	boolean CycleRun = false; // check to see if all cycles have ended
	for (byte c=0; c < PIXELSIZE; c++) { // compute next increment for each color
	if (++Pixels[c].Step >= Pixels[c].NumSteps) {
	Pixels[c].Step = 0;
	printf("Cycle %d steps %d at %8ld delta %ld ms\r\n",c,Pixels[c].NumSteps,MillisNow,(MillisNow – MillisThen));
	}
	else {
	CycleRun = true; // this color is still cycling
	}
	}

	// If all cycles have completed, reset the color generators

	if (!CycleRun) {
	printf("All cycles ended: setting new color generator values\r\n");
	SetColorGenerators();
	}

	for (int i=0; i < strip.numPixels(); i++) { // for each pixel
	byte Value[PIXELSIZE];
	for (byte c=0; c < PIXELSIZE; c++) { // … for each color
	Value[c] = (Pixels[c].MaxPWM / 2.0) * (1.0 + sin(Pixels[c].Step * Pixels[c].StepSize – i*Pixels[c].Phase));
	}
	UniColor = strip.Color(Value[RED],Value[GREEN],Value[BLUE],Value[WHITE]);
	strip.setPixelColor(i,UniColor);
	}

	MillisThen = MillisNow;
	digitalWrite(PIN_HEARTBEAT,LOW);
	}

	}

view raw TubeMorse.ino hosted with ❤ by GitHub

2017-03-22

Raspberry Pi Streaming Radio Player: OLED Display

With the OLED wired up to the Raspberry Pi, the LUMA.OLED driver makes it surprisingly easy to slap text on the screen, at least after some obligatory fumbling around:

RPi OLED Display - Plenitude — RPi OLED Display – Plenitude

Connect the hardware, install the driver, then the setup goes like this:

import textwrap

from luma.oled.device import sh1106
from luma.core.serial import spi
from luma.core.render import canvas
from PIL import ImageFont

… snippage …

font1 = ImageFont.truetype('/usr/share/fonts/truetype/dejavu/DejaVuSansMono.ttf',14)
font2 = ImageFont.truetype('/usr/share/fonts/truetype/dejavu/DejaVuSans.ttf',11)

wrapper = textwrap.TextWrapper(width=128//font2.getsize('n')[0])

StatLine = 0
DataLine = 17           # allow for weird ascenders and accent marks
LineSpace = 16

Contrast = 255          # OLED brightness setting

serial = spi(device=0,port=0)
device = sh1106(serial)
device.contrast(Contrast)

The Python Imaging Library below the LUMA driver supports Truetype fonts that look much better than the default fonts. For these tiny displays, DejaVu Sans comes close enough to being a single-stroke (“stick”) font and, being proportional, packs more text into a fixed horizontal space.

The textwrap library chops a string into lines of a specified length, which works great with a fixed-width font and not so well with a proportional font. I set the line length based on the width of a mid-size lowercase letter and hope for the best. In round numbers, each 128 pixel line can hold 20-ish characters of the size-11 (which might be the height in pixels) font.

It also understands hyphens and similar line-ending punctuation:

Felix Mendelssohn-
Bartholdy - Piano
Concerto No.01 in

It turns out whatever library routine blits characters into the bitmap has an off-by-one error that overwrites the leftmost column with the pixel columns that should be just off-screen on the right; it may also overwrite the topmost row with the bottommost row+1. I poked around a bit, couldn’t find the actual code amid the layers of inherited classes and methods and suchlike, and gave up: each line starts in pixel column 1, not 0. With textwrap generally leaving the rightmost character in each line blank, the picket-fence error (almost) always overwrites the first column with dark pixels.

Display coordinates start at (0,0) in the upper left corner, but apparently the character origin corresponds to the box around an uppercase letter, with ascenders and diacritical marks extending (at least) one pixel above that. The blue area in these displays starts at (0,16), but having the ascenders poke into the yellow section is really, really conspicuous, so DataLine Finagles the text down by one pixel. The value of Linespace avoids collisions between descenders and ascenders in successive lines that you (well, I) wouldn’t expect with a spacing equal to the font height.

The display has a variable brightness setting, called “contrast” by the datasheet and driver, that determines the overall LED current (perhaps according to an exponential relationship, because an α appears in the tables). I tweak the value in Contrast based on where the streamer lives, with 1 being perfectly suitable for a dark room and 255 for ordinary lighting.

The LUMA package includes a scrolling terminal emulator. With maybe four lines, tops, on that display (in a reasonable font, anyhow), what’s the point?

Instead, I homebrewed a panel with manual positioning:

def ShowStatus(L1=None,L2=None,L3='None'):
  with canvas(device) as screen:
    screen.text((1,StatLine),Media[CurrentKC][0][0:11],
             font=font1,fill='white')
    screen.text((127-(4*font1.getsize('M')[0] + 2),StatLine),'Mute' if Muted else ' ',
             font=font1,fill='white')

    screen.text((1,DataLine),L1,
             font=font2,fill='white')
    screen.text((1,DataLine + 1*LineSpace),L2,
             font=font2,fill='white')
    screen.text((1,DataLine + 2*LineSpace),L3,
             font=font2,fill='white')

Yeah, those are global variables in the first line; feel free to object-orient it as you like.

The LUMA driver hands you a blank screen inside the with … as …: context, whereupon you may draw as you see fit and the driver squirts the bitmap to the display at the end of the context. There’s apparently a way to set up a permanent canvas and update it at will, but this works well enough for now.

That means you (well, I) must mange those three lines by hand:

ShowStatus('Startup in ' + Location,
           'Mixer: ' + MixerChannel + ' = ' + MixerVol,
           'Contrast: ' + str(Contrast))

Chopping the track info string into lines goes like this:

if TrackName:
  info = wrapper.wrap(TrackName)
  ShowStatus(info[0],
             info[1] if len(info) > 1 else '',
             info[2] if len(info) > 2 else '')
else:
  ShowStatus('No track info','','')

Something along the way ruins Unicode characters from the track info, converting them into unrelated (and generally accented) characters. They work fine when shipped through the logging interface, so it may be due to a font incompatibility or, more likely, my not bothering to work around Python 2’s string vs. byte stream weirdness. Using Python 3 would be a Good Idea, but I’m unsure all the various & sundry libraries are compatible and unwilling to find out using programming as an experimental science.

The Python source code as a GitHub Gist:

	from evdev import InputDevice,ecodes,KeyEvent
	import subprocess32 as subp
	import select
	import re
	import sys
	import time
	import logging
	import logging.handlers
	import os.path
	import argparse as args
	import textwrap

	from luma.oled.device import sh1106
	from luma.core.serial import spi
	from luma.core.render import canvas
	from PIL import ImageFont

	# URL must be last entry in command line list

	Media = {'KEY_KP7' : ['Classical',False,['mplayer','-playlist','http://stream2137.init7.net/listen.pls'%5D%5D,
	'KEY_KP8' : ['Jazz',False,['mplayer','-playlist','http://stream2138.init7.net/listen.pls'%5D%5D,
	'KEY_KP9' : ['WMHT',False,['mplayer','http://wmht.streamguys1.com/wmht1'%5D%5D,
	'KEY_KP4' : ['Classic 1k',True,['mplayer','-playlist','http://listen.radionomy.com/1000classicalhits.m3u'%5D%5D,
	'KEY_KP5' : ['Love',True,['mplayer','-playlist','/home/pi/Playlists/LoveRadio.m3u']],
	'KEY_KP6' : ['WAMC',False,['mplayer','-playlist','http://playerservices.streamtheworld.com/pls/WAMCFM.pls'%5D%5D,
	'KEY_KP1' : ['60s',True,['mplayer','-playlist','http://listen.radionomy.com/all60sallthetime-keepfreemusiccom.m3u'%5D%5D,
	'KEY_KP2' : ['50-70s',True,['mplayer','-playlist','http://listen.radionomy.com/golden-50-70s-hits.m3u'%5D%5D,
	'KEY_KP3' : ['Soft Rock',True,['mplayer','-playlist','http://listen.radionomy.com/softrockradio.m3u'%5D%5D,
	'KEY_KP0' : ['Zen',False,['mplayer','http://iradio.iceca.st:80/zenradio'%5D%5D,
	'KEY_KPDOT' : ['Ambient',False,['mplayer','http://185.32.125.42:7331/maschinengeist.org.mp3'%5D%5D,
	'KEY_KPMINUS' : ['Relaxation',True,['mplayer','-playlist','/home/pi/Playlists/Frequences-relaxation.m3u']],
	'KEY_KPPLUS' : ['Plenitude',True,['mplayer','-playlist','/home/pi/Playlists/Radio-PLENITUDE.m3u']]
	}

	# these keycode will be fed directly into mplayer

	Controls = {'KEY_KPSLASH' : '//////',
	'KEY_KPASTERISK' : '******',
	'KEY_VOLUMEUP' : '*',
	'KEY_VOLUMEDOWN' : '/'
	}

	# stream title keywords that trigger muting

	MuteStrings = ['TargetSpot', # common Radionomy insert
	'Intro of','Jingle','bumper', # Radio-PLENITUDE
	'[Unknown]','Advert:','+++','—','SRR','Srr', # softrockradio
	'PEACE LK1','PEACE J1'] # Frequences-relaxation


	# Set up default configuration

	CurrentKC = 'KEY_KP7' # default stream source

	MuteDelay = 6.5 # delay before non-music track; varies with buffering
	UnMuteDelay = 9.0 # delay after non-music track

	MixerChannel = 'PCM' # default amixer output control
	MixerVol = '30' # mixer gain

	RestartDelay = 10 # delay after stream failure

	Contrast = 255 # OLED brightness setting

	# Set up command line parsing

	cmdline = args.ArgumentParser(description='Streaming Radio Player',epilog='KE4ZNU – http://softsolder.com')
	cmdline.add_argument('Loc',help='Location: BR1 BR2 …',default='any',nargs='?')
	args = cmdline.parse_args()

	# Set up logging

	LogFN = '/home/pi/Streamer.log'
	LogFmt = logging.Formatter('%(asctime)s %(levelname)s: %(message)s')

	LogHandler = logging.handlers.RotatingFileHandler(LogFN,backupCount=9)
	LogHandler.setFormatter(LogFmt)

	logger = logging.getLogger('StreamLog')
	logger.addHandler(LogHandler)
	logger.setLevel(logging.INFO)

	# Tweak config based on where we are

	Location = vars(args)['Loc'].upper()
	logger.info('Player setup for: ' + Location)

	if Location == 'BR1':
	CurrentKC = 'KEY_KPDOT'
	MixerVol = '5'
	Contrast = 1
	elif Location == 'BR2':
	MuteDelay = 4.5
	UnMuteDelay = 8.5
	MixerVol = '5'
	Contrast = 1
	elif Location == 'LR':
	MixerVol = '40'
	CurrentKC = 'KEY_KPPLUS'

	# set up event inputs and polling objects
	# This requires some udev magic to create the symlinks

	k = InputDevice('/dev/input/keypad')
	k.grab()

	kp = select.poll()
	kp.register(k.fileno(),select.POLLIN + select.POLLPRI + select.POLLERR)

	# if volume control knob exists, then set up its events

	VolumeDevice = '/dev/input/volume'

	vp = select.poll()
	if os.path.exists(VolumeDevice):
	logger.info('Volume control device: %s',VolumeDevice)
	v = InputDevice(VolumeDevice)
	v.grab()
	vp.register(v.fileno(),select.POLLIN + select.POLLPRI + select.POLLERR)

	# set up file for mplayer output tracing

	lw = open('/home/pi/mp.log','w') # mplayer piped output

	# set the mixer output low enough that the initial audio won't wake the dead

	subp.call(['amixer','-q','sset',MixerChannel,MixerVol])

	if Media[CurrentKC][1]:
	subp.call(['amixer','-q','sset',MixerChannel,'mute'])
	Muted = True # squelch anything before valid track name
	logger.info('Audio muted at startup')
	else:
	subp.call(['amixer','-q','sset',MixerChannel,'unmute'])
	Muted = False # allow early audio
	logger.info('Audio unmuted at startup')

	# Set up OLED display

	font1 = ImageFont.truetype('/usr/share/fonts/truetype/dejavu/DejaVuSansMono.ttf',14)
	font2 = ImageFont.truetype('/usr/share/fonts/truetype/dejavu/DejaVuSans.ttf',11)

	wrapper = textwrap.TextWrapper(width=128//font2.getsize('n')[0])

	StatLine = 0
	DataLine = 17 # allow one line for weird ascenders and accent marks
	LineSpace = 16

	serial = spi(device=0,port=0)
	device = sh1106(serial)
	device.contrast(Contrast)

	def ShowStatus(L1=None,L2=None,L3='None'):
	with canvas(device) as screen:
	screen.text((1,StatLine),Media[CurrentKC][0][0:11],
	font=font1,fill='white')
	screen.text((127-(4*font1.getsize('M')[0] + 2),StatLine),'Mute' if Muted else ' ',
	font=font1,fill='white')

	screen.text((1,DataLine),L1,
	font=font2,fill='white')
	screen.text((1,DataLine + 1*LineSpace),L2,
	font=font2,fill='white')
	screen.text((1,DataLine + 2*LineSpace),L3,
	font=font2,fill='white')

	ShowStatus('Startup in ' + Location,
	'Mixer: ' + MixerChannel + ' = ' + MixerVol,
	'Contrast: ' + str(Contrast))

	# Start the player with the default stream, set up for polling

	logger.info('Starting mplayer on %s -> %s',Media[CurrentKC][0],Media[CurrentKC][-1][-1])
	p = subp.Popen(Media[CurrentKC][-1],
	stdin=subp.PIPE,stdout=subp.PIPE,stderr=subp.STDOUT)

	pp = select.poll() # this may be valid for other invocations, but is not pretty
	pp.register(p.stdout.fileno(),select.POLLIN + select.POLLPRI + select.POLLERR)

	#——————–
	#— Play the streams

	while True:

	# pluck next line from mplayer and decode it

	if [] != pp.poll(10):
	text = p.stdout.readline()

	if 'Error: ' in text: # something horrible went wrong
	lw.write(text)
	lw.flush()
	logger.info('Unsolvable problem! ' + text)
	logger.info('Exiting')
	LogHandler.doRollover()
	logging.shutdown()
	sys.exit('Exit streamer on mplayer error –' + text)

	if 'ICY Info: ' in text: # these lines may contain track names
	lw.write(text)
	lw.flush()

	trkinfo = text.split(';') # also splits at semicolon embedded in track name
	# logger.info('Raw split line: %s', trkinfo)
	for ln in trkinfo:
	if 'StreamTitle' in ln: # this part probably contains the track name
	NeedMute = False # assume a listenable track
	trkhit = re.search(r"StreamTitle='(.*)'",ln) # extract title if possible
	if trkhit: # regex returned valid result?
	TrackName = trkhit.group(1) # get string between two quotes
	else:
	logger.info('Regex failed for line: [' + ln + ']')
	TrackName = 'Invalid StreamTitle format!'

	logger.info('Track name: [%s]', TrackName)
	if Media[CurrentKC][1] and ( (len(TrackName) == 0) or any(m in TrackName for m in MuteStrings) ) :
	NeedMute = True

	if NeedMute:
	if Media[CurrentKC][1] and not Muted:
	time.sleep(MuteDelay) # brute-force assumption about buffer leadtime
	subp.call(['amixer','-q','sset',MixerChannel,'mute'])
	Muted = True
	logger.info('Track muted')
	else:
	if Muted:
	if Media[CurrentKC][1]:
	time.sleep(UnMuteDelay) # another brute-force timing assumption
	subp.call(['amixer','-q','sset',MixerChannel,'unmute'])
	Muted = False
	logger.info('Track unmuted')

	if TrackName:
	info = wrapper.wrap(TrackName)
	ShowStatus(info[0],
	info[1] if len(info) > 1 else '',
	info[2] if len(info) > 2 else '')
	else:
	ShowStatus('No track info','','')

	elif 'Exiting.' in text: # mplayer just imploded
	lw.write(text)
	lw.flush()
	logger.info('EOF or stream cutoff: [' + text + ']')
	ShowStatus('Killing dead Mplayer','','')
	pp.unregister(p.stdout.fileno())
	p.terminate() # p.kill()
	p.wait()
	logger.info('Discarding keys')
	while [] != kp.poll(0):
	kev = k.read
	time.sleep(RestartDelay)
	logger.info('Restarting mplayer')
	ShowStatus('Restarting Mplayer','','')
	p = subp.Popen(Media[CurrentKC][-1],
	stdin=subp.PIPE,stdout=subp.PIPE,stderr=subp.STDOUT)
	pp.register(p.stdout.fileno(),select.POLLIN + select.POLLPRI + select.POLLERR)
	logger.info(' … running')
	ShowStatus('Mplayer running','','')


	# accept pending events from volume control knob

	if [] != vp.poll(10):
	vev = v.read()
	lw.write('Volume')
	lw.flush()
	for e in vev:
	if e.type == ecodes.EV_KEY:
	kc = KeyEvent(e).keycode

	if kc in Controls:
	try:
	p.stdin.write(Controls[kc])
	except Exception as e:
	logger.info('Error sending volume, restarting player: ' + str(e))
	try:
	pp.unregister(p.stdout.fileno())
	except Exception as e:
	logger.info('Cannot unregister stdout: ' + str(e))
	ShowStatus('Vol error','Restarting',' Mplayer')
	time.sleep(RestartDelay)
	p = subp.Popen(Media[CurrentKC][-1],
	stdin=subp.PIPE,stdout=subp.PIPE,stderr=subp.STDOUT)
	pp.register(p.stdout.fileno(),select.POLLIN + select.POLLPRI + select.POLLERR)
	logger.info(' … running')


	# accept pending events from keypad

	if [] != kp.poll(10):
	kev = k.read()
	lw.write('Keypad')
	lw.flush()
	for e in kev:
	if e.type == ecodes.EV_KEY:
	kc = KeyEvent(e).keycode

	if kc == 'KEY_NUMLOCK': # discard these, as we don't care
	continue

	if (kc == 'KEY_BACKSPACE') and (KeyEvent(e).keystate == KeyEvent.key_hold):
	if True:
	logger.info('Shutting down')
	LogHandler.doRollover()
	logging.shutdown()
	p.kill()
	q = subp.call(['sudo','shutdown','-P','now'])
	q.wait()
	time.sleep(5)
	else:
	logger.info('Exiting from main')
	LogHandler.doRollover()
	logging.shutdown()
	sys.exit('Exit on command')
	break

	if KeyEvent(e).keystate != KeyEvent.key_down: # now OK to discard key up & hold
	continue

	if kc == 'KEY_KPENTER': # toggle muted state
	if Muted:
	logger.info('Forcing unmute')
	subp.call(['amixer','-q','sset',MixerChannel,'unmute'])
	Muted = False
	else:
	logger.info('Forcing mute')
	subp.call(['amixer','-q','sset',MixerChannel,'mute'])
	Muted = True
	continue

	if kc in Controls:
	logger.info('Control: ' + kc)

	try:
	p.stdin.write(Controls[kc])
	except Exception as e:
	logger.info('Error sending controls, restarting player: ' + str(e))
	ShowStatus('Ctl error','Restarting',' Mplayer')
	try:
	pp.unregister(p.stdout.fileno())
	except Exception as e:
	logger.info('Cannot unregister stdout: ' + str(e))
	p.terminate() # p.kill()
	p.wait()
	time.sleep(RestartDelay)
	p = subp.Popen(Media[CurrentKC][-1],
	stdin=subp.PIPE,stdout=subp.PIPE,stderr=subp.STDOUT)
	pp.register(p.stdout.fileno(),select.POLLIN + select.POLLPRI + select.POLLERR)
	logger.info(' … running')
	ShowStatus('Mplayer',' running','')

	if kc in Media:
	logger.info('Switching stream: ' + Media[kc][0] + ' -> ' + Media[kc][-1][-1])
	oldname = Media[CurrentKC][0]
	CurrentKC = kc
	ShowStatus('Switching from',oldname,'Halt Mplayer')
	try:
	pp.unregister(p.stdout.fileno())
	except Exception as e:
	logger.info('Cannot unregister stdout: ' + str(e))
	try:
	p.communicate(input='q')
	except Exception as e:
	logger.info('Mplayer already dead? ' + str(e))
	try:
	p.terminate() # p.kill()
	p.wait()
	except Exception as e:
	logger.info('Trouble with terminate or wait: ' + str(e))

	if Media[CurrentKC][1]:
	subp.call(['amixer','-q','sset',MixerChannel,'mute'])
	Muted = True
	logger.info('Audio muted for restart')
	else:
	subp.call(['amixer','-q','sset',MixerChannel,'unmute'])
	Muted = False
	logger.info('Audio unmuted for restart')

	time.sleep(RestartDelay)
	logger.info('Restarting Mplayer')
	p = subp.Popen(Media[CurrentKC][-1],
	stdin=subp.PIPE,stdout=subp.PIPE,stderr=subp.STDOUT)
	pp.register(p.stdout.fileno(),select.POLLIN + select.POLLPRI + select.POLLERR)
	logger.info(' … running')
	ShowStatus('Started Mplayer','','')

view raw Streamer-OLED.py hosted with ❤ by GitHub

2017-03-17

Raspberry Pi: OLED Display
These cute displays have barely enough dots for the job:

RPi OLED Display – Classical

That’s a 0.96 inch = 24.4 mm OLED display, measured diagonally, with a breathtaking 8192 = 128×64 dots. It’s a binary display: on or off pixels, nothing in between. This is not a color display: what you see is what it does, with a two-pixel void between the yellow and blue sections.

The void is a physical separation that does not affect the display addressing: the yellow section has 16 rows, the blue section has 48. It’s your responsibility to keep things where they belong; a character descender from the yellow section will appear in the blue section.

They’re three bucks each, shipped halfway around the planet: search eBay / Amazon for oled 128x64 yellow. The all-blue and all-white versions do not have the two-pixel void. I have some white 1.3 inch versions on the way for those applications requiring 35% more visibility.

The SPI interface uses all seven wires, peeled from a premade 100 mm 40-pin cable with female pin connectors:

RPi OLED Display – Wiring

Other OLED versions have a four-wire I²C interface. The boards have option jumpers on the back, but the pin header along the edge will have 7 holes for SPI or 4 holes for I²C .

Caveat emptor for online buyers: the item picture(s) may not match the title or the description text. The low-end sellers carrying beach balls, cookware, MOSFETs, cheap consumer electronics, and OLEDs do not understand the tech on a small board that’s Just Another SKU among thousands.

For cables, search eBay or Amazon for ribbon dupont "female to female" 10cm. Amazon has sets of male-female, male-male, and female-female jumpers for ten bucks in various lengths. The insulation seems rather stiff and I may be forced to build better cables with fine wire inside PET braid.

The SPI interface soaks up a tidy block of pins on the RPi’s big header:

RPi OLED Display – RPi connector detail

The LUMA-OLED Python driver doc gives a useful summary of those connections, herewith extracted for future reference:
- 17 VCC – 3.3 V works for sure, 5 V might not
- 18 DC – Data/Command
- 19 D1 (“dee one”) – Data to display = MOSI
- 20 GND
- 21 not used, that’s the pin in the midst of the block
- 22 RST – Reset
- 23 D0 (“dee zero”) – clock to display = SCLK
- 24 CS – Chip Select = CE0 (“cee ee zero”)
Pin 1 is in front on the left end of that picture, closest to the MicroSD card slot, and proceeds 1-2, 3-4, and so forth along the length of the connector: odds toward the CPU, evens toward the PCB edge.

The LUMA-OLD maintainter must have OLED boards with a slightly different SPI pinout than mine: VCC and GND are interchanged. Caveat emptor!

Obviously, it’s desperately in need of a cute little case, which is in the nature of fine tuning.
2017-03-16