Story/Progress:

• Started wanting to clone https://wp.josh.com/2016/05/20/huge-scrolling-arduino-led-sign/
• Successfully cloned it by following instructions
• Wanted to add dynamic messages
• Modified Arduino sketch to accept new strings
• Enabled the RX pin using a trick I found on stackoverflow - see code
• Tried using bluetooth to send strings but strings came out garbled
• Had a LOT of trouble getting the string to read properly via serial - thought it was grounding issues or serial was too fast
• Slowed down the serial code because I thought it was too fast
• Turned out you needed a ferrite bead to reduce noise
  • So serial may not have been a problem the whole time
• After ferrite bead was added everything worked more or less perfectly
• Box was added for polish
• Colors were added
  • for green, use [these brackets] and for red, use {these brackets}
  • this works well well enough for the ticker, but see to do list

Links:

• Most of the components for this project come from:
• https://wp.josh.com/2016/05/20/huge-scrolling-arduino-led-sign/
• https://github.com/bigjosh/MacroMarquee (original github link - mine is modified for dynamic string input)

Hardware:

• A Raspberry Pi running some version of Rasbian
  • If you need to reflash the SD card, any version of linux will do.
  • To install the software on a new raspberry pi:
    • Go to the github page @ https://github.com/khazanahamericas/scrolling-sign
    • Fork it
    • Clone the repo using git clone
    • cd to the scrolling-sign-python-client folder
    • run using python main.py
    • install any packages missing using pip
• Arduino Uno
  • No modifications needed. Any Arduino Uno should work. There are a bunch in the innovation office
• 5V 60A PSU
• 7x 60LED/meter LED strips
  • If you want to make another one, I recommend using 90LED/meter strips for higher resolution
• Yardsticks for the back
  • Literally any backing structure will work. The LED strips are pretty versatile

Software:

• Firebase database
  • See improvements
• Python client script that updates from firebase (currently checks every X seconds - could change to streaming)
  • See improvements
• Arduino sketch
  • Probably the most important component
  • Really difficult to wrap your head around because it uses low level stuff
  • Available on github as well - pls fork it
• The config.h file contains all the parameters you need to change the basic parameters (for Teresa)
• To access the pi, SSH into it
  • Find the IP address by going on the shellfire router page and checking the latest connections
  • You can also plug in a wireless keyboard, but Gabi stole it from the pi for her fish thing lol

Improvements / To do

• Make tablet mobile-friendly
• I’m using the kraken API which may not be ideal for displaying all sorts of crypto prices
  • May want to find a better API
• Catch exceptions when there is no internet connection so the script doesn’t just stop
• You may need to replace the SD card at some point. I had to reformat it initially so it could act up in the future.
• Replace my API keys with your own API keys please lol
• Try to speed up the LED sign
  • Try putting in a “normal” Serial read and write
    • Just use readString()
  • May even want to shoot an email to the Josh guy that made it
    • In doing research Josh comments on his own post about how easy it is to add dynamic strings
• Add an interface for the twitter API.
  • May want to read up on Foundation for Apps
    • They have a really great doc page and tutorials are everywhere
    • But you could probably figure everything out just from my code
  • Just copy what I did for the other templates
  • May be tricky getting Foundation for Apps working
    • If it’s a problem, clone the repo from github - that version works for sure
• Try to fix the color problem
  • This pretty much requires you to fully understand how the code work
  • I only got so far in my understanding
  • The farthest I got was putting a special character before each character you wish to color but obviously this isn’t ideal
    • There was a problem when each invisible character causing a pause in the scrolling. Couldn’t figure it out.