Episode 10: Four Topics and an Interview
Welcome
Welcome to the first newsletter from The Bootloader! We have some notes from the latest episode for you, some interesting links that didn't make it into the show, and updates from your two hosts.
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Show Highlights
Last week's episode featured CircuitPython, starting with some new intermediate to advanced videos from Professor John Gallaugher. For macOS (and most Linux) users, he walks through setting up PyCharm to work with CircuitPython, tio for a serial monitor, and using circup to install and update libraries.
Tod shared a number of links about embedded Swift, including a video from Apple. Tod also shared his ongoing journey to using only open source software and migrating from Fusion to CadQuery. CadQuery uses Python for scripting and can also output STEP files in addition to STL.
Lastly, it was back to CircuitPython and we wrapped it up with our first ever interview. Back in Episode 7 in The CircuitPython 9 Release Show, I made a passing reference to the new ConnectionManager library, but only guessed at what it did. I made sure to fix that and reached out to the author, Justin Myers. We had a nice chat about the need for ConnectionManager, partnering with the core developers to bring it to life, and what's next for ConnectionManager.
Leftover Links
These are interesting things we found but didn't make it into the show.
- 3D Printing With a Twist by Al Williams at Hackaday. There's no practical purpose to it, but now you can add a twist to any STL you want to 3D print.
- The Filament Color Library catalogs the real colors of just about every filament ever made (or so it feels like).
- Swapping Vinyl For Cardboard With This ESP32 Turntable by Bryan Cockfield at Hackaday: If you know me, you know I love vinyl records. I was amused to see this "working" cardboard music player using an ESP32 and an SD card.
From the hosts
Paul
What I'm working on: I've been taking one of the latest courses from Talk Python to Me, a free one called Build An Audio AI App Course. It's a nice refresher course on FastAPI and HTMX and uses podcast data to generate transcripts, summaries, and a chatbot using AssemblyAI.
What I'm reading: Critical Mass by Daniel Suarez. The second in a two book series, this techno-space thriller takes place in the near future with the goal of humans mining asteroids. My summary doesn't do it justice, I flew threw the first book in the series, Delta-V, and am really enjoying its sequel.
What I'm watching: Dark Matter on AppleTV+. AppleTV+ has become the home of some really good sci-fi, from For All Mankind to Severance to Foundation to Dark Matter.
What I'm listening to: The Decemberists - As It Ever Was, So It Will Be Again
Tod
What I'm working on: I'm finally updating my pico_test_synth project (and soon, qtpy_synth) to support Arduino. These Arduino examples will use the Mozzi synth lib.
The main stumbling block is the GUI for the little OLED screen! I spent a whole afternoon trying to find a decent GUI library that worked with either Adafruit_GFX or U8g2 and came up empty. Some of the ones I considered:
- U8g2 "MUI" -- ugly hard-to-read config
- GEM -- Easy to config, only simple menus, can only edit numeric values digit-by-digit
- ArduinoMenu -- only simple menus, no other controls
- tcMenuLib -- huge and unwieldy for small projects
- LVGL -- overkill and unsupported for SSD1306 OLEDs it seems
So for now I'm building a simple handmade GUI. I'm unhappy with it from several angles, but at least it's something. And I'm reloading into my brain ancient C++ knowledge I'd swapped out to get the UI to be data-driven. If anyone has an Arduino GUI library they're a fan of, let me know!
What I'm watching: The Expanse on Amazon Prime. Finally re-watching it as a complete work. It's incredible. I wish there were more hard sci-fi like this. Perhaps with less 'jerks-ruin-the-amazing' storylines.
What I'm listening to: Mostly just various ambient/chill channels on Soma FM.
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You made it to the end! You deserve a dog picture.
Until next time - stay positive!
