Comments: ESP8266 Thing Hookup Guide

-------------------- Tech Support Tips/Troubleshooting/Common Issues --------------------

Serial Monitor and Upload Issues

If you are having issues seeing output on the serial monitor, you need to cut the DTR pin on the back of the Thing after uploading to view data sent to the serial monitor. To reupload new code, add a jumper wire to reconnect . Jim talks about it in this section of the tutorial => https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/esp8266-thing-hookup-guide/using-the-arduino-addon.

After cutting the DTR pin and happen to see random serial data in the serial monitor (with the correct baud rate settings) after powering the ESP8266, this is normal => https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B0jwgLkjMWzDM2lDUEdYSkViVkk . However, if you are not seeing any data after, most likely it has something to do with the board definition. Try using an older board definition version.

-------------------- Tech Support Tips/Troubleshooting/Common Issues --------------------

If you had the ESP8266 board compiling and uploading initially in your Arduino IDEs and now it doesn't any more, delete all instances and files related to the ESP8266 in your Arduino15 AppData. On my Windows 7 OS computer, it looks like:

C:\Users\...\AppData

Make sure to delete all copies in Local, LocalLow, and Roaming. Then uninstall the board definitions with the board manager, and then reinstall the files.

-------------------- Tech Support Tips/Troubleshooting/Common Issues --------------------

If you see this error output in Arduino v1.6.4 or v1.6.5 and you are using a Mac iOS:

Arduino: 1.6.5 (Mac OS X), Board: "SparkFun ESP8266 Thing, 80 MHz, Serial, 115200"

/Users/.../Library/Arduino15/packages/esp8266/tools/esptool/0.4.6/esptool returned 139
Error compiling.

or if you see this output in Arduino v.1.6.6 and a Mac iOS:

signal: illegal instruction
Error compiling.

The issue is probably due to the ESP8266 board definition and your Mac's iOS version. As soon as I test this on our older Mac iOS v10.7.5 Lion, I receive the same error. Testing this with our engineer's iOS v10.11 EL Capitan, there were no issues compiling. We tried different board definition versions but we were unsuccessful. We even tried deleting the definitions in the “Arduino15” Application Data folder and temporary files. I think the issue stems from the Mac operating system version and the ESP8266 build => https://github.com/esp8266/Arduino/issues/275#issuecomment-104470653.

Try using the a modified version of the esptool v0.4.6 https://github.com/igrr/esptool-ck/releases that our engineer quickly packaged through our Google Driver => https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B0jwgLkjMWzDWU1pb0RseWdtbmM. Just unzip the files and replace everything in the esptool folder located in your Arduino's App Data folder. The directory will probably be:

/Users/.../Library/Arduino15/packages/

You can also find this through the Arduino IDE and clicking on your preferences.

Otherwise, you would need to update your Mac iOS or wait until there is a fix from the ESP8266 Community.

-------------------- Tech Support Tips/Troubleshooting/Common Issues --------------------

If you see this error?

.
.
.
compilation terminated.

exit status 1
Error compiling.

You might have selected the wrong board definition or there is something wrong with the ESP8266 board definition.

-------------------- Tech Support Tips/Troubleshooting/Common Issues --------------------

**Troubleshooting Note for those using Arduino v.1.6.6 and v1.6.7... **

You need to have your modular functions set BEFORE void setup() and void loop(), otherwise the Arduino v1.6.6 and v1.6.7 compilers will not recognize the defined functions (even though they are in the same sketch file).

An example is was the old Posting to Phant example sketch for the ESP8266. Example code compiles just fine on Arduino v1.6.5 and below. In v1.6.6 and v1.6.7, you would need to move the setup() and loop() functions to the bottom of the sketch after connectWiFi(), initHardware(), and postToPhant(), to compile. Otherwise, you will might see these compilation errors:

.
.
.
C:\Users\bobby.chan\Downloads\ESP8266_Phant\ESP8266_Phant\ESP8266_Phant.ino: In function 'void setup()':
ESP8266_Phant:35: error: 'initHardware' was not declared in this scope

initHardware();
            ^

ESP8266_Phant:36: error: 'connectWiFi' was not declared in this scope

connectWiFi();
           ^

C:\Users\bobby.chan\Downloads\ESP8266_Phant\ESP8266_Phant\ESP8266_Phant.ino: In function 'void loop()':
ESP8266_Phant:44: error: 'postToPhant' was not declared in this scope

     if (postToPhant())
                 ^
exit status 1
'initHardware' was not declared in this scope

In the ESP8266 Thing Hook Up guide - AP Web Server sketch... Where was the ip address of 192.168.4.1/ set?

I plugged in the 3.7V battery that you show in your description of how to power it up. It started to steam? Any thoughts?

Just a heads-up in 2021: I cannot upload with anything newer than version 2.5.2 of the add-on.

Arduino 1.8.13 on macOS 11.2.1.

I'm just starting out with ESP8266 and rely heavily on examples. I had things like operating an LED through a web server example to a phone, but did not find many digital input (switch) examples. I tried the AP web server example listed here, but got seriously confused at the MAC part of the code. Firstly, it would have been useful to explain what the ESP8266 MAC is, and also, how to enter it in the code supplied. I found the MAC here https://techtutorialsx.com/2017/04/09/esp8266-get-mac-address/ It's a 48 bit code comprised of 6 eight bit values. The first three, reading left to right, are the manufacturer code (Espressif), the two right-hand values are used in the code. What worked for me was mac[6] = {0xAA,0xBB,0xCC,0xDD,0xEE,0xFF} substitute your own six values.

I would like to know if the bootloader can be modified to not flash built-in LED (pin #5) upon booting up. Thanks

If I have sensors set up on 5,0,4,13,12 and xpd set for deepsleep. Have I used up all my pins? or can I use 2 & 14 as well?

For some reason, my 'thing' has suddenly forgotten how to run the sketch on restart - it always drops directly into boot loader mode and stays there. When I hook up a terminal I see 'boot mode:(1,6)' which tells me that GPIO/DTR is low, but this happens even if I pull that pin up manually with a 4.7k resistor. I can download new sketches and they run fine the first time, but once the device is power cycled, it always just sits in boot loader mode. I had recently upgraded to arduino IDE 1.8 and v2.3 of the ESP8266 tools, but even downgrading back down to 1.6.x and older 8266 tools does not change the behavior.

How can I get my thing unstuck from boot loader mode and run the sketch that is already onboard?

Is it possible to set up an LCD to this system? so I can see the sensor values that I have hooked up to the I2C connections on the Thing?

Just posting this in case someone got the same error as me : warning: espcomm_sync failed error: espcomm_open failed I had connected my Reset pin to D0 to put the board to deep sleep and then tried uploading the code . So obviously it was unable to upload the code and so i removed the connection then uploaded and connected back to reset pin.

I got up and running very easily after setting up Arduino for 8266 on OS/X El Capitan. I am just using a USB cable and have not needed to use a separate FTDI cable.

The note above seems to imply that you need both USB for power and the FTDI module for the actual loading. Which is true?

Hello Everyone, does anyone know if any of the PINS on this Thing are PWM? I am trying 5, 0 , 4 and 15, without success.

Excellent hookup guide - as always. As a user making the first pass 4 suggestions.

1) Include the 90 degree headers with the unit. Those are not "usual" and certainly make connecting the FTDI basic easier. Without them it is a very tight fit on the breadboard. Especially as the "chip" side of the FTDI needs to face the board and the connectors are on the back side.

2) Also include a spare jumper (for us to solder if desired) for the DTR jumper. Debugging is step 1 in learning. Don't make us order another (very inexpensive) part. Wait for shipping, etc....

3) I would suggest adding a pointer in this hookup guide pointing to the page to download the FTDI basic driver. It was easy to find, but I had to search google to find my way right back to another great Sparkfun guide. Once I found it the fix was trivial.

4) Lastly, it would be nice to have a comment about the compile errors that happen with the declarations in arduino IDE > 1.6.6. The fix is again, trivial and easy. The hardest part was finding it.

Four comments aside - thanks guys for a great product and a super detailed hookup guide. Got up and running on the first pass. Keep up the good work.

Hello all,

Can anyone please guide me how to establish a wifi direct or P2P or softAP between a ESP8266 or sparkfun ESP8266 Thing and android device?

Is anybody using custom NodeMCU images (from http://nodemcu-build.com/index.php) on their Thing? I have flashed a few different images and I can connect serially, but after a few keystrokes in the lua interpreter it always reboots. Does this problem sound familiar to anyone? TIA. -peter

Can the Thing backup data so that when it's offline, the next data point doesn't replace the previous data point before it gets streamed?

I have been studying the AP Web Server example and can not figure out how the IP address "192.168.4.1" is set. Can you fill me in on where that is happening?

I have found little on the internet talking about how to use OSC (Open Sound Control) or any UDP message with ESP8266. There is one topic: http://www.esp8266.com/viewtopic.php?p=29149 that teaches how to use ESP8266 connected through serial to a teensy 3.1 to send SLIP (Serial Line Internet Protocol) OSC messages.

Does anyone know how to send OSC messages or any UDP directly from ESP8266 thing? I believe I can achieve a much faster data rate and lower latency not needing to bypass the information through a serial line.

Thanks!

https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/esp8266-thing-hookup-guide/example-sketch-ap-web-server

I cannot get this to compile. setupWiFi and initHardware are both missing. Any help would be appreciated. Jon

OSX 10.9.5, Arduino 1.6.7, ESP8266 Thing Dev

For the Posting to Phant sketch the following turned out to be needed:

-- Function prototypes before Setup to avoid compilation errors:

void connectWiFi();

void initHardware();

int postToPhant();

-- Connect GPIO 0 to ground to avoid espcomm_sync failed error

The sketch now downloads and runs, but does not connect, with continual blinking blue LED. Other devices seem to connect OK with the same network parameters. Any suggestions?

If you'd like to avoid cutting the DTR pin, you can select the following option in CoolTerm : "Initial Line States when Port opens: DTR Off". Got serial communication working for me.

I put the (modified) AP Web Server sketch in an adafruit Huzzah. It does work.

fixed issues:

huzzah built-in led is on pin 0

huzzah led on pin 0 is reversed - pullup on that pin(?). several small edits to accommodate this.

ongoing issues:

----------------------------CANNOT get the <INITIAL> AP Web Server sketch's WiFi configuration OUT of the ESP8266.--------------------------------

Downloading another sketch does not clear the WiFi config - whether the sketch is the AP Web Server or another WiFi sketch. In my wireless devices, the AP 'ESP8266 Thing 7448' appears whenever this huzzah board is powered. Doesn't matter which sketch is in it. Changing the password (WiFiAPPSK) in this sketch and then downloading, does NOT take effect. Changing the AP_NameString in this sketch and then downloading, does NOT take effect.

WOW, Working On Whitespace

EDIT: I found some notes over at jeelabs(github) about a 'blank.bin' to clear wifi configuration. I'll report back.

EDIT: Forget it. I must have used some invalid info. I changed the WiFiAPPSK[]= line to an 8-char pw andthe SSID/PW change works. I power-cycled than downloaded the sketch.

So far I can't seem to get the ESP8266 Thing to work. The board definitions for the Arduino IDE won't even download on OSX because of SSL errors. I can get the blink sketch to work on Linux, but no internet connectivity. In contrast, I was able to get a Photon board up and running on my local network, so I know this isn't a network issue per-se. The hookup guide provides no help when one of the setup steps fails. I'm not even sure where to start debugging this. It seems that the ESP8266 ThingDev is still too experimental and buggy compared to, say, Arduino boards.

I can't get AT commands to display without griberish on the serial monitor. I followed exactly the directions of cutting the trace on the DTR jumper, added a removable jumper. When jumper is on I can upload sketches. With or without the jumper, i get griberish on the serial output. This does not work as described! HELP

Help!! And/Or What is going on here??

Had some major issues with getting ESP8266 Thing up & running on a new Mac / El Capitan. Downloaded Arduino 1.6.6 & added Board Manager from http://arduino.esp8266.com/stable/package_esp8266com_index.json. Tried to Verify previous working Thing code and got the message "max not defined in current scope." Oddly, the compiler pointed out that there were alternatives in .../Arduino15/packages/esp8266/tools/...

Also would not recognize other functions (i.e xxx not defined...) unless I put "classic" C headers up in front of the code. Went through a number of machinations. Finally got things working by installing Arduino 1.6.5 & using the Old SparkFun ESP8266 Thing board definitions: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/sparkfun/Arduino_Boards/master/IDE_Board_Manager/package_sparkfun_index.json, after stumbling across this comment section/forum.

Is this some unique problem I'm having? (and if so, how would I fix this?) If this is widespread, I would have expected to see it up front on the hookup guide. I know that there are some issues with the current GitHub esp8266 and Arduino 1.6.6 (Also not stated prominently in the hookup guide) but I tried 1.6.5 and the "current" Board Manager listed in the hookup guide, but no luck. And I know El Cap has been an issue for a lot of third party developers, as it now protects portions of the system that some have traditionally "dumped" resources into. Conversely, Hookup guide should address Mac specific issues up front, as it appears there are configurations that will work.

Update...

So, using the above configuration got the code to compile, BUT - after downloading, the Thing just keeps going into wdt reset mode. I can disable the watchdog timer with wdt_disable(); , but then the code just seems to freeze. Still haven't actually gotten the Thing to work under Mac/El Cap, although was programming fine under Yosemite and Arduino 1.6.4.

Hello, I followed the tutorial up through the "posting to phant" example. I have tried two different wireless networks, and neither seems to work: I upload the sketch and just get a blinking blue LED indicating that no connection is made. Are there suggested next steps for debugging?

*** PLEASE HELP ***

Has anyone been able to use the ESP to connect to and download data from a server - and use that data as commands - for example to turn some LEDs on/off? (does anyone understand the +IPD protocol)?

I'd like to create an app that allows my daughter to use a web/app interface to turn some LEDs attached to ESP/Arduino on/off. The web/app interface is super simple. All it does is update a text file on my server. The file is 12 bits, each representing an LED attached to ESP/Arduino.

I'm also able to connect to the server and download the content of the text file, using a GET over HTTP. However,

I DO NOT UNDERSTAND this +IPD protocol that the ESP uses. While I can print the contents of the file to Serial Monitor, I am not able to use those 12 bits, for example, to assign them to an array.

I am happy to share all the code, etc as needed. PLEASE HELP - and THANK YOU.

I was able to get the "Blink" sketch to work and I could connect to my router with the sketch "Posting to Phant" if i commented out the Phant library calls. I am connecting to a standalone router because of network/firewall limitations. I made the "AP Web Server" sketch work by substituing WiFi.mode(WIFI_AP) with WiFi.mode(WIFI_STA). I found about 18 examples for the ESP8266 installed by the ESP8266 Arduino Addon and tried them. None of the examples worked. Are the examples designed to work with the ESP-01 module(WRL-13678)? Is the ESP8266 Thing somehow different than the ESP-01 module? The code compiles and uploads and the board connects to the router. The WiFiScan and WiFiWebServer examples print gibberish to the serial monitor and the WiFiWebServer cannot be contacted by a web browser. Any ideas what I am doing wrong?

For the SPI bus, you mention pin 15 for CS. Where do I find pin 15?

Has anyone had any luck with the on-board TMP102? I tried the sample code on the TMP102 product page; no go—it returns all 1's in both registers.

A link to the example: http://bildr.org/2011/01/tmp102-arduino/

EDIT--- Serial Monitor output for example code: Celsius: 255.94 Fahrenheit: 492.69

I got Blink working, and then was working through the Posting to Phant tutorial.

I downloaded the Phant library and added to Documents/Arduino/libraries/Phant/ Then used the Arduino Library manager to see that it was available. On compile I get: /Users/spencerogden/Documents/Arduino/libraries/Phant/src/Phant.cpp:23:26: fatal error: avr/pgmspace.h: No such file or directory #include <avr/pgmspace.h>

Am I missing a library? Since everything else is spelled out very clearly, a note that you have to install the Phant library on this page would be helpful.

There's a bug in Example Sketch: AP Web Server.

memset(AP_NameChar, AP_NameString.length() + 1, 0);

should be:

memset(AP_NameChar, 0, AP_NameString.length() + 1);

Was wondering why I get open network, rather than intended WPA2-PSK network.

Is there any way to read the status of the battery or charging? For example, to provide low battery indication.