Examples and demos

Various examples are provided for fast library evaluation on embedded systems. These are prepared and maintained for 2 platforms, but could be easily extended to more platforms:

  • WIN32 examples, prepared as CMake projects, ready for MSYS2 GCC compiler

  • ARM Cortex-M examples for STM32, prepared as STM32CubeIDE GCC projects. These are also supported in Visual Studio Code through CMake and ninja build system. Dedicated tutorial is available to get started in VSCode.

Note

Library is platform agnostic and can be used on many different products

Example architectures

There are many platforms available today on a market, however supporting them all would be tough task for single person. Therefore it has been decided to support (for purpose of examples) 2 platforms only, WIN32 and STM32.

WIN32

Examples for WIN32 are CMake-ready and VSCode-ready. It utilizes CMake-presets feature to let you select the example and compile it directly.

  • Make sure you have installed GCC compiler and is in env path (you can get it through MSYS2 packet manager)

  • Install ninja and cmake and make them available in the path (you can get all through MSYS2 packet manager)

  • Go to examples win32 folder, open vscode there or run cmd: cmake --preset <project name> to configure cmake and later cmake --build --preset <project name> to compile the project

Application opens COM port, set in the low-level driver. External USB to UART converter (FTDI-like device) is necessary in order to connect to ESP device.

Note

ESP device is connected with USB to UART converter only by RX and TX pins.

Device driver is located in /lwesp/src/system/lwesp_ll_win32.c

STM32

Embedded market is supported by many vendors and STMicroelectronics is, with their STM32 series of microcontrollers, one of the most important players. There are numerous amount of examples and topics related to this architecture.

Examples for STM32 are natively supported with STM32CubeIDE, an official development IDE from STMicroelectronics.

You can run examples on one of official development boards, available in repository examples.

Supported development boards

Board name

ESP settings

Debug settings

UART

MTX

MRX

RST

GP0

GP2

CHPD

UART

MDTX

MDRX

STM32F769I-Discovery

UART5

PC12

PD2

PJ14

USART1

PA9

PA10

STM32F723E-Discovery

UART5

PC12

PD2

PG14

PD6

PD3

USART6

PC6

PC7

STM32L496G-Discovery

USART1

PB6

PG10

PB2

PH2

PA0

PA4

USART2

PA2

PD6

STM32L432KC-Nucleo

USART1

PA9

PA10

PA12

PA7

PA6

PB0

USART2

PA2

PA3

STM32F429ZI-Nucleo

USART2

PD5

PD6

PD1

PD4

PD7

PD3

USART3

PD8

PD9

Pins to connect with ESP device:

  • MTX: MCU TX pin, connected to ESP RX pin

  • MRX: MCU RX pin, connected to ESP TX pin

  • RST: MCU output pin to control reset state of ESP device

  • GP0: GPIO0 pin of ESP8266, connected to MCU, configured as output at MCU side

  • GP2: GPIO2 pin of ESP8266, connected to MCU, configured as output at MCU side

  • CHPD: CH_PD pin of ESP8266, connected to MCU, configured as output at MCU side

Note

GP0, GP2, CH_PD pins are not always necessary for ESP device to work properly. When not used, these pins must be tied to fixed values as explained in ESP datasheet.

Other pins are for your information and are used for debugging purposes on board.

  • MDTX: MCU Debug TX pin, connected via on-board ST-Link to PC

  • MDRX: MCU Debug RX pin, connected via on-board ST-Link to PC

  • Baudrate is always set to 921600 bauds

Examples list

Here is a list of all examples coming with this library.

Tip

Examples are located in /examples/ folder in downloaded package. Check Download library section to get your package.

Warning

Several examples need to connect to access point first, then they may start client connection or pinging server. Application needs to modify file /snippets/station_manager.c and update ap_list variable with preferred access points, in order to allow ESP to connect to home/local network

Access point

ESP device is configured as software access point, allowing stations to connect to it. When station connects to access point, it will output its MAC and IP addresses.

Client

Application tries to connect to custom server with classic, event-based API. It starts concurrent connections and processes data in its event callback function.

Server

It starts server on port 80 in event based connection mode. Every client is processed in callback function.

When ESP is successfully connected to access point, it is possible to connect to it using its assigned IP address.

Domain name server

ESP tries to get domain name from specific domain name, example.com as an example. It needs to be connected to access point to have access to global internet.

MQTT Client

This example demonstrates raw MQTT connection to mosquitto test server. A new application thread is started after ESP successfully connects to access point. MQTT application starts by initiating a new TCP connection.

This is event-based example as there is no linear code.

MQTT Client API

Similar to MQTT Client examples, but it uses separate thread to process events in blocking mode. Application does not use events to process data, rather it uses blocking API to receive packets

Netconn client

Netconn client is based on sequential API. It starts connection to server, sends initial request and then waits to receive data.

Processing is in separate thread and fully sequential, no callbacks or events.

Netconn server

Netconn server is based on sequential API. It starts server on specific port (see example details) and it waits for new client in separate threads. Once new client has been accepted, it waits for client request and processes data accordingly by sending reply message back.

Tip

Server may accept multiple clients at the same time