Ivor

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• Espruinofone

  @Ivor started

  • 4 comments
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  @Jean-Philippe_Rey replied
• Espruinofone

  in Projects • 2 days, 17 hours

  

  However it's quite a lot of work

  Yeah well, everyone needs a hobby. :D
  Definitely some interesting phone modules, albeit most of the breakout all-in-ones seem to be 2G only. So a custom board is probably the way to go, might have a play.

  not much better than a Nokia candybar phone

  Yeah I still use an ancient Sony dumbphone when I don't need connectivity, but I like the flexibility of the js runtime you've created with espruino which you'd still be missing on a candybar.
  Just thinking the hybrid of a flexible "bangle" style ecosystem on a handheld but with the added built in connectivity and obviously phone functionality might be fun.

• Espruinofone

  in Projects • 6 days, 17 hours

  

  This is just pondering/thinking out loud....
  I've been going through a phase of really disliking pretty much any current/modern smartphone, and I had been looking and pondering alternatives and saw devices such as:
  https://www.thelightphone.com/ although as far as I can see that's still just an android phone under the skin, but stripped down, so still limited hacking ability.
  but seeing components like this: https://www.dfrobot.com/product-2323.htm­l made me wonder, could a reasonable hackable espruino driven phone be constructed with a small number of basic off the shelf components?
  (I had pondered the rak5010 for the guts since I'm very familiar with it, and it's got an impressive set of features, but looks like the BG9x only has VoLTE)

• Automatic cat litter box.

  in Projects • 1 week, 2 days

  

  Loving (and watching) this project, I actually have, and use one of the LitterRobots which is actually pretty good to use day-to-day, although I have been meaning to modify/work with the onboard control board at some point which could be better.
  having said that - I have a higher priority project to work on first which is to figure out the protocol for the SurePet cat flaps, since their software/setup is really lacking (aka dumb as a box of bricks).
  (even with "internet" control it needs DST manually updating, and loses all it's timing settings when you change the batteries🤦♂️)

• Banglejs2 becomes discoverable from time to time even when BLE is off

  in Bangle.js • 9 months

  

  Someone correct me if I'm wrong... but I believe what's happening here is that during the bootloader the bluetooth hardware is initialised before espruino starts to run, the fact that your other device had stored the bluetooth mac address means that it detects, recognises and shows up the device during this process. Then once it boots the bluetooth is disabled.
  This is how you can flash and update the device when it powers up/doesn't boot. I expect the bootloader code could be changed to not activate bluetooth at all, but would make it less user friendly if it needed to be bootable to be able to flash.
  I guess/expect that code could be added to set a permanent flag that the bootloader could read during initialisation (although I've not looked at the bootloader code), but again that would open the possibility of ending up with a non-flashable device.

• Reboot to DFU?

  in Puck.js, Pixl.js and MDBT42 • 9 months, 1 week

  

  I've not tried/done it from espruino... but in my nrf code the steps to get to DFU are:

  1. disable softdevice
     
  2. disable interrupts (NVIC->ICER & NVIC->ICPR [0&1] = 0xffffffff)
     
  3. write 0x57 into GPREGRET
     
  4. call NVIC_SystemReset()
     
• Chipping in to buy José Rebelo of Gadgetbridge a Bangle 2

  in Bangle.js • 9 months, 1 week

  

  Superb! and welcome!

  and it's quite weird to not have to reverse engineer a device for a change

  bah, but that's half the fun. 😉

• I demand BangleJS3!

  in Bangle.js • 9 months, 1 week

  

  Runs a build of Android. Apparently uses a chinese "Ingenic M200" cpu - http://www.ingenic.com.cn/en/?newton/id/­13.html so no, unlikely to be an option for Espruino.

• Is there a way to get a replacement screen?

  in Bangle.js • 9 months, 3 weeks

  

  So.... this will be "half a guide" reasons at the end. ☹
  Disassembly was relatively straightforward if a little tricky, if I was more organised and had the setup I should have made a video, so I will try to describe. Can't see how to re-order pictures so attached show (pic 3) the black tape peeled away, (pic 4) the screen with the tape removed, (pic 5). all the backlight parts.
  I used a soldering hot-air gun to soften the glue, but I expect a hair-dryer could be used instead just as effectively, firstly on the screen itself and then used a suction cup to pull the screen away.
  The back of the screen is covered in a black plastic tape, this is very sticky and needs patience to remove, again - used the hot-air to soften the glue and peeled away from the top holding the screen back as it peeled, this tore where it joined the LCD cables at the base, I was assuming I'd just cut a strip of tape to replace it with, but it you're careful you could probably re-use this.
  Next I used tweezers to pull the black plastic cover away, this seemed to be clipped around the edges.
  Next (more warming) and the thin white plastic sheet is glued around the edges and needs pulling away again from the top, this should come away with the solid clear diffuser.
  Now all the parts ready to fit to the new screen in reverse, place the white sheet into the black frame with the black edging upwards, LED's down (pic 2), then clip the frame onto the back of the LCD (pic 1), finally clip the diffuser into the back of the frame and connect the ribbon cable into the screen socket.
  And now the failure. Connecting up the new screen discover that the watch was indeed destroyed in the accident and is completely dead, so I can't add a guide to finishing the reassembly and confirming that the backlight works.

• Is there a way to get a replacement screen?

  in Bangle.js • 9 months, 3 weeks

  

  Indeed, will take some pics and describe how it goes (assuming it's not an abject failure) 😁 also hoping the watch is still ok, it took quite a drop. 😬