The day before Makers around the world celebrated Arduino day on March 28, 2015, major news quietly hit theย ESP8266 forums. A post by Richard Sloanย declared that he and Ivan Grokhotkov hadย successfully hacked ESP8266 support intoย the Arduino IDE. For those following theย forum this announcement was a big deal;ย for everyone else, it would be a week orย two before Sloan and Grokhotkovโs workย resonated: The ESP8266, until then usedย only as a Wi-Fi accessory for Arduinosย and other microcontrollers, could beย programmed directly as a standalone board.
Available for $3-$7 (even less inย quantity), the ย ESP8266 was originallyย designed as a Wi-Fi communicationย expansion board. Prior to Sloan andย Grokhotkovโs software, users had alreadyย noted that it could be programmed usingย basic modem instructions known asย AT-commands. Microcontrollers easilyย parse AT commands, but they are notย fun for humans to work with. Developingย an interface with more user-friendlyย programming language, such as theย C/C++ familiar to Arduino sketch programmers,ย is what made the ESP8266ย vastly more popular.
The Espressif Systems ESP8266-01 lacks an FTDI chip, whichย typically allows a board to have an externalย communication port like USB, so youย have to use a separate hardware interfaceย such as the FTDI Friend to program it.ย Fortunately, instructions are now easilyย available to set everything up properly.
Thanks to these software improvements,ย itโs easier than ever for people to createย projects with the ESP8266 at the center ofย their design. Internet of Things projects,ย such as data logging stations or panicย buttons, are the most common. With each project, small Arduinoย sketches run directly on the ESP8266 andย shuttle data between the input pins and theย Wi-Fi connection.
Espressif Systems, the company thatย manufactures the ESP8266, has been soย receptive to feedback about their productย and how it is being used that their nextย board, the ESP32, is integrating much of theย communityโs suggestions into the design.ย Now entering a beta phase, the new boardย is planned to have faster Wi-Fi, onboardย Bluetooth, and two processors to handle theย Wi-Fi and code execution separately.
Whether itโs adding Wi-Fi to a board thatย lacks it (such as the Pi Zero), or simply runningย the ESP8266 in a standalone mode, theย board is certainly worth experimenting with,ย and cheap enough to buy a bunch.
