The first ESP32 device I’ve bought is the M5Stack Core, which I shorten to M5Core. Here’s the official product page. The “5” is supposed to mean “5 centimeters”, which should be the dimension of the device (it is square) but in reality that’s the dimension of the circuit boards inside. The module itself measures 54 x 54 mm.
Update : Nucleo and STM32CubeIDE
Now that you know what an STM32 is and what it looks like, it’s time to get your hands on one and get it to do stuff. Ambitious stuff. Like blinking an LED. Dizzying heights of human achievement.
New ! Nucleo and STM32CubeIDE
Now that you know what an STM32 is and what it looks like, it’s time to get your hands on one and get it to do stuff. Ambitious stuff. Like blinking an LED. Dizzying heights of human achievement.
Update : STM32 Basics
A Bit of Etymology
The STM32 family of microcontrollers has a very obvious and unoriginal name : it’s made by STMicroelectronics and it’s 32-bit microcontrollers. I like it when a big corporation doesn’t waste effort coming up with esoteric product names or puns such as “Spresense” or “Raspberry Pi”. We’re technical people, a bunch of letters and numbers that obey a simple logic is all we need. I mean, I have trouble remembering the names of people I haven’t seen for a month, do you honestly expect me to remember fancy product names ? Know you audience !
New ! Getting Started with STM32
A journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step. This section covers more than one.
Update : STM32
ST’s STM32 microcontrollers are a very successful implementation of ARM’s Cortex-M family of 32-bit cores. In my opinion, a big part of that success is their ease of use : ST provides low-cost modules and development kits that beat the living crap out of Arduinos, and the software development tools to match. This section covers all sorts of information on how to use them, both in terms of hardware and software. The topic is vast.
Update : Microcontrollers
Chances are, if you found this site then you already know what a microcontroller is. But you might also be here to educate yourself, in which case you should read this post to get a very brief introduction. Fair warning : this post contains a lot of TLA, Three-Letter Acronyms. This section contains compendiums covering every aspect of using microcontrollers, both hardware and software. I’m mostly interested in STM32 microcontrollers, but not exclusively. And if you’re expecting Arduino, expect again. As with everything on this site (and as Ryan Reynolds would say), I’m only dealing with the pro shit.
Update : ROS
The Robot Operating System is an open-source project that is essentially middleware between Linux, sensors, actuators and algorithms. Its purpose is to facilitate the design, debugging and operation of software for robots. If you want to move away from amateur-hour spaghetti code and create software you can build upon, robot after robot, then a middleware (or framework) like ROS is an absolute necessity. That is not open to debate outside the confine of YouTube commenteers who’ve never built a robot or programmed anything more complex than a pocket calculator. You don’t want to be that guy.
Update : Robotics
This section is dedicated to robotics building blocks and applications : this is where I keep track of my progress with core technologies such as operating systems, algorithms, mechanisms… and it is also where I document my own creations.