Skip to content

AEFeinstein/Super-2023-Swadge-FW

Folders and files

NameName
Last commit message
Last commit date

Latest commit

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Repository files navigation

Welcome

This is the firmware repository for the Super Magfest 2023 Swadge.

The corresponding hardware repository for the Super Magfest 2023 Swadge can be found here.

If you have any questions, feel free to create a Github ticket or email us at [email protected].

This is living documentation, so if you notice anything incorrect, please open a ticket and/or submit a pull request with a fix!

Table of Contents

Continuous Integration

This project uses CircleCI to automatically build the firmware any time a change is pushed to main. Eventually it will notify our Slack channel whenever there is a fresh executable. I hope the build is currently passing!

AEFeinstein

Configuring Your Environment

No matter your environment, you'll need to first install git. Just google it.

You must follow the instructions on this page, but I recommend reading through the official ESP32-S2 Get Started Guide for setting up a development environment for more context or if something written here doesn't work anymore. When given the option, use command line tools instead of installer programs.

From the official guide:

Keep in mind that ESP-IDF does not support spaces in paths.

By default this guide sets up ESP-IDF in your home directory, so if your username has a space in it, please change all paths to something without a space, like c:\esp\. Also note that ccache uses a temporary directory in your home directory, and spaces in that path cause issues. ccache is enabled by default when running export.ps1, but it can be disabled by removing the following from esp-idf/tools/tools.json:

"export_vars": {
  "IDF_CCACHE_ENABLE": "1"
},

For Windows and Linux, I recommend setting up native tools. I don't recommend WSL in Windows. I haven't tried any setup on macOS yet.

When building an ESP32 project, the default components in the IDF may be overridden. To override a component, create a directory in the local components/ directory with the same name as a component in the IDF. This project overrides freemodbus and wpa_supplicant to effectively remove the components from the firmware and tinyusb to add USB HID gamepad support.

This project uses CircleCI to build the firmware each time code is committed to main. As a consequence, you can always read the config.yml to see how the Windows build environment is set up from scratch for both the firmware and emulator.

Windows (Powershell)

Git

Did you already install git from Configuring Your Environment? If not, do that now.

Python

Install Python 3.10 for Windows.

Warning

Do not install Python 3.11 or any newer version! You may install a newer update of Python 3.10 from the releases page.

When installing Python, make sure to check off "Add Python to environment variables":

The Python installer with the "Add Python to environment variables" option checked.

Preparation to run PowerShell scripts

Before you can run any PowerShell scripts from this repository, run this command in a PowerShell prompt to enable execution of downloaded scripts:

Set-ExecutionPolicy -Scope CurrentUser Unrestricted

After that, clone this repository to the location of your choice. The script below puts it in ~\esp\Super-2023-Swadge-FW, but you can modify it to wherever you want.

cd ~\esp\
git clone https://github.com/AEFeinstein/Super-2023-Swadge-FW.git
cd Super-2023-Swadge-FW
git submodule update --init --recursive

MSYS2

Next, you'll want to run the following PowerShell from the repository script to download, install, and update msys2 in one shot. Feel free to replace C:\ with a different path if you want. Note that there may be a more up-to-date installer than the one used in this script.

.\setup-msys2.ps1

Alternatively, install msys2 with their installer. Once you have an msys2 shell, the command to install required packages for building from an msys2 terminal after installing msys2 is:

pacman -S base-devel mingw-w64-x86_64-toolchain make zip mingw-w64-x86_64-python-pip

After installing msys2, you'll need to add it to Windows's path variable. Here are some instructions on how to do that. You must add C:\msys64\mingw64\bin and C:\msys64\usr\bin to the path, in that order, and before C:\Windows\System32. That's because two different find.exe programs exist, one in msys2 and one in System32, and the makefile expects the msys2 one.

The msys2 path variables must come after the Python path variables. You may have to move the Python variables up the list. If you don't see the Python variables, and you're sure you checked off the option in the Python installer, they may be in the Path in User variables rather than System variables. If so, cut and paste them from the Path list in User Variables to the Path list in System variables.

When it's all set up, it should look something like this:

image

ESP-IDF

To set up the ESP32 toolchain, you can run the following powershell script from the repository. It will install the IDF in ~/esp/esp-idf and the tools in ~/.espressif. I don't recommend changing those paths.

.\setup-esp-idf.ps1

Note that export.ps1, which is called in that script, does not make any permanent changes and it must be run each time you open a new terminal for a build.

Warning

Sometimes install.ps1, which is also called in that script, can be a bit finicky and not install everything it's supposed to. If it doesn't create a ~/.espressif/python_env folder, try running it again. And again. And again. As a last resort you can try editing install.ps1 and swap the "Setting up Python environment" and "Installing ESP-IDF tools" sections to set up the Python environment first.

Linux

To set up the ESP32 build environment, you can run this bash script. It will install the IDF in ~/esp/esp-idf and the tools in ~/.espressif. I don't recommend changing those paths.

# Make an esp folder and move into it
mkdir ~/esp
cd ~/esp

# Clone the IDF and move into it
git clone -b v4.4.3 --recursive https://github.com/espressif/esp-idf.git esp-idf
cd ~/esp/esp-idf

# Initialize submodules
git submodule update --init --recursive

# Install tools
./install.sh

# Export paths and variables
./export.sh

To set up the emulator build environment, you'll need to install the following packages. If your system uses the apt package manager, use this command:

sudo apt install build-essential xorg-dev libx11-dev libxinerama-dev libxext-dev mesa-common-dev libglu1-mesa-dev libasound2-dev libpulse-dev libasan8

Or if your system uses the dnf package manager, use these commands:

sudo dnf group install "C Development Tools and Libraries" "Development Tools"
sudo dnf install libX11-devel libXinerama-devel libXext-devel mesa-libGLU-devel alsa-lib-devel pulseaudio-libs-devel libudev-devel cmake libasan8

macOS

TBD

Configuring VSCode

For all OSes, I recommend using the Visual Studio Code IDE and the Espressif Extension.

If you've already configured your environment, which you should have, then when setting up the extension for the first time, point the extension at the existing IDF and tools rather than installing new ones. Remember that the IDF should exist in ~/esp/esp-idf and the tools should exist in ~/.espressif/.

The .vscode folder already has tasks for making and cleaning the emulator. It also has launch settings for launching the emulator with gdb attached. To build the firmware from VSCode, use the espressif extension buttons on the bottom toolbar. The build icon looks like a cylinder. Hover over the other icons to see what they do.

I also recommend installing the Doxygen Documentation Generator plugin to generate Doxygen comments and the Astyle plugin to automatically format code with this project's .astylerc file.

Building and Flashing Firmware

  1. Clone this repository if you don't have it already.

    cd ~/esp/
    git clone https://github.com/AEFeinstein/Super-2023-Swadge-FW.git
    cd Super-2023-Swadge-FW
    git submodule update --init --recursive
  2. Make sure the IDF symbols are exported. This example is for Windows, so the actual command may be different for your OS.

    ~/esp/esp-idf/export.ps1
  3. Build, flash, and monitor with a single command. Note in this example the ESP is connected to COM8, and the serial port will likely be different on your system.

    idf.py -p COM8 -b 2000000 build flash monitor
  4. Close the monitor with ctrl + ]

Building and Running the Emulator

  1. Clone this repository if you don't have it already. You probably already have it from the prior step but it never hurt to mention.

    cd ~/esp/
    git clone https://github.com/AEFeinstein/Super-2023-Swadge-FW.git
    cd Super-2023-Swadge-FW
    git submodule update --init --recursive
  2. Build the emulator. Simple

    make -f emu.mk clean all
  3. Run the emulator. Also simple.

    swadge_emulator.exe

Contribution Guide

How to Contribute a Feature

  1. Create an issue in this repository with a short summary of the feature and any specs you want to write. Summaries and specs are a great way to make sure everyone is on the same page before writing code. No one likes writing a feature only to have to rewrite or scrap it later due to a misunderstanding. Specs also make writing documentation like user guides easier.
  2. Fork this repository to create your own personal copy of the project. Working in your own forked repository guarantees no one else will mess with the project in unexpected ways during your development (and you won't mess with anyone else either!).
  3. If you're going to develop multiple features in your fork, you should create a branch for each feature. Keeping a single feature per-branch leads to cleaner and easier to understand pull requests.
  4. This is the fun part, write your feature!
    1. Please comment your code. This makes it easier for everyone to understand.
    2. Doxygen comments will be especially appreciated. You can set up VSCode to automatically add empty Doxygen templates to functions
    3. You should run astyle with this projects .astylerc file to beautify the code. Everyone loves pretty code. There's a VSCode Extension for this too.
    4. The code should compile without any warnings.
    5. Try to write small, useful messages in each commit.
  5. Test your feature. Try everything, mash buttons, whatever. Get creative. Users certainly will. Write your test plan and steps in the ticket you opened.
  6. Once your feature is written and tested, create a pull request to merge the feature back to the master project. Please reference the ticket from step 1 in the pull request.
  7. The new code will be reviewed and either merge it or have changes requested. The better the spec and conversation in step 1, the better the chances it gets merged quickly.

How to Report a Bug

Create an issue in this project with the following information:

  • What the expected behavior is.
  • What the actual behavior is. Pictures or video could be useful here.
  • If repeatable, steps to reproduce the buggy behavior.
  • If not repeatable, what you were doing when the bug occurred.
  • Serial logs, if you were logging.

Adding a Swadge Mode

A Swadge mode is kind of like an app. Only one runs at a time and it gets all the system resources.

All Swadge mode source code should be in the /main/modes folder. To build, the source file must be listed in /main/CMakeLists.txt.

Swadge Mode Struct

A Swadge mode is struct of function pointers, which is the closest thing in C to an object. The struct is defined in swadgeMode.h. The ESP32's system firmware will call the Swadge mode's function pointers. If a mode does not need a particular function, say it doesn't do audio handling, it is safe to set the function pointer to NULL. It just won't be called. The details of the struct and all the function pointers it contains are below. You can also read this in source.

typedef struct _swadgeMode
{
    /**
     * This swadge mode's name, mostly for debugging.
     * This is not a function pointer.
     */
    char* modeName;

    /**
     * This function is called when this mode is started. It should initialize
     * any necessary variables.
     * disp should be saved and used for later draw calls.
     *
     * @param disp The display to draw to
     */
    void (*fnEnterMode)(display_t * disp);

    /**
     * This function is called when the mode is exited. It should clean up
     * anything that shouldn't happen when the mode is not active
     */
    void (*fnExitMode)(void);

    /**
     * This function is called from the main loop. It's pretty quick, but the
     * timing may be inconsistent.
     *
     * @param elapsedUs The time elapsed since the last time this function was
     *                  called. Use this value to determine when it's time to do
     *                  things
     */
    void (*fnMainLoop)(int64_t elapsedUs);

    /**
     * This function is called when a button press is pressed. Buttons are
     * handled by interrupts and queued up for this callback, so there are no
     * strict timing restrictions for this function.
     *
     * @param evt The button event that occurred
     */
    void (*fnButtonCallback)(buttonEvt_t* evt);

    /**
     * This function is called when a touchpad event occurs.
     *
     * @param evt The touchpad event that occurred
     */
    void (*fnTouchCallback)(touch_event_t* evt);

    /**
     * This function is called periodically with the current acceleration
     * vector.
     *
     * @param accel A struct with 10 bit signed X, Y, and Z accel vectors
     */
    void (*fnAccelerometerCallback)(accel_t* accel);

    /**
     * This function is called whenever audio samples are read from the
     * microphone (ADC) and are ready for processing. Samples are read at 8KHz
     *
     * @param samples A pointer to 12 bit audio samples
     * @param sampleCnt The number of samples read
     */
    void (*fnAudioCallback)(int16_t * samples, uint32_t sampleCnt);

    /**
     * This function is called periodically with the current temperature
     *
     * @param temperature A floating point temperature in celcius
     */
    void (*fnTemperatureCallback)(float temperature);

    /**
     * This is a setting, not a function pointer. Set it to one of these
     * values to have the system configure the swadge's WiFi
     *
     * NO_WIFI - Don't use WiFi at all. This saves power.
     * ESP_NOW - Send and receive packets to and from all swadges in range
     */
    wifiMode_t wifiMode;

    /**
     * This function is called whenever an ESP-NOW packet is received.
     *
     * @param mac_addr The MAC address which sent this data
     * @param data     A pointer to the data received
     * @param len      The length of the data received
     * @param rssi     The RSSI for this packet, from 1 (weak) to ~90 (touching)
     */
    void (*fnEspNowRecvCb)(const uint8_t* mac_addr, const char* data, uint8_t len, int8_t rssi);

    /**
     * This function is called whenever an ESP-NOW packet is sent.
     * It is just a status callback whether or not the packet was actually sent.
     * This will be called after calling espNowSend()
     *
     * @param mac_addr The MAC address which the data was sent to
     * @param status   The status of the transmission
     */
    void (*fnEspNowSendCb)(const uint8_t* mac_addr, esp_now_send_status_t status);
} swadgeMode;

Drawing to the Screen

Drawing to a display is done through a struct of function pointers, display_t. This struct has basic functions for setting and getting pixels, clearing the whole display, drawing the current framebuffer to the physical display (which you should not call directly). It also has the display's width and height, in pixels. This design decision was made to abstract any framebuffer specifics from functions that draw graphics. For instance, the TFT has 15 bit color, the OLED has 1 bit color, and the emulator has 24 bit color, but the same functions for drawing sprites can be used for all three. This design could even drive multiple displays simultaneously.

The TFT display uses 8-bit web-safe color palette. This means that the red, green, and blue channels all range from 0 to 5. There's a handy enum, paletteColor_t, which has all the colors named like cRGB. For example, c500 is full red. cTransparent is a special value for a transparent pixel.

You do not have to call any functions to draw the current framebuffer to the physical display. That is handled by the system firmware. Just draw your frame and it will get pushed out as fast as possible.

There are a few convenient ways to draw your frame. You can use the display_t struct's clearPx() function to clear the entire frame before drawing, unless you're only redrawing specific elements. If you really want to draw a single pixel at a time, you can call the display_t struct's setPx() function. Likewise, getPx() will return a pixel from the current frame. This may be useful for collision detection or something. The macros SET_PIXEL() and GET_PIXEL() macros are faster versions of setPx() and getPx() that directly access the framebuffer, but do not do bounds checking. SET_PIXEL_BOUNDS() does do bounds checking, which makes it a little slower.

bresenham.h contains functions for drawing shapes like lines, rectangles, circles, or curves. Note that these shapes are not filled in. If you want filled shapes, or other shapes, we'll need to work on that. Remember that more complex polygons are just series of lines.

Drawing more complex graphics, like text or png images is explained in the next section, Loading and Freeing Assets.

As an example, this will clear the display, then draw a pixel, line, rectangle, and circle.

#include "display.h"
#include "bresenham.h"

// Clear the display to black
demo->disp->clearPx();

// Draw a single white pixel in the middle of the display
demo->disp->setPx(
    demo->disp->w / 2, // Middle of the screen width
    demo->disp->h / 2, // Middle of the screen height
    c555);

// Draw a yellow line
plotLine(demo->disp, 10, 5, 50, 20, c550);

// Draw a magenta rectangle
plotRect(demo->disp, 70, 5, 100, 20, c505);

// Draw a cyan circle
plotCircle(demo->disp, 140, 30, 20, c055);

Loading and Freeing Assets

The build system will automatically process, pack, and flash assets as a read-only part of the firmware. The spiffs_file_preprocessor is responsible for this. Assets are an easy way to include things like images, fonts, and eventually other file types. Any files in the /assets/ folder will be processed and the output will be written to /spiffs_image/.

spiffs_file_preprocessor currently only processes .png and .font.png files. .png are converted into .wsg files, which use an 8 bit web-safe color palette, are reasonably compressed and have very little overhead to decode. .font.png files are a line of characters with underlines to denote char width (open one up to see what I'm talking about). They are converted into a one-bit bitmapped format.

Loading assets is a relatively slower operation, so often times it makes sense to load once when a mode starts and free when the mode finishes. On the other hand, loading assets eats up RAM, so it may be wise to only load assets when necessary. Engineering is a figuring out a series of trade-offs.

As an example, this will load, draw, and free both an image and some red text. Note that the TFT's screen uses 15 bit color, but the firmware uses the web-safe color palette, so each color channel (r, g, b) ranges from 0 to 5.

#include "display.h"

wsg_t megaman;
loadWsg("megaman.wsg", &megaman);
drawWsg(demo->disp, &megaman, 0, 0, false, false, 0);
freeWsg(&megaman);

font_t ibm;
loadFont("ibm_vga8.font", &ibm);
drawText(demo->disp, &ibm, c500, "Demo Text", 0, 0);
freeFont(&ibm);

Drawing a Menu

Most modes will have a menu. This project provides functions for creating, drawing, and interacting with a menu. This menu should be used for consistency across the whole project.

To use a menu, you must first create it by giving it a title, a font_t, and a callback function which will be called when the user clicks on a row. Next you must add some rows with label strings. When a row is clicked the callback is called. The argument in the callback will be the pointer to the label used for that row. This pointer address can be compared to the label strings used when adding a row to determine which row was clicked.

When you're done with a menu, it must be deinitialized.

Note that the strings used for the title and rows are not copied to any menu-specific memory, so they must be persistent for as long as the menu is used.

// These strings are stored in ROM and declared outside a function
static const char title[] = "Main Menu"
static const char _R1[]   = "Row 1";
static const char _R2[]   = "Row 2";
static const char _R3[]   = "Row 3";
static const char _R4[]   = "Row 4";
static const char _R5[]   = "Row 5";

// Variables that stick around
font_t mm;
meleeMenu_t * menu;

void initFunc()
{
    // Each menu needs a font, so load that first
    loadFont("mm.font", &mm);

    // Create the menu
    menu = initMeleeMenu(title, &mm, mainMenuCb);

    // Add the rows
    addRowToMeleeMenu(menu, _R1);
    addRowToMeleeMenu(menu, _R2);
    addRowToMeleeMenu(menu, _R3);
    addRowToMeleeMenu(menu, _R4);
    addRowToMeleeMenu(menu, _R5);
}

void deinitFunc()
{
    // When done, deinitialize the menu
    deinitMeleeMenu(menu);
    // Free the font too!
    freeFont(&meleeMenuFont);
}

void buttonCb(buttonEvt_t* evt)
{
    // Pass button events from the Swadge mode to the menu
    meleeMenuButton(menu, evt->button);
}

void mainMenuCb(const char* opt)
{
    // When a row is clicked, print the label for debugging
    ESP_LOGI("MNU", "%s", opt);
}

Saving Persistent Data

Persistent data is saved in a key-value store. Currently the only value that can be stored is a 32 bit integer. This may be expanded in the future. The functions readNvs32() and writeNvs32() do what they say. As an example, this will write a value to NVS if it does not already exist.

#include "nvs_manager.h"

#define MAGIC_VAL 0xAF

int32_t magicVal = 0;
if((false == readNvs32("magicVal", &magicVal)) || (MAGIC_VAL != magicVal))
{
    writeNvs32("magicVal", MAGIC_VAL);
}

Lighting LEDs

Use an array of led_t structs and call setLeds() to light them the color of your choice. NUM_LEDS is defined as the number of LEDs on the hardware. Each color channel has eight bits of range (i.e. 0 to 255). For example, this will make six LEDs a rainbow.

#include "led_util.h"

static const led_t leds[NUM_LEDS] =
{
    {.r = 0xFF, .g = 0x00, .b = 0x00},
    {.r = 0x80, .g = 0x80, .b = 0x00},
    {.r = 0x00, .g = 0xFF, .b = 0x00},
    {.r = 0x00, .g = 0x80, .b = 0x80},
    {.r = 0x00, .g = 0x00, .b = 0xFF},
    {.r = 0x80, .g = 0x00, .b = 0x80}
};

setLeds(leds, NUM_LEDS);

Playing Sounds

The buzzer can play song_t structs. Each song_t is a collection of musicalNote_t, and each musicalNote_t has a noteFrequency_t and a duration. Eventually, songs will be loadable assets. For example, this will play three notes

#include "musical_buzzer.h"

static const song_t do_re_mi =
{
    .notes =
    {
        {.note = A_4, .timeMs = 400},
        {.note = SILENCE, .timeMs = 100},
        {.note = B_4, .timeMs = 400},
        {.note = SILENCE, .timeMs = 100},
        {.note = C_4, .timeMs = 400},
    },
    .numNotes = 5,
    .shouldLoop = false
};

// Play background music. This probably should loop
buzzer_play_bgm(&do_re_mi);
// Play a sound effect. This will interrupt bgm, but bgm will keep correct time in the background
buzzer_play_sfx(&do_re_mi);

Note that buzzer_play_bgm() will play an interruptable background track and buzzer_play_sfx() will play a higher priority sound effect.

ESP-NOW

ESP-NOW is a kind of connectionless Wi-Fi communication protocol that is defined by Espressif. You can read all about it in the official documentation.

To enable ESP-NOW, set the Swadge mode struct's wifiMode to ESP_NOW.

The Swadge uses the simplest form of ESP-NOW, where every message sent to the broadcast address, and every Swadge receives every message in range. If all you want is simple UDP-like communication then simply add the two required function pointers to your Swadge mode struct. One will be called when receiving messages, and the other will be called after transmission with transmission statuses. Call espNowSend() to send packets, and receive other packets through the callback. For example:

#include "espNowUtils.h"

// Broadcast some data
const uint8_t[] data = {1, 2, 3};
espNowSend(data, sizeof(data) / sizeof(data[0]));

// Callbacks for the Swadge mode struct
void demoEspNowRecvCb(const uint8_t* mac_addr, const char* data, uint8_t len, int8_t rssi)
{
    ; // Do something with received packet
}

void demoEspNowSendCb(const uint8_t* mac_addr, esp_now_send_status_t status)
{
    ; // Confirmation that a packet was sent, or failed to send
}

If you want TCP-like communication between two Swadges, then you should use the p2p code. p2p builds on ESP-NOW by including a mode ID (so that a given Swadge mode doesn't try to connect to a different mode), destination MAC address, sequence number, and packet type in the payload. Packets are ack'ed and duplicates are ignored. Packets from other modes or Swadges are also ignored.

For p2p to work, it must be initialized and deinitialized, ideally when the Swadge mode starts and finishes. p2pRecvCb() and p2pSendCb() must be called from the respective functions registered for ESP-NOW in the Swadge struct.

A p2p connection is established by having both Swadges call p2pStartConnection() and being in close range of each other. The RSSI must be above a given threshold to establish a connection. Connection events are signaled through the p2pConCbFn callback function. Once established, one Swadge is designated GOING_FIRST and the other is designated GOING_SECOND. Calling p2pGetPlayOrder() will return the designation.

Once connected, messages can be sent by calling p2pSendMsg(). Messages are received through the p2pMsgRxCbFn callback function.

#include "espNowUtils.h"
#include "p2pConnection.h"

// Initialization and deinitialization
void demoEnterMode(display_t * disp)
{
    p2pInitialize(&demo->p, "dmo", demoConCbFn, demoMsgRxCbFn, -10);
    p2pStartConnection(&demo->p);
}

void demoExitMode(void)
{
    p2pDeinit(&demo->p);
}

// Callbacks for the Swadge mode struct
void demoEspNowRecvCb(const uint8_t* mac_addr, const uint8_t* data, uint8_t len, int8_t rssi)
{
    p2pRecvCb(&demo->p, mac_addr, data, len, rssi);
}

void demoEspNowSendCb(const uint8_t* mac_addr, esp_now_send_status_t status)
{
    p2pSendCb(&demo->p, mac_addr, status);
}

// Callbacks for p2p
void demoConCbFn(p2pInfo* p2p, connectionEvt_t evt)
{
    ; // Do something when connection status changes
}

void demoMsgRxCbFn(p2pInfo* p2p, const char* msg, const char* payload, uint8_t len)
{
    ; // Do something when a message is received
}

void demoMsgTxCbFn(p2pInfo* p2p, messageStatus_t status)
{
    ; // Do something with the transmission status
}

// Send a message
const char tMsg[] = "Test Message";
p2pSendMsg(&(demo->p), "tst", tMsg, sizeof(tMsg), true, demoMsgTxCbFn);

Best Practices

Only one Swadge mode runs at a time, and each mode wants as much RAM as possible. Therefore it's best practice to not statically allocate state variables, especially large ones. This includes static variables within functions. Don't use them. It's good practice to keep all your mode's state variables in a single struct which is allocated when the mode starts and freed when it ends. For example:

// This is just a typedef, not a variable
typedef struct
{
    uint16_t stateVar1;
    uint8_t bunch_of_numbers[256];
} demo_t;

// This is just a single pointer, so it's small
demo_t * demo;

// When entering the mode, allocate memory for it
void demoEnterMode(display_t * disp)
{
    // Allocate memory for this mode
    demo = (demo_t *)malloc(sizeof(demo_t));
    memset(demo, 0, sizeof(demo_t));
}

// When exiting the mode, free the memory
void demoExitMode(void)
{
    free(demo);
}

Updating your environment

Windows (Powershell)

Preparation to run PowerShell scripts

If you have not yet run any PowerShell scripts from this repository, run this command in a PowerShell prompt to enable execution of downloaded scripts:

Set-ExecutionPolicy -Scope CurrentUser Unrestricted

ESP-IDF

To update the ESP32 toolchain, you can run the following powershell script from the repository. It will only work if you have installed the IDF in ~/esp/esp-idf and the tools in ~/.espressif.

.\update-esp-idf.ps1

Linux

ESP-IDF

To update the ESP32 build environment, you can run the following bash script from the repository. It will only work if you have installed the IDF in ~/esp/esp-idf and the tools in ~/.espressif.

./update-esp-idf.sh

Troubleshooting

Reread the Get Started Guide, then google your issue, then ask me about it either in a Github issue or the Slack channel. All troubleshooting issues should be written down here for posterity.

If VSCode isn't finding IDF symbols, try running the export.ps1 script from a terminal, then launching code from that same session.

Tips

To add more source files, they either need to be in the main folder, and added to the CMakeLists.txt file there, or in a subdirectory of the components folder with it's own CMakeLists.txt. The folder names are specific. You can read up on the Build System if you're curious.

There are a lot of example projects in the IDF that are worth looking at.