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Among the off-brand online game consoles and even equipment for the main manufacturers can depart rather a lot to be desired. Whether or not it’s poor construct high quality or a normal lack of help or updates, there are fairly a number of issues in the marketplace not value anybody’s time or cash. [Jonathan] was not too long ago handed simply such a peripheral, a toy recreation controller initially meant for a small baby, however upon additional inspection it was a surprisingly hackable platform, able to loads of IoT-type duties.
The controller itself was simply disassembled, and the practical buttons inside have been wired to a Wemos D1 Mini as an alternative of the originally-planned ESP32 due to some wiring irregularities and the truth that the Wemos D1 Mini having the required quantity of I/O. It’s nonetheless sufficiently small to be sealed again contained in the controller as properly, powered by the batteries that may have powered the unique controller.
For the software program, [Jonathan] is utilizing MQTT to register button presses with every little thing simply accessible over Wi-Fi, additionally making it potential to replace the software program wirelessly. He was in a position to make use of it to do a number of issues as proof-of-concept, together with enjoying a recreation in PyGame and controlling a Sonos speaker, however for now he’s utilizing it to regulate an LED sculpture. With one thing this simply modified, although, it might be fairly simple to make use of it as an alternative for a house automation distant management, particularly since it’s already arrange to make use of MQTT.
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