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Jimmy d5cab2efdf Add multi-panel Pico UDP firmware and Python LED control.

Pico panels get static IPs on 10.1.1.10–14 with per-panel LED counts, Makefile deploy targets, and Python examples for animations, sync tests, and direct Pi SPI control.

Co-authored-by: Cursor <cursoragent@cursor.com>

2026-06-28 22:46:08 +12:00

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Portal panel firmware (Pico SDK)

C firmware for a Pico + W5500 + WS2812 panel adapter. Replaces the slow CircuitPython adapter/code.py path with native UDP receive and PIO WS2812 output.

Hardware

Matches adapter/code.py:

Signal	GPIO
W5500 CS	GP9
SPI1 SCK	GP10
SPI1 MOSI	GP11
SPI1 MISO	GP12
W5500 RST	GP13
Status LED	GP25
WS2812 data	GP27

Default: 405 LEDs (45×9 matrix chain), one data pin per panel.

WS2812 output uses ForsakenNGS/Pico_WS2812 (FORMAT_GRB on GP27).

Build

Requires pico-sdk and the ARM GCC toolchain (arm-none-eabi-gcc).

# From repo root
make deploy          # build + flash over USB
make build           # build only

# Or from this directory
make deploy

Manual cmake (one-time pico-sdk setup):

git clone https://github.com/raspberrypi/pico-sdk.git ~/pico/pico-sdk
cd ~/pico/pico-sdk && git submodule update --init
export PICO_SDK_PATH=~/pico/pico-sdk

mkdir -p build && cd build
cmake ..
make -j$(nproc)

UF2 output: build/panel.uf2 — hold BOOTSEL and copy to the Pico.

Options

# Panel 0 of 5 → 10.1.1.10, unique MAC, UDP panel_id filter
make deploy PANEL_ID=0   # 10.1.1.10
make deploy PANEL_ID=1   # 10.1.1.11

# DHCP instead of static 10.1.1.10–14
make deploy PANEL_ID=0 NO_DHCP=0

# Fewer LEDs for bench test
make deploy NUM_LEDS=2

Static IP and MAC are derived from PANEL_ID:

Panel	IP	MAC
0	10.1.1.10	02:50:52:54:4C:00
1	10.1.1.11	02:50:52:54:4C:01
…	…	…
4	10.1.1.14	02:50:52:54:4C:04
255 (bench)	10.1.1.19	02:50:52:54:4C:FF

Edit board_config.h for gateway, subnet, and pin changes.

UDP protocol (port 50007)

Payload	Action
1215 bytes	Raw RGB (`405 × 3`), show immediately
1216 bytes	`panel_id` (byte 0) + RGB; `255` = accept on any panel
4 bytes `SHOW`	Push buffered pixels to the strip (sync helper)

Pi sends RGB order; firmware converts to WS2812 GRB.

Target throughput: ~30–50 fps per panel (vs ~10–20 fps on CircuitPython).

Pi test sender

pipenv run python examples/panel_udp_send.py --host 192.168.2.111 --animation rainbow

Flashing

Requires picotool with libusb support:

make deploy

Or ./scripts/panel_deploy.sh (same thing).

Or manually:

picotool load -x -f build/panel.uf2

-f forces a USB reboot into BOOTSEL when the panel is already running.

Legacy UF2 drag-and-drop also works: hold BOOTSEL, plug USB, copy panel.uf2 to RPI-RP2.

Serial debug:

make monitor
# or: picocom /dev/ttyACM0

Ctrl+A then Ctrl+X to exit picocom.

Multi-panel (5 Picos)

Flash each Pico with PANEL_ID 0–4 (make deploy PANEL_ID=N). Each gets 10.1.1.1N (10–14), a unique MAC, and UDP filtering. Send frames from the Pi to each panel’s IP, or use a leading panel_id byte with 255 broadcast filtering.

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