Moving ESP32-based Listener Clients' Codebase to Platform.io

[mattv8]

I'd like to open a discussion about porting the ESP32 and Arduino C++ based listener clients to PlatoformIO. Simply put, PlatformIO is a robust and much more coder-friendly IDE than the default Arduino IDE. For further reading about PlatoformIO, see here: https://platformio.org/.

I recently "ported" my listener client's code base to PlatoformIO and I've been very happy with the results, although it is still very much a work-in-progress.

Applicable listener clients currently in the TallyArbiter repo:

• M5AtomMatrix-listener
• TTGO_T-listener
• esp32-neopixel-listener
• m5stickc-listene

Pros:

• Support for two different IDE's: Visual Studio Code and Atom.io.
  • Programming therefore becomes much easier by using a full-featured IDE.
• VS Code's intellisense would become available for use.
• Faster and better compiler.
• Much better library management.
• Porting from Arduino IDE to Platform.io is a cinch, and I could make these initial contributions.

Cons:

• It would make coding in Arduino's IDE no longer an option.
• It might therefore make contributing to the listener clients codebases less accessible to "novice" programmers who are unfamiliar with PlatoformIO.
  • I feel this could be fixed with good documentation.

Neutrals:

• It would change the directory structure of each respective listener client's codebase.

[josephdadams]

I think we are working toward distributing compiled firmware hex files which will not require users to delve much into the Arduino IDE anyways. Isn't that the plan, @hrueger ?

Beyond that though, I'm all for using anything but the Arduino IDE. Gosh it's awful.

[mattv8]

Great! If we're distributing compiled firmwares to the end-users anyways, PlatformIO has a pretty good pipeline for creating the firmware binaries.

[josephdadams]

GH Actions can't do this? @MatteoGheza has them doing something currently - I just don't know what 😆

[hrueger]

Yes, as far as I know, that was the plan.
For me it would be ok if we require users to connect their devices via USB, then we would not have to deal with OTA.

[josephdadams]

Yes, I'm also good with USB. Even if USB is the goal now, and in another major release we offer OTA capability.

[JTF4]

I would be all for that. I would have to relearn a few things but I think that in the long run it will be better.

Only question I have is if it's more or less processing intensive than arduino.

Oh....... and I absolutely DESPISE the arduino ide. I actually edit all my arduino stuff in VS code and then only use the arduino thing for compiling.

[MatteoGheza]

Working on a new "generic embedded listener client", that works for M5Atom/M5Stick/(generic) ESP32/(generic) ESP8266/TTGO.
Works with PlatformIO envs, so every device firmware is based on the same codebase and is compiled only with required libs/code.
Doing this, fixing bug, supporting new devices and adding new features will be easier.

[josephdadams]

This sounds awesome. Thank you!