RPI Pico W

[wpiman]

So I just got one of the $6 RPI Pico W boards. I was able to get the MQTT python program to load, connect to my wifi, and publish on a topic and see on McsMQTT.

This board doesn't run an operating system-- just essentially runs python programs as far as I can tell.

The interesting thing here is that the Bluetooth isn't enabled- but probably soon will be. Would be an interesting candidate for a BLEE MQTT port. The zeros are only $10-- so the case to use them from a cost perspective isn't high, but the PICO requires no SD card so reliability should be higher-- and it isn't a SBC so shutdown can be whenever.

https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/ras...-iot-platform/

[Michael McSharry]

MicroPython is also available on the ESP8266 and more appropriately on the ESP32 that has built-in BLE. Similar price points. While I have read some Python code, I have never written anything in Python. There should be Python BLE implementations readily available. Doing a Google search of "python BLE ESP32" brings up several hits on YouTube and source code of implementations. It should be relatively easy to add a MQTT interface to one of these if such does not already exist. Similarly, whatever the output of these implementations may be, it should be easy to provide a HS integration.