If you haven’t yet experimented with the Arduino Cloud, then you may not be aware of how powerful it is for Internet of Things (IoT) applications.Using the service and its online tools, you can quickly build and deploy smart IoT devices — often with little or no custom code required.Rei Vilo’s Remote E-Paper Weather and Message Board perfectly demonstrates how you can accomplish that.
This device shows current weather information and custom messages on a 2.9” Pervasive Displays EPDK-Matter Development Kit screen.Though that was designed for use with the Arduino Nano Matter, is also works with others, including the Nano ESP32 that Vilo chose for this project.Like all e-paper displays, it only consumes power when refreshing the screen.
And the adapter makes it easy to connect to the Arduino board.The hardware setup is very straightforward: just connect the Arduino to the display adapter and plug in a USB cable for power.Most of Vilo’s tutorial focuses on configuring an Arduino Cloud service and setting up the Nano ESP32 to work with that. This showcases the real power of Arduino Cloud, which is its ability to automatically generate sketches to make use of hardware and specified variables.
For example, Vilo didn’t need to explicitly program functions to gather the weather data.The Arduino Cloud service automatically passes that data over Wi-Fi to the Nano ESP32, which then updates the display with the new information.Arduino Cloud also provides a nice online dashboard where users can interact with their devices, such as to enter a custom message.
