PyPortal Weather Station

With this compact weather station stuck to your fridge, you'll always know what mother nature is up to!

by John Park

published March 13, 2019, last edited April 14, 2025

posted in Sensors/ Weather Internet of Things - IOT/ Wireless Programming/ MicroPython / CircuitPython

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112

Intermediate

Project guide

Overview

With this compact PyPortal weather station on your desk or stuck to your fridge, you'll always know what mother nature is up to!

Using CircuitPython, this project queries the Open Weather Maps site API to find out the current weather for your location and displays it along with an informative icon.

3D printed case and magnetic backing allow you to mount it to your fridge or other ferrous metal surface.

Adafruit PyPortal - CircuitPython Powered Internet Display

PyPortal, our easy-to-use IoT device that allows you to create all the things for the “Internet of Things” in minutes. Make custom touch screen interface...

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5V 2A Switching Power Supply with USB-A Connector

5V 2A Switching Power Supply w/ USB-A Connector

Our 5V 2A USB power adapter is the perfect choice for powering single-board computers like Raspberry Pi, BeagleBone, or anything else that's power-hungry!This adapter was...

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USB A/Micro Cable - 2m

This is your standard USB A-Plug to Micro-USB cable. It's 2 meters long so you'll have plenty of cord to work with for those longer extensions.

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Additional Tools & Materials

You may want to create the optional mounting case for your PyPortal Weather Station. For this you'll need:

If you don't have access to a 3D printer you can optionally use an online service such as 3D Hubs to have it printed for you on demand.

Magnetic Pin Back

These magnetic pin backs have two pieces: a metal bar with adhesive strip and a plastic piece with two strong rare-earth magnets. Affix the metal bar to your FLORA projects-- it's...

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Black Nylon Screw and Stand-off Set with M2.5 Threads, kit box

Black Nylon Machine Screw and Stand-off Set – M2.5 Thread

Totaling 380 pieces, this M2.5 Screw Set is a must-have for your workstation. You'll have enough screws, nuts, and hex standoffs to fuel your maker...

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Ultimaker 2+ 3D Printer

The Ultimaker 2+ is one of our favorite 3D printers on the market. It's a well-built open-source compact machine with an excellent UX. Every inch of the...

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Spool of PLA filament for 3D printers - lilac color with 2.85mm Diameter.

PLA Filament for 3D Printers - 2.85mm Diameter - Lilac - 1 Kg

Having a 3D printer without filament is sort of like having a regular printer without paper or ink. And while a lot of printers come with some filament there's a good chance...

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Install CircuitPython

CircuitPython is a derivative of MicroPython designed to simplify experimentation and education on low-cost microcontrollers. It makes it easier than ever to get prototyping by requiring no upfront desktop software downloads. Simply copy and edit files on the CIRCUITPY "flash" drive to iterate.

The following instructions will show you how to install CircuitPython. If you've already installed CircuitPython but are looking to update it or reinstall it, the same steps work for that as well!

Set up CircuitPython Quick Start!

Follow this quick step-by-step for super-fast Python power :)

Download the latest version of CircuitPython for the PyPortal via CircuitPython.org

Download the latest version of CircuitPython for the PyPortal Pynt via CircuitPython.org

Click the link above to download the latest version of CircuitPython for the PyPortal.

Download and save it to your desktop (or wherever is handy).

Plug your PyPortal into your computer using a known-good USB cable.

A lot of people end up using charge-only USB cables and it is very frustrating! So make sure you have a USB cable you know is good for data sync.

Double-click the Reset button on the top in the middle (magenta arrow) on your board, and you will see the NeoPixel RGB LED (green arrow) turn green. If it turns red, check the USB cable, try another USB port, etc. Note: The little red LED next to the USB connector will pulse red. That's ok!

If double-clicking doesn't work the first time, try again. Sometimes it can take a few tries to get the rhythm right!

You will see a new disk drive appear called PORTALBOOT.

Drag the adafruit-circuitpython-pyportal-<whatever>.uf2 file to PORTALBOOT.

The LED will flash. Then, the PORTALBOOT drive will disappear and a new disk drive called CIRCUITPY will appear.

If you haven't added any code to your board, the only file that will be present is boot_out.txt. This is absolutely normal! It's time for you to add your code.py and get started!

That's it, you're done! :)

PyPortal Default Files

Click below to download a zip of the files that shipped on the PyPortal or PyPortal Pynt.

PyPortal Default Files

PyPortal Pynt Default Files

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PyPortal CircuitPython Setup

To use all the amazing features of your PyPortal with CircuitPython, you must first install a number of libraries. This page covers that process.

Adafruit CircuitPython Bundle

Download the Adafruit CircuitPython Library Bundle. You can find the latest release here:

Latest Adafruit CircuitPython Library Bundle

Download the adafruit-circuitpython-bundle-*.x-mpy-*.zip bundle zip file where *.x MATCHES THE VERSION OF CIRCUITPYTHON YOU INSTALLED, and unzip a folder of the same name. Inside you'll find a lib folder. You have two options:

You can add the lib folder to your CIRCUITPY drive. This will ensure you have all the drivers. But it will take a bunch of space on the 8 MB disk
Add each library as you need it, this will reduce the space usage but you'll need to put in a little more effort.

At a minimum we recommend the following libraries, in fact we more than recommend. They're basically required. So grab them and install them into CIRCUITPY/lib now!

adafruit_esp32spi - This is the library that gives you internet access via the ESP32 using (you guessed it!) SPI transport. You need this for anything Internet
adafruit_requests - This library allows us to perform HTTP requests and get responses back from servers. GET/POST/PUT/PATCH - they're all in here!
adafruit_connection_manager - used by adafruit_requests.
adafruit_pyportal - This is our friendly wrapper library that does a lot of our projects, displays graphics and text, fetches data from the internet. Nearly all of our projects depend on it!
adafruit_portalbase - This library is the base library that adafruit_pyportal library is built on top of.
adafruit_touchscreen - a library for reading touches from the resistive touchscreen. Handles all the analog noodling, rotation and calibration for you.
adafruit_io - this library helps connect the PyPortal to our free datalogging and viewing service
adafruit_imageload - an image display helper, required for any graphics!
adafruit_display_text - not surprisingly, it displays text on the screen
adafruit_bitmap_font - we have fancy font support, and its easy to make new fonts. This library reads and parses font files.
adafruit_slideshow - for making image slideshows - handy for quick display of graphics and sound
neopixel - for controlling the onboard neopixel
adafruit_adt7410 - library to read the temperature from the on-board Analog Devices ADT7410 precision temperature sensor (not necessary for Titano or Pynt)
adafruit_bus_device - low level support for I2C/SPI
adafruit_fakerequests - This library allows you to create fake HTTP requests by using local files.

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Create Your settings.toml File

CircuitPython works with WiFi-capable boards to enable you to make projects that have network connectivity. This means working with various passwords and API keys. As of CircuitPython 8, there is support for a settings.toml file. This is a file that is stored on your CIRCUITPY drive, that contains all of your secret network information, such as your SSID, SSID password and any API keys for IoT services. It is designed to separate your sensitive information from your code.py file so you are able to share your code without sharing your credentials.

CircuitPython previously used a secrets.py file for this purpose. The settings.toml file is quite similar.

Your settings.toml file should be stored in the main directory of your CIRCUITPY drive. It should not be in a folder.

CircuitPython settings.toml File

This section will provide a couple of examples of what your settings.toml file should look like, specifically for CircuitPython WiFi projects in general.

The most minimal settings.toml file must contain your WiFi SSID and password, as that is the minimum required to connect to WiFi. Copy this example, paste it into your settings.toml, and update:

your_wifi_ssid
your_wifi_password

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CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID = "your_wifi_ssid"
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD = "your_wifi_password"

CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID = "your_wifi_ssid"
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD = "your_wifi_password"

Many CircuitPython network-connected projects on the Adafruit Learn System involve using Adafruit IO. For these projects, you must also include your Adafruit IO username and key. Copy the following example, paste it into your settings.toml file, and update:

your_wifi_ssid
your_wifi_password
your_aio_username
your_aio_key

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CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID = "your_wifi_ssid"
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD = "your_wifi_password"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_USERNAME = "your_aio_username"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_KEY = "your_aio_key"

CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID = "your_wifi_ssid"
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD = "your_wifi_password"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_USERNAME = "your_aio_username"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_KEY = "your_aio_key"

Some projects use different variable names for the entries in the settings.toml file. For example, a project might use ADAFRUIT_AIO_ID in the place of ADAFRUIT_AIO_USERNAME. If you run into connectivity issues, one of the first things to check is that the names in the settings.toml file match the names in the code.

Not every project uses the same variable name for each entry in the settings.toml file! Always verify it matches the code.

settings.toml File Tips

Here is an example settings.toml file.

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# Comments are supported
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID = "guest wifi"
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD = "guessable"
CIRCUITPY_WEB_API_PORT = 80
CIRCUITPY_WEB_API_PASSWORD = "passw0rd"
test_variable = "this is a test"
thumbs_up = "\U0001f44d"

# Comments are supported
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID = "guest wifi"
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD = "guessable"
CIRCUITPY_WEB_API_PORT = 80
CIRCUITPY_WEB_API_PASSWORD = "passw0rd"
test_variable = "this is a test"
thumbs_up = "\U0001f44d"

In a settings.toml file, it's important to keep these factors in mind:

Strings are wrapped in double quotes; ex: "your-string-here"
Integers are not quoted and may be written in decimal with optional sign (+1, -1, 1000) or hexadecimal (0xabcd).
- Floats (decimal numbers), octal (0o567) and binary (0b11011) are not supported.
Use \u escapes for weird characters, \x and \ooo escapes are not available in .toml files
- Example: \U0001f44d for 👍 (thumbs up emoji) and \u20ac for € (EUR sign)
Unicode emoji, and non-ASCII characters, stand for themselves as long as you're careful to save in "UTF-8 without BOM" format

When your settings.toml file is ready, you can save it in your text editor with the .toml extension.

Accessing Your settings.toml Information in code.py

In your code.py file, you'll need to import the os library to access the settings.toml file. Your settings are accessed with the os.getenv() function. You'll pass your settings entry to the function to import it into the code.py file.

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import os

print(os.getenv("test_variable"))

import os

print(os.getenv("test_variable"))

In the upcoming CircuitPython WiFi examples, you'll see how the settings.toml file is used for connecting to your SSID and accessing your API keys.

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Internet Connect!

Connect to WiFi

OK, now that you have your settings.toml file set up - you can connect to the Internet.

To do this, you need to first install a few libraries, into the lib folder on your CIRCUITPY drive. Then you need to update code.py with the example script.

Thankfully, we can do this in one go. In the example below, click the Download Project Bundle button below to download the necessary libraries and the code.py file in a zip file. Extract the contents of the zip file, open the directory examples/ and then click on the directory that matches the version of CircuitPython you're using and copy the contents of that directory to your CIRCUITPY drive.

Your CIRCUITPY drive should now look similar to the following image:

Update to CircuitPython 9.2.x or later to use this example.

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# SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2019 ladyada for Adafruit Industries
# SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT

from os import getenv

import adafruit_connection_manager
import adafruit_requests
import board
import busio
from digitalio import DigitalInOut

from adafruit_esp32spi import adafruit_esp32spi

# Get wifi details and more from a settings.toml file
# tokens used by this Demo: CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID, CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD
ssid = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID")
password = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD")

print("ESP32 SPI webclient test")

TEXT_URL = "http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/index.html"
JSON_URL = "http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/sample.json"


# If you are using a board with pre-defined ESP32 Pins:
esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_CS)
esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_BUSY)
esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_RESET)

# If you have an AirLift Shield:
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D10)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D7)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D5)

# If you have an AirLift Featherwing or ItsyBitsy Airlift:
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D13)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D11)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D12)

# If you have an externally connected ESP32:
# NOTE: You may need to change the pins to reflect your wiring
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D9)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D10)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D5)

# Secondary (SCK1) SPI used to connect to WiFi board on Arduino Nano Connect RP2040
if "SCK1" in dir(board):
    spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK1, board.MOSI1, board.MISO1)
else:
    spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK, board.MOSI, board.MISO)
esp = adafruit_esp32spi.ESP_SPIcontrol(spi, esp32_cs, esp32_ready, esp32_reset)

pool = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_socketpool(esp)
ssl_context = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_ssl_context(esp)
requests = adafruit_requests.Session(pool, ssl_context)

if esp.status == adafruit_esp32spi.WL_IDLE_STATUS:
    print("ESP32 found and in idle mode")
print("Firmware vers.", esp.firmware_version)
print("MAC addr:", ":".join("%02X" % byte for byte in esp.MAC_address))

for ap in esp.scan_networks():
    print("\t%-23s RSSI: %d" % (ap.ssid, ap.rssi))

print("Connecting to AP...")
while not esp.is_connected:
    try:
        esp.connect_AP(ssid, password)
    except OSError as e:
        print("could not connect to AP, retrying: ", e)
        continue
print("Connected to", esp.ap_info.ssid, "\tRSSI:", esp.ap_info.rssi)
print("My IP address is", esp.ipv4_address)
print("IP lookup adafruit.com: %s" % esp.pretty_ip(esp.get_host_by_name("adafruit.com")))
print("Ping google.com: %d ms" % esp.ping("google.com"))

# esp._debug = True
print("Fetching text from", TEXT_URL)
r = requests.get(TEXT_URL)
print("-" * 40)
print(r.text)
print("-" * 40)
r.close()

print()
print("Fetching json from", JSON_URL)
r = requests.get(JSON_URL)
print("-" * 40)
print(r.json())
print("-" * 40)
r.close()

print("Done!")

# SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2019 ladyada for Adafruit Industries
# SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT

from os import getenv

import adafruit_connection_manager
import adafruit_requests
import board
import busio
from digitalio import DigitalInOut

from adafruit_esp32spi import adafruit_esp32spi

# Get wifi details and more from a settings.toml file
# tokens used by this Demo: CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID, CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD
ssid = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID")
password = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD")

print("ESP32 SPI webclient test")

TEXT_URL = "http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/index.html"
JSON_URL = "http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/sample.json"


# If you are using a board with pre-defined ESP32 Pins:
esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_CS)
esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_BUSY)
esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_RESET)

# If you have an AirLift Shield:
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D10)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D7)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D5)

# If you have an AirLift Featherwing or ItsyBitsy Airlift:
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D13)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D11)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D12)

# If you have an externally connected ESP32:
# NOTE: You may need to change the pins to reflect your wiring
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D9)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D10)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D5)

# Secondary (SCK1) SPI used to connect to WiFi board on Arduino Nano Connect RP2040
if "SCK1" in dir(board):
    spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK1, board.MOSI1, board.MISO1)
else:
    spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK, board.MOSI, board.MISO)
esp = adafruit_esp32spi.ESP_SPIcontrol(spi, esp32_cs, esp32_ready, esp32_reset)

pool = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_socketpool(esp)
ssl_context = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_ssl_context(esp)
requests = adafruit_requests.Session(pool, ssl_context)

if esp.status == adafruit_esp32spi.WL_IDLE_STATUS:
    print("ESP32 found and in idle mode")
print("Firmware vers.", esp.firmware_version)
print("MAC addr:", ":".join("%02X" % byte for byte in esp.MAC_address))

for ap in esp.scan_networks():
    print("\t%-23s RSSI: %d" % (ap.ssid, ap.rssi))

print("Connecting to AP...")
while not esp.is_connected:
    try:
        esp.connect_AP(ssid, password)
    except OSError as e:
        print("could not connect to AP, retrying: ", e)
        continue
print("Connected to", esp.ap_info.ssid, "\tRSSI:", esp.ap_info.rssi)
print("My IP address is", esp.ipv4_address)
print("IP lookup adafruit.com: %s" % esp.pretty_ip(esp.get_host_by_name("adafruit.com")))
print("Ping google.com: %d ms" % esp.ping("google.com"))

# esp._debug = True
print("Fetching text from", TEXT_URL)
r = requests.get(TEXT_URL)
print("-" * 40)
print(r.text)
print("-" * 40)
r.close()

print()
print("Fetching json from", JSON_URL)
r = requests.get(JSON_URL)
print("-" * 40)
print(r.json())
print("-" * 40)
r.close()

print("Done!")

And save it to your board, with the name code.py.

Don't forget you'll also need to create the settings.toml file as seen above, with your WiFi ssid and password.

In a serial console, you should see something like the following. For more information about connecting with a serial console, view the guide Connecting to the Serial Console.

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>>> import wifitest
ESP32 SPI webclient test
ESP32 found and in idle mode
Firmware vers. 1.7.5
MAC addr: 24:C9:DC:BD:0F:3F
	HomeNetwork             RSSI: -46
	HomeNetwork             RSSI: -76
	Fios-12345              RSSI: -92
	FiOS-AB123              RSSI: -92
	NETGEAR53               RSSI: -93
Connecting to AP...
Connected to HomeNetwork 	RSSI: -45
My IP address is 192.168.1.245
IP lookup adafruit.com: 104.20.39.240
Ping google.com: 30 ms
Fetching text from http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/index.html
----------------------------------------
This is a test of Adafruit WiFi!
If you can read this, its working :)
----------------------------------------

Fetching json from http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/sample.json
----------------------------------------
{'fun': True, 'company': 'Adafruit', 'founded': 2005, 'primes': [2, 3, 5], 'pi': 3.14, 'mixed': [False, None, 3, True, 2.7, 'cheese']}
----------------------------------------
Done!

>>> import wifitest
ESP32 SPI webclient test
ESP32 found and in idle mode
Firmware vers. 1.7.5
MAC addr: 24:C9:DC:BD:0F:3F
	HomeNetwork             RSSI: -46
	HomeNetwork             RSSI: -76
	Fios-12345              RSSI: -92
	FiOS-AB123              RSSI: -92
	NETGEAR53               RSSI: -93
Connecting to AP...
Connected to HomeNetwork 	RSSI: -45
My IP address is 192.168.1.245
IP lookup adafruit.com: 104.20.39.240
Ping google.com: 30 ms
Fetching text from http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/index.html
----------------------------------------
This is a test of Adafruit WiFi!
If you can read this, its working :)
----------------------------------------

Fetching json from http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/sample.json
----------------------------------------
{'fun': True, 'company': 'Adafruit', 'founded': 2005, 'primes': [2, 3, 5], 'pi': 3.14, 'mixed': [False, None, 3, True, 2.7, 'cheese']}
----------------------------------------
Done!

Going over the example above, here's a breakdown of what the program is doing:

Initialize the ESP32 over SPI using the SPI port and 3 control pins:

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esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_CS)
esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_BUSY)
esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_RESET)

#...

else:
    spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK, board.MOSI, board.MISO)
esp = adafruit_esp32spi.ESP_SPIcontrol(spi, esp32_cs, esp32_ready, esp32_reset)

esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_CS)
esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_BUSY)
esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_RESET)

#...

else:
    spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK, board.MOSI, board.MISO)
esp = adafruit_esp32spi.ESP_SPIcontrol(spi, esp32_cs, esp32_ready, esp32_reset)

Get the socket pool and the SSL context, and then tell the adafruit_requests library about them.

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pool = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_socketpool(esp)
ssl_context = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_ssl_context(esp)
requests = adafruit_requests.Session(pool, ssl_context)

pool = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_socketpool(esp)
ssl_context = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_ssl_context(esp)
requests = adafruit_requests.Session(pool, ssl_context)

Verify an ESP32 is found, checks the firmware and MAC address

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if esp.status == adafruit_esp32spi.WL_IDLE_STATUS:
    print("ESP32 found and in idle mode")
print("Firmware vers.", esp.firmware_version)
print("MAC addr:", ":".join("%02X" % byte for byte in esp.MAC_address))

if esp.status == adafruit_esp32spi.WL_IDLE_STATUS:
    print("ESP32 found and in idle mode")
print("Firmware vers.", esp.firmware_version)
print("MAC addr:", ":".join("%02X" % byte for byte in esp.MAC_address))

Perform a scan of all access points it can see and print out the name and signal strength.

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for ap in esp.scan_networks():
    print("\t%-23s RSSI: %d" % (ap.ssid, ap.rssi))

for ap in esp.scan_networks():
    print("\t%-23s RSSI: %d" % (ap.ssid, ap.rssi))

Connect to the AP we've defined here, then print out the local IP address. Then attempt to do a domain name lookup and ping google.com to check network connectivity. (Note sometimes the ping fails or takes a while; this isn't a big deal.)

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print("Connecting to AP...")
while not esp.is_connected:
    try:
        esp.connect_AP(ssid, password)
    except OSError as e:
        print("could not connect to AP, retrying: ", e)
        continue
print("Connected to", esp.ap_info.ssid, "\tRSSI:", esp.ap_info.rssi)
print("My IP address is", esp.ipv4_address)
print(
    "IP lookup adafruit.com: %s" % esp.pretty_ip(esp.get_host_by_name("adafruit.com"))
)

print("Connecting to AP...")
while not esp.is_connected:
    try:
        esp.connect_AP(ssid, password)
    except OSError as e:
        print("could not connect to AP, retrying: ", e)
        continue
print("Connected to", esp.ap_info.ssid, "\tRSSI:", esp.ap_info.rssi)
print("My IP address is", esp.ipv4_address)
print(
    "IP lookup adafruit.com: %s" % esp.pretty_ip(esp.get_host_by_name("adafruit.com"))
)

Now we're getting to the really interesting part of the example program. We've written a library for web fetching web data, named adafruit_requests. It is a lot like the regular Python library named requests. This library allows you to send HTTP and HTTPS requests easily and provides helpful methods for parsing the response from the server.

Here is the part of the example program is fetching text data from a URL.

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TEXT_URL = "http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/index.html"  # Further up in the program

# ...

print("Fetching text from", TEXT_URL)
r = requests.get(TEXT_URL)
print('-' * 40)
print(r.text)
print('-' * 40)
r.close()

TEXT_URL = "http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/index.html"  # Further up in the program

# ...

print("Fetching text from", TEXT_URL)
r = requests.get(TEXT_URL)
print('-' * 40)
print(r.text)
print('-' * 40)
r.close()

Finally, here the program is fetching some JSON data. The adafruit_requests library will parse the JSON into a Python dictionary whose structure is the same as the structure of the JSON.

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JSON_URL = "http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/sample.json"   # Further up in the program

# ...

print("Fetching json from", JSON_URL)
r = requests.get(JSON_URL)
print('-' * 40)
print(r.json())
print('-' * 40)
r.close()

JSON_URL = "http://wifitest.adafruit.com/testwifi/sample.json"   # Further up in the program

# ...

print("Fetching json from", JSON_URL)
r = requests.get(JSON_URL)
print('-' * 40)
print(r.json())
print('-' * 40)
r.close()

Advanced Requests Usage

Want to send custom HTTP headers, parse the response as raw bytes, or handle a response's http status code in your CircuitPython code?

We've written an example to show advanced usage of the requests module below.

To use with CircuitPython, you need to first install a few libraries, into the lib folder on your CIRCUITPY drive. Then you need to update code.py with the example script.

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# SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2021 ladyada for Adafruit Industries
# SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT

import os

import adafruit_connection_manager
import board
import busio
from adafruit_esp32spi import adafruit_esp32spi
from digitalio import DigitalInOut

import adafruit_requests

# Get WiFi details, ensure these are setup in settings.toml
ssid = os.getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID")
password = os.getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD")

# If you are using a board with pre-defined ESP32 Pins:
esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_CS)
esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_BUSY)
esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_RESET)

# If you have an externally connected ESP32:
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D9)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D10)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D5)

# If you have an AirLift Featherwing or ItsyBitsy Airlift:
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D13)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D11)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D12)

spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK, board.MOSI, board.MISO)
radio = adafruit_esp32spi.ESP_SPIcontrol(spi, esp32_cs, esp32_ready, esp32_reset)

print("Connecting to AP...")
while not radio.is_connected:
    try:
        radio.connect_AP(ssid, password)
    except RuntimeError as e:
        print("could not connect to AP, retrying: ", e)
        continue
print("Connected to", str(radio.ap_info.ssid, "utf-8"), "\tRSSI:", radio.ap_info.rssi)

# Initialize a requests session
pool = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_socketpool(radio)
ssl_context = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_ssl_context(radio)
requests = adafruit_requests.Session(pool, ssl_context)

JSON_GET_URL = "https://httpbin.org/get"

# Define a custom header as a dict.
headers = {"user-agent": "blinka/1.0.0"}

print("Fetching JSON data from %s..." % JSON_GET_URL)
with requests.get(JSON_GET_URL, headers=headers) as response:
    print("-" * 60)

    json_data = response.json()
    headers = json_data["headers"]
    print("Response's Custom User-Agent Header: {0}".format(headers["User-Agent"]))
    print("-" * 60)

    # Read Response's HTTP status code
    print("Response HTTP Status Code: ", response.status_code)
    print("-" * 60)

# SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2021 ladyada for Adafruit Industries
# SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT

import os

import adafruit_connection_manager
import board
import busio
from adafruit_esp32spi import adafruit_esp32spi
from digitalio import DigitalInOut

import adafruit_requests

# Get WiFi details, ensure these are setup in settings.toml
ssid = os.getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID")
password = os.getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD")

# If you are using a board with pre-defined ESP32 Pins:
esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_CS)
esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_BUSY)
esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_RESET)

# If you have an externally connected ESP32:
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D9)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D10)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D5)

# If you have an AirLift Featherwing or ItsyBitsy Airlift:
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D13)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D11)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D12)

spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK, board.MOSI, board.MISO)
radio = adafruit_esp32spi.ESP_SPIcontrol(spi, esp32_cs, esp32_ready, esp32_reset)

print("Connecting to AP...")
while not radio.is_connected:
    try:
        radio.connect_AP(ssid, password)
    except RuntimeError as e:
        print("could not connect to AP, retrying: ", e)
        continue
print("Connected to", str(radio.ap_info.ssid, "utf-8"), "\tRSSI:", radio.ap_info.rssi)

# Initialize a requests session
pool = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_socketpool(radio)
ssl_context = adafruit_connection_manager.get_radio_ssl_context(radio)
requests = adafruit_requests.Session(pool, ssl_context)

JSON_GET_URL = "https://httpbin.org/get"

# Define a custom header as a dict.
headers = {"user-agent": "blinka/1.0.0"}

print("Fetching JSON data from %s..." % JSON_GET_URL)
with requests.get(JSON_GET_URL, headers=headers) as response:
    print("-" * 60)

    json_data = response.json()
    headers = json_data["headers"]
    print("Response's Custom User-Agent Header: {0}".format(headers["User-Agent"]))
    print("-" * 60)

    # Read Response's HTTP status code
    print("Response HTTP Status Code: ", response.status_code)
    print("-" * 60)

Your CIRCUITPY drive should now look similar to the following image:

WiFi Manager

The way the examples above connect to WiFi works but it's a little finicky. Since WiFi is not necessarily so reliable, you may have disconnects and need to reconnect. For more advanced uses, we recommend using the WiFiManager class. It will wrap the connection/status/requests loop for you - reconnecting if WiFi drops, resetting the ESP32 if it gets into a bad state, etc.

Here's a more advanced example that shows using the WiFiManager and also how to fetch the current time from a web source.

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# SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2019 ladyada for Adafruit Industries
# SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT

import time
from os import getenv

import board
import busio
import neopixel
import rtc
from digitalio import DigitalInOut

from adafruit_esp32spi import adafruit_esp32spi
from adafruit_esp32spi.adafruit_esp32spi_wifimanager import WiFiManager

# Get wifi details and more from a settings.toml file
# tokens used by this Demo: CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID, CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD
ssid = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID")
password = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD")

print("ESP32 local time")

TIME_API = "http://worldtimeapi.org/api/ip"

# If you are using a board with pre-defined ESP32 Pins:
esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_CS)
esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_BUSY)
esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_RESET)

# If you have an externally connected ESP32:
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D9)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D10)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D5)

# Secondary (SCK1) SPI used to connect to WiFi board on Arduino Nano Connect RP2040
if "SCK1" in dir(board):
    spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK1, board.MOSI1, board.MISO1)
else:
    spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK, board.MOSI, board.MISO)
esp = adafruit_esp32spi.ESP_SPIcontrol(spi, esp32_cs, esp32_ready, esp32_reset)

"""Use below for Most Boards"""
status_pixel = neopixel.NeoPixel(board.NEOPIXEL, 1, brightness=0.2)
"""Uncomment below for ItsyBitsy M4"""
# status_pixel = dotstar.DotStar(board.APA102_SCK, board.APA102_MOSI, 1, brightness=0.2)
"""Uncomment below for an externally defined RGB LED (including Arduino Nano Connect)"""
# import adafruit_rgbled
# from adafruit_esp32spi import PWMOut
# RED_LED = PWMOut.PWMOut(esp, 26)
# GREEN_LED = PWMOut.PWMOut(esp, 27)
# BLUE_LED = PWMOut.PWMOut(esp, 25)
# status_pixel = adafruit_rgbled.RGBLED(RED_LED, BLUE_LED, GREEN_LED)

wifi = WiFiManager(esp, ssid, password, status_pixel=status_pixel)

the_rtc = rtc.RTC()

response = None
while True:
    try:
        print("Fetching json from", TIME_API)
        response = wifi.get(TIME_API)
        break
    except OSError as e:
        print("Failed to get data, retrying\n", e)
        continue

json = response.json()
current_time = json["datetime"]
the_date, the_time = current_time.split("T")
year, month, mday = (int(x) for x in the_date.split("-"))
the_time = the_time.split(".")[0]
hours, minutes, seconds = (int(x) for x in the_time.split(":"))

# We can also fill in these extra nice things
year_day = json["day_of_year"]
week_day = json["day_of_week"]
is_dst = json["dst"]

now = time.struct_time((year, month, mday, hours, minutes, seconds, week_day, year_day, is_dst))
print(now)
the_rtc.datetime = now

while True:
    print(time.localtime())
    time.sleep(1)

# SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2019 ladyada for Adafruit Industries
# SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT

import time
from os import getenv

import board
import busio
import neopixel
import rtc
from digitalio import DigitalInOut

from adafruit_esp32spi import adafruit_esp32spi
from adafruit_esp32spi.adafruit_esp32spi_wifimanager import WiFiManager

# Get wifi details and more from a settings.toml file
# tokens used by this Demo: CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID, CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD
ssid = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID")
password = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD")

print("ESP32 local time")

TIME_API = "http://worldtimeapi.org/api/ip"

# If you are using a board with pre-defined ESP32 Pins:
esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_CS)
esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_BUSY)
esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.ESP_RESET)

# If you have an externally connected ESP32:
# esp32_cs = DigitalInOut(board.D9)
# esp32_ready = DigitalInOut(board.D10)
# esp32_reset = DigitalInOut(board.D5)

# Secondary (SCK1) SPI used to connect to WiFi board on Arduino Nano Connect RP2040
if "SCK1" in dir(board):
    spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK1, board.MOSI1, board.MISO1)
else:
    spi = busio.SPI(board.SCK, board.MOSI, board.MISO)
esp = adafruit_esp32spi.ESP_SPIcontrol(spi, esp32_cs, esp32_ready, esp32_reset)

"""Use below for Most Boards"""
status_pixel = neopixel.NeoPixel(board.NEOPIXEL, 1, brightness=0.2)
"""Uncomment below for ItsyBitsy M4"""
# status_pixel = dotstar.DotStar(board.APA102_SCK, board.APA102_MOSI, 1, brightness=0.2)
"""Uncomment below for an externally defined RGB LED (including Arduino Nano Connect)"""
# import adafruit_rgbled
# from adafruit_esp32spi import PWMOut
# RED_LED = PWMOut.PWMOut(esp, 26)
# GREEN_LED = PWMOut.PWMOut(esp, 27)
# BLUE_LED = PWMOut.PWMOut(esp, 25)
# status_pixel = adafruit_rgbled.RGBLED(RED_LED, BLUE_LED, GREEN_LED)

wifi = WiFiManager(esp, ssid, password, status_pixel=status_pixel)

the_rtc = rtc.RTC()

response = None
while True:
    try:
        print("Fetching json from", TIME_API)
        response = wifi.get(TIME_API)
        break
    except OSError as e:
        print("Failed to get data, retrying\n", e)
        continue

json = response.json()
current_time = json["datetime"]
the_date, the_time = current_time.split("T")
year, month, mday = (int(x) for x in the_date.split("-"))
the_time = the_time.split(".")[0]
hours, minutes, seconds = (int(x) for x in the_time.split(":"))

# We can also fill in these extra nice things
year_day = json["day_of_year"]
week_day = json["day_of_week"]
is_dst = json["dst"]

now = time.struct_time((year, month, mday, hours, minutes, seconds, week_day, year_day, is_dst))
print(now)
the_rtc.datetime = now

while True:
    print(time.localtime())
    time.sleep(1)

Further Information

For more information on the basics of doing networking in CircuitPython, see this guide:

Networking in CircuitPython

By Anne Barela

View Guide

Page last edited March 08, 2024

Text editor powered by tinymce.

Code PyPortal with CircuitPython

Open Weather Maps API Key

We'll be using OpenWeatherMaps.org to retrieve the weather info through its API. In order to do so, you'll need to register for an account and get your API key.

Go to this link and register for a free account. Once registered, you'll get an email containing your API key, also known as the "openweather token".

Copy and paste this key into your settings.toml file that is on the root level of your CIRCUITPY drive, so it looks something like this:

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CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID="your-wifi-ssid"
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD="your-wifi-password"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_USERNAME="my_username"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_KEY="my_key"
openweather_token="xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"

CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID="your-wifi-ssid"
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD="your-wifi-password"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_USERNAME="my_username"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_KEY="my_key"
openweather_token="xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"

Adafruit IO Time Server

In order to get the precise time, our project will query the Adafruit IO Internet of Things service for the time. Adafruit IO is absolutely free to use, but you'll need to log in with your Adafruit account to use it. If you don't already have an Adafruit login, create one here.

If you haven't used Adafruit IO before, check out this guide for more info.

Once you have logged into your account, there are two pieces of information you'll need to place in your settings.toml file: Adafruit IO username, and Adafruit IO key. Head to io.adafruit.com and simply click the View AIO Key link on the left hand side of the Adafruit IO page to get this information.

Then, add them to the settings.toml file using a text editor on your computer like this:

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CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID = "your_wifi_ssid"
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD = "your_wifi_password"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_USERNAME="my_username"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_KEY="my_key"
openweather_token="xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"

CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID = "your_wifi_ssid"
CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD = "your_wifi_password"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_USERNAME="my_username"
ADAFRUIT_AIO_KEY="my_key"
openweather_token="xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx"

CircuitPython Code

In the embedded code element below, click on the Download Project Bundle bundle, and save the .zip archive file to your computer.

Then, uncompress the .zip file, it will unpack to a folder named PyPortal_OpenWeather.

Copy the contents of the PyPortal_OpenWeather directory to your PyPortal CIRCUITPY drive.

This is what the final contents of the CIRCUITPY drive will look like:

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# SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2019 Limor Fried for Adafruit Industries
#
# SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT

"""
This example queries the Open Weather Maps site API to find out the current
weather for your location... and display it on a screen!
if you can find something that spits out JSON data, we can display it
"""

from os import getenv
import sys
import time
import board
from adafruit_pyportal import PyPortal
cwd = ("/"+__file__).rsplit('/', 1)[0] # the current working directory (where this file is)
sys.path.append(cwd)
import openweather_graphics  # pylint: disable=wrong-import-position

# Get WiFi details, ensure these are setup in settings.toml
ssid = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID")
password = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD")

if None in [ssid, password]:
    raise RuntimeError(
        "WiFi settings are kept in settings.toml, "
        "please add them there. The settings file must contain "
        "'CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID', 'CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD', "
        "at a minimum."
    )

# Use cityname, country code where countrycode is ISO3166 format.
# E.g. "New York, US" or "London, GB"
LOCATION = "Manhattan, US"

# Set up where we'll be fetching data from
DATA_SOURCE = "http://api.openweathermap.org/data/2.5/weather?q="+LOCATION
DATA_SOURCE += "&appid=" + getenv('openweather_token')
# You'll need to get a token from openweather.org, looks like 'b6907d289e10d714a6e88b30761fae22'
DATA_LOCATION = []


# Initialize the pyportal object and let us know what data to fetch and where
# to display it
pyportal = PyPortal(url=DATA_SOURCE,
                    json_path=DATA_LOCATION,
                    status_neopixel=board.NEOPIXEL,
                    default_bg=0x000000)

gfx = openweather_graphics.OpenWeather_Graphics(pyportal.root_group, am_pm=True, celsius=False)

localtile_refresh = None
weather_refresh = None
while True:
    # only query the online time once per hour (and on first run)
    if (not localtile_refresh) or (time.monotonic() - localtile_refresh) > 3600:
        try:
            print("Getting time from internet!")
            pyportal.get_local_time()
            localtile_refresh = time.monotonic()
        except RuntimeError as e:
            print("Some error occured, retrying! -", e)
            continue

    # only query the weather every 10 minutes (and on first run)
    if (not weather_refresh) or (time.monotonic() - weather_refresh) > 600:
        try:
            value = pyportal.fetch()
            print("Response is", value)
            gfx.display_weather(value)
            weather_refresh = time.monotonic()
        except RuntimeError as e:
            print("Some error occured, retrying! -", e)
            continue

    gfx.update_time()
    time.sleep(30)  # wait 30 seconds before updating anything again

# SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2019 Limor Fried for Adafruit Industries
#
# SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT

"""
This example queries the Open Weather Maps site API to find out the current
weather for your location... and display it on a screen!
if you can find something that spits out JSON data, we can display it
"""

from os import getenv
import sys
import time
import board
from adafruit_pyportal import PyPortal
cwd = ("/"+__file__).rsplit('/', 1)[0] # the current working directory (where this file is)
sys.path.append(cwd)
import openweather_graphics  # pylint: disable=wrong-import-position

# Get WiFi details, ensure these are setup in settings.toml
ssid = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID")
password = getenv("CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD")

if None in [ssid, password]:
    raise RuntimeError(
        "WiFi settings are kept in settings.toml, "
        "please add them there. The settings file must contain "
        "'CIRCUITPY_WIFI_SSID', 'CIRCUITPY_WIFI_PASSWORD', "
        "at a minimum."
    )

# Use cityname, country code where countrycode is ISO3166 format.
# E.g. "New York, US" or "London, GB"
LOCATION = "Manhattan, US"

# Set up where we'll be fetching data from
DATA_SOURCE = "http://api.openweathermap.org/data/2.5/weather?q="+LOCATION
DATA_SOURCE += "&appid=" + getenv('openweather_token')
# You'll need to get a token from openweather.org, looks like 'b6907d289e10d714a6e88b30761fae22'
DATA_LOCATION = []


# Initialize the pyportal object and let us know what data to fetch and where
# to display it
pyportal = PyPortal(url=DATA_SOURCE,
                    json_path=DATA_LOCATION,
                    status_neopixel=board.NEOPIXEL,
                    default_bg=0x000000)

gfx = openweather_graphics.OpenWeather_Graphics(pyportal.root_group, am_pm=True, celsius=False)

localtile_refresh = None
weather_refresh = None
while True:
    # only query the online time once per hour (and on first run)
    if (not localtile_refresh) or (time.monotonic() - localtile_refresh) > 3600:
        try:
            print("Getting time from internet!")
            pyportal.get_local_time()
            localtile_refresh = time.monotonic()
        except RuntimeError as e:
            print("Some error occured, retrying! -", e)
            continue

    # only query the weather every 10 minutes (and on first run)
    if (not weather_refresh) or (time.monotonic() - weather_refresh) > 600:
        try:
            value = pyportal.fetch()
            print("Response is", value)
            gfx.display_weather(value)
            weather_refresh = time.monotonic()
        except RuntimeError as e:
            print("Some error occured, retrying! -", e)
            continue

    gfx.update_time()
    time.sleep(30)  # wait 30 seconds before updating anything again

If you run into any errors, such as "ImportError: no module named `adafruit_display_text.label`" be sure to update your libraries to the latest release bundle!

How It Works

The PyPortal Weather Station has a few steps it takes to provide you with the information you desire! It has a boot-up screen, weather icons, and multiple fonts for displaying the info.

Background

First, it displays a bitmap graphic as the screen's startup background until it connects to the Open Weather Maps server to get the weather info. This is a 320 x 240 pixel RGB 16-bit raster graphic in .bmp format.

Time

Next, the program connects through the WiFi to get the local time via the adafruit.io server, which will be displayed in the upper right corner of the display.

Location

In the code.py file (which you will have renamed from openweather.py) you can change the location for which you want to display the weather in this line:

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# Use cityname, country code where countrycode is ISO3166 format.
# E.g. "New York, US" or "London, GB"
LOCATION = "Manhattan, US"

# Use cityname, country code where countrycode is ISO3166 format.
# E.g. "New York, US" or "London, GB"
LOCATION = "Manhattan, US"

API Query and JSON

Using this information, the code can then send a query to Open Weather Maps's API that looks something like this:

http://api.openweathermap.org/data/2.5/weather?q=Los Angeles, US&appid=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

(where all of those 'x's are your token).

When this query is complete, it returns a JSON file that looks like this:

Download File

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    {
  "coord": {
    "lon": -118.24,
    "lat": 34.05
  },
  "weather": [
    {
      "id": 501,
      "main": "Rain",
      "description": "moderate rain",
      "icon": "10d"
    }
  ],
  "base": "stations",
  "main": {
    "temp": 287.42,
    "pressure": 1016,
    "humidity": 50,
    "temp_min": 285.15,
    "temp_max": 289.15
  },
  "visibility": 16093,
  "wind": {
    "speed": 3.6,
    "deg": 300
  },
  "rain": {
    "1h": 1.52
  },
  "clouds": {
    "all": 75
  },
  "dt": 1552073935,
  "sys": {
    "type": 1,
    "id": 3514,
    "message": 0.0087,
    "country": "US",
    "sunrise": 1552054308,
    "sunset": 1552096542
  },
  "id": 5368361,
  "name": "Los Angeles",
  "cod": 200
}

    {
  "coord": {
    "lon": -118.24,
    "lat": 34.05
  },
  "weather": [
    {
      "id": 501,
      "main": "Rain",
      "description": "moderate rain",
      "icon": "10d"
    }
  ],
  "base": "stations",
  "main": {
    "temp": 287.42,
    "pressure": 1016,
    "humidity": 50,
    "temp_min": 285.15,
    "temp_max": 289.15
  },
  "visibility": 16093,
  "wind": {
    "speed": 3.6,
    "deg": 300
  },
  "rain": {
    "1h": 1.52
  },
  "clouds": {
    "all": 75
  },
  "dt": 1552073935,
  "sys": {
    "type": 1,
    "id": 3514,
    "message": 0.0087,
    "country": "US",
    "sunrise": 1552054308,
    "sunset": 1552096542
  },
  "id": 5368361,
  "name": "Los Angeles",
  "cod": 200
}

Here is the same file beautified with the Firefox browswer's built in tools (You can also use online code "beautifiers" such as https://codebeautify.org/jsonviewer or http://jsonviewer.stack.hu) :

JSON Traversal

The JSON file is formatted in a way that makes it easy to traverse the hierarchy and parse the data. In it, you'll see keys, such as main, description, icon , and temp, and their respective values. So, here are some key : value pairs we care about for the weather station:

"main" : "Rain"
"description" : "moderate rain"
"icon" : "10d"
"temp" : "287.42"

In order to fetch this data from the file, we need to be able to describe their locations in the file hierarchically. This is helpful, for example, in differentiating between the 'main' weather condition and the 'main' section containing temperature and other data. To avoid name clashing we rely on JSON traversal.

In the openweather_graphics.py file, you'll see how this is done. For example, the main key is found in this hierarchy of the JSON file: ['weather'], [0], ['main']

This means there is a key at the top level of the JSON file called 'weather', which has a sub-tree indexed [0], and then below that is the 'main' key.

This process is used to cast the values of the temperature, weather, description, and which icon to display from the directory of bitmap icons.

These are the icons represented:

Font

The data is displayed as text created with bitmapped fonts to overlay on top of the background. The fonts used here are bitmap fonts made from the Arial typeface. You can learn more about converting type in this guide.

PyPortal Constructor

When we set up the pyportal constructor, we are providing it with these things:

url to query
json_path to traverse and find the key:value pairs we need
default_bg default background color

Fetch

With the PyPortal set up, we can then use pyportal.fetch() to do the query and parsing of the weather data and then display it on screen.

All of the heavy lifting of parsing that data and displaying it as text or bitmaps is done in the openweather_graphics.py code.

Graphics

Let's have a look at how the openweather_graphics.py code places the elements on screen. Below, we can see the icon and text that are displayed. The items in quotes are the key names from the JSON file, and their values are what we see displayed using the CircuitPython label library.

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# SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2019 Limor Fried for Adafruit Industries
#
# SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT

import time
import json
import displayio
from adafruit_display_text.label import Label
from adafruit_bitmap_font import bitmap_font

cwd = ("/"+__file__).rsplit('/', 1)[0] # the current working directory (where this file is)

small_font = cwd+"/fonts/Arial-12.bdf"
medium_font = cwd+"/fonts/Arial-16.bdf"
large_font = cwd+"/fonts/Arial-Bold-24.bdf"

class OpenWeather_Graphics(displayio.Group):
    def __init__(self, root_group, *, am_pm=True, celsius=True):
        super().__init__()
        self.am_pm = am_pm
        self.celsius = celsius

        root_group.append(self)
        self._icon_group = displayio.Group()
        self.append(self._icon_group)
        self._text_group = displayio.Group()
        self.append(self._text_group)

        self._icon_sprite = None
        self._icon_file = None
        self.set_icon(cwd+"/weather_background.bmp")

        self.small_font = bitmap_font.load_font(small_font)
        self.medium_font = bitmap_font.load_font(medium_font)
        self.large_font = bitmap_font.load_font(large_font)
        glyphs = b'0123456789abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ-,.: '
        self.small_font.load_glyphs(glyphs)
        self.medium_font.load_glyphs(glyphs)
        self.large_font.load_glyphs(glyphs)
        self.large_font.load_glyphs(('°',))  # a non-ascii character we need for sure
        self.city_text = None

        self.time_text = Label(self.medium_font)
        self.time_text.x = 200
        self.time_text.y = 12
        self.time_text.color = 0xFFFFFF
        self._text_group.append(self.time_text)

        self.temp_text = Label(self.large_font)
        self.temp_text.x = 200
        self.temp_text.y = 195
        self.temp_text.color = 0xFFFFFF
        self._text_group.append(self.temp_text)

        self.main_text = Label(self.large_font)
        self.main_text.x = 10
        self.main_text.y = 195
        self.main_text.color = 0xFFFFFF
        self._text_group.append(self.main_text)

        self.description_text = Label(self.small_font)
        self.description_text.x = 10
        self.description_text.y = 225
        self.description_text.color = 0xFFFFFF
        self._text_group.append(self.description_text)

    def display_weather(self, weather):
        weather = json.loads(weather)

        # set the icon/background
        weather_icon = weather['weather'][0]['icon']
        self.set_icon(cwd+"/icons/"+weather_icon+".bmp")

        city_name =  weather['name'] + ", " + weather['sys']['country']
        print(city_name)
        if not self.city_text:
            self.city_text = Label(self.medium_font, text=city_name)
            self.city_text.x = 10
            self.city_text.y = 12
            self.city_text.color = 0xFFFFFF
            self._text_group.append(self.city_text)

        self.update_time()

        main_text = weather['weather'][0]['main']
        print(main_text)
        self.main_text.text = main_text

        temperature = weather['main']['temp'] - 273.15 # its...in kelvin
        print(temperature)
        if self.celsius:
            self.temp_text.text = "%d °C" % temperature
        else:
            self.temp_text.text = "%d °F" % ((temperature * 9 / 5) + 32)

        description = weather['weather'][0]['description']
        description = description[0].upper() + description[1:]
        print(description)
        self.description_text.text = description
        # "thunderstorm with heavy drizzle"

    def update_time(self):
        """Fetch the time.localtime(), parse it out and update the display text"""
        now = time.localtime()
        hour = now[3]
        minute = now[4]
        format_str = "%d:%02d"
        if self.am_pm:
            if hour >= 12:
                hour -= 12
                format_str = format_str+" PM"
            else:
                format_str = format_str+" AM"
            if hour == 0:
                hour = 12
        time_str = format_str % (hour, minute)
        print(time_str)
        self.time_text.text = time_str

    def set_icon(self, filename):
        """The background image to a bitmap file.

        :param filename: The filename of the chosen icon

        """
        print("Set icon to ", filename)
        if self._icon_group:
            self._icon_group.pop()

        if not filename:
            return  # we're done, no icon desired

        icon = displayio.OnDiskBitmap(filename)
        self._icon_sprite = displayio.TileGrid(icon, pixel_shader=icon.pixel_shader)

        self._icon_group.append(self._icon_sprite)

# SPDX-FileCopyrightText: 2019 Limor Fried for Adafruit Industries
#
# SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT

import time
import json
import displayio
from adafruit_display_text.label import Label
from adafruit_bitmap_font import bitmap_font

cwd = ("/"+__file__).rsplit('/', 1)[0] # the current working directory (where this file is)

small_font = cwd+"/fonts/Arial-12.bdf"
medium_font = cwd+"/fonts/Arial-16.bdf"
large_font = cwd+"/fonts/Arial-Bold-24.bdf"

class OpenWeather_Graphics(displayio.Group):
    def __init__(self, root_group, *, am_pm=True, celsius=True):
        super().__init__()
        self.am_pm = am_pm
        self.celsius = celsius

        root_group.append(self)
        self._icon_group = displayio.Group()
        self.append(self._icon_group)
        self._text_group = displayio.Group()
        self.append(self._text_group)

        self._icon_sprite = None
        self._icon_file = None
        self.set_icon(cwd+"/weather_background.bmp")

        self.small_font = bitmap_font.load_font(small_font)
        self.medium_font = bitmap_font.load_font(medium_font)
        self.large_font = bitmap_font.load_font(large_font)
        glyphs = b'0123456789abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyzABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ-,.: '
        self.small_font.load_glyphs(glyphs)
        self.medium_font.load_glyphs(glyphs)
        self.large_font.load_glyphs(glyphs)
        self.large_font.load_glyphs(('°',))  # a non-ascii character we need for sure
        self.city_text = None

        self.time_text = Label(self.medium_font)
        self.time_text.x = 200
        self.time_text.y = 12
        self.time_text.color = 0xFFFFFF
        self._text_group.append(self.time_text)

        self.temp_text = Label(self.large_font)
        self.temp_text.x = 200
        self.temp_text.y = 195
        self.temp_text.color = 0xFFFFFF
        self._text_group.append(self.temp_text)

        self.main_text = Label(self.large_font)
        self.main_text.x = 10
        self.main_text.y = 195
        self.main_text.color = 0xFFFFFF
        self._text_group.append(self.main_text)

        self.description_text = Label(self.small_font)
        self.description_text.x = 10
        self.description_text.y = 225
        self.description_text.color = 0xFFFFFF
        self._text_group.append(self.description_text)

    def display_weather(self, weather):
        weather = json.loads(weather)

        # set the icon/background
        weather_icon = weather['weather'][0]['icon']
        self.set_icon(cwd+"/icons/"+weather_icon+".bmp")

        city_name =  weather['name'] + ", " + weather['sys']['country']
        print(city_name)
        if not self.city_text:
            self.city_text = Label(self.medium_font, text=city_name)
            self.city_text.x = 10
            self.city_text.y = 12
            self.city_text.color = 0xFFFFFF
            self._text_group.append(self.city_text)

        self.update_time()

        main_text = weather['weather'][0]['main']
        print(main_text)
        self.main_text.text = main_text

        temperature = weather['main']['temp'] - 273.15 # its...in kelvin
        print(temperature)
        if self.celsius:
            self.temp_text.text = "%d °C" % temperature
        else:
            self.temp_text.text = "%d °F" % ((temperature * 9 / 5) + 32)

        description = weather['weather'][0]['description']
        description = description[0].upper() + description[1:]
        print(description)
        self.description_text.text = description
        # "thunderstorm with heavy drizzle"

    def update_time(self):
        """Fetch the time.localtime(), parse it out and update the display text"""
        now = time.localtime()
        hour = now[3]
        minute = now[4]
        format_str = "%d:%02d"
        if self.am_pm:
            if hour >= 12:
                hour -= 12
                format_str = format_str+" PM"
            else:
                format_str = format_str+" AM"
            if hour == 0:
                hour = 12
        time_str = format_str % (hour, minute)
        print(time_str)
        self.time_text.text = time_str

    def set_icon(self, filename):
        """The background image to a bitmap file.

        :param filename: The filename of the chosen icon

        """
        print("Set icon to ", filename)
        if self._icon_group:
            self._icon_group.pop()

        if not filename:
            return  # we're done, no icon desired

        icon = displayio.OnDiskBitmap(filename)
        self._icon_sprite = displayio.TileGrid(icon, pixel_shader=icon.pixel_shader)

        self._icon_group.append(self._icon_sprite)

Text Position

Depending on the design of your background bitmap and the length of the text you're displaying, you may want to reposition the text and caption.

The PyPortal's display is 320 pixels wide and 240 pixels high. In order to refer to those positions on the screen, we use an x/y coordinate system, where x is horizontal and y is vertical.

The origin of this coordinate system is the upper left corner. This means that a pixel placed at the upper left corner would be (0,0) and the lower right corner would be (320, 240).

So, if you wanted to move the subscriber count text to the right and up closer to the top, your code may look like this for that part of the pyportal constructor: text_position=(250, 10)

Text Color

Another way to customize your display is to adjust the color of the text. The line text_color=0xFFFFFF in the constructor shows how. You will need to use the hexadecimal value for any color you want to display.

You can use something like https://htmlcolorcodes.com/ to pick your color and then copy the hex value, in this example it would be 0x0ED9EE

Now, we'll look at mounting the PyPortal into a case for display!

Page last edited March 08, 2024

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PyPortal Weather Station Case

I decided to use the portable PyPortal case designed by the Ruiz Bros. as my enclosure. You can go to this guide to build it -- either by 3D printing it yourself or sending out to a service such as 3DHubs.