# CircuitPython Weekly for 8 June 2020

Video is available here [on YouTube](https://youtu.be/k_vklLFGBog) and [on diode.zone](https://diode.zone/videos/watch/01ebebf0-4738-4031-b0b5-fc2cf7f2c469).

Join here for the chat all week: http://adafru.it/discord

The CircuitPython Weekly happens normally at 2pm ET/11am PT on Mondays. Check the #circuitpython channel on Discord for notices of change in time and links to past meetings. Meeting times are also available in iCal format using the following link: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/adafruit/adafruit-circuitpython-weekly-meeting/master/meeting.ical

CircuitPython development is sponsored by Adafruit. Please support them by purchasing hardware from https://adafruit.com.

Reminders: Podcast available on most services. Let us know if we’re missing some.

## 4:55 Community News

CircuitPythonista Kattni talks with Real Python

On Real Python this week, Ricky White joined by Kattni Rembor, creative engineer at Adafruit Industries. Kattni’s role is varied, as she covers embedded software, hardware design, technical writing, and community leadership.
In the interview, they talk about Kattni's work developing CircuitPython and the role mentorship has played in her career to date. She also shares her advice for anyone looking to start their first hardware project using CircuitPython - Real Python.


6:01 CircuitPython Deep Dive Stream with Scott Shawcroft
This week, Scott streams his work on a little ESP32-S2 and voting - YouTube.


6:38 Geek Mom Projects has made a DIY "Nanoleaf" scuplture. Triangle PCBs use side-emitting LEDs which diffuse into a translucent acrylic layer. It's free standing and modular. Assembled by screwing smaller PCB connectors to the back of adjoining boards. On the back, a system of spring connectors and pads on connector and triangle PCBs transmits signal/power. A thin buffer layer of clear acrylic keeps spring connectors from getting crushed. It is all powered by an Adafruit ItsyBitsy M4 Express running CircuitPython - Twitter.


7:21 The sparkline class - a sparkline is a scrolling line graph, where any values added to sparkline using add_value are plotted. Kevin Matocha created a sparklines example for CircuitPython and displayio with inspiration from a Hackaday article - Twitter and GitHub.
Adafruit Update
Adafruit is shipping regular (non-emergency) orders after priority orders are filled.
If you have been waiting to order, read Adafruit's announcement and FAQ and then Shop Adafruit.
## 9:29 State of CircuitPython, Libraries and Blinka
### 9:55 Overall
* 20 pull requests merged
  * 14 authors - bergdahl, siddacious, jepler, weblate, kmatch98, brentru, Flameeyes, FoamyGuy, makermelissa, sommersoft, kattni, Gadgetoid, hierophect, vooralfred
  * 9 reviewers - ladyada, siddacious, jepler, tannewt, FoamyGuy, brentru, arturo182, theacodes, sommersoft
* 11 closed issues by 8 people, 21 opened by 15 people


Overall: The project’s growing, which is great.  We’re seeing new contributors and new folks come in every day.  As a group who's already here, let’s continue to support those folks and bring more in.  On the core side, we’re looking at a beta release hopefully today.  On the libraries side, we are creating new libraries as Adafruit gets back to releasing hardware.  Blinka continues to add new boards, and Melissa also does great work keeping the circuitpython website up to date.
### 11;54 Core
* 8 pull requests merged
  * 7 authors - bergdahl, Flameeyes, sommersoft, jepler, weblate, hierophect, vooralfred
  * 5 reviewers - jepler, arturo182, tannewt, theacodes, sommersoft
* 12 open pull requests
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/2780 (Open 51 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/2863 (Open 32 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/2879 (Open 27 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/2918 (Open 22 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/2914 (Open 22 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/2966 (Open 11 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/2985 (Open 7 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/3003 (Open 4 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/3002 (Open 4 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/3009 (Open 3 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/3017 (Open 2 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/3016 (Open 2 days)
* 4 closed issues by 4 people, 8 opened by 5 people
* 309 open issues
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/issues
* 6 active milestones
  * 5.x.0 - Features: 11 open issues
  * 5.x.x - Bug Fixes: 34 open issues
  * 6.0.0: 16 open issues
  * Libraries: 11 open issues
  * Long term: 222 open issues
  * Support: 4 open issues
  * 11 issues not assigned a milestone


* Core download stats available at https://circuitpython.org/stats
### 13:27 Libraries
* 12 pull requests merged
  * 8 authors - siddacious, kmatch98, brentru, Flameeyes, FoamyGuy, makermelissa, kattni, Gadgetoid
  * 7 reviewers - jepler, ladyada, siddacious, tannewt, theacodes, FoamyGuy, brentru
  * Merged pull requests:
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_ESP32SPI/pull/99 (Days open: 22)
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_Display_Text/pull/48 (Days open: 4)
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_Display_Text/pull/49 (Days open: 2)
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_FONA/pull/6 (Days open: 1)
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_AHTx0/pull/1 (Days open: 1)
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_LPS2X/pull/4 (Days open: 1)
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_SSD1305/pull/9 (Days open: 1)
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_MiniMQTT/pull/36 (Days open: 1)
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_MiniMQTT/pull/34 (Days open: 1)
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_Bundle/pull/251 (Days open: 1)
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_APDS9500/pull/4 (Days open: 1)
    * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_APDS9500/pull/5 (Days open: 1)
* 4 closed issues by 3 people, 12 opened by 9 people
* https://circuitpython.org/contributing
  * 173 open issues
  * 33 open pull requests (Oldest: 518, Newest: 1)
Library updates in the last seven days:

**New Libraries**
 * [Adafruit_CircuitPython_AHTx0](https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_AHTx0)
 
**Updated Libraries**
 * [Adafruit_CircuitPython_FONA](https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_FONA)
 * [Adafruit_CircuitPython_SSD1305](https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_SSD1305)
 * [Adafruit_CircuitPython_MiniMQTT](https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_MiniMQTT)
 * [Adafruit_CircuitPython_LSM6DS](https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_LSM6DS)
 
### 16:03 Blinka
* 0 pull requests merged
  * 0 authors - 
  * 0 reviewers - 
* 1 open pull requests
  * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_Blinka/pull/304 (Open 0 days)
* 3 closed issues by 3 people, 1 opened by 1 people
* 23 open issues
  * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_Blinka/issues
* PyPI Downloads in the last week: 2503
Number of supported boards: 52

## 16:54 Hug reports


17:52 @tannewt
* Limor and Phil for continually supporting everyone at Adafruit. Particularly giving me the time to run with electioncal.us and get v0 up and going.
* Fede2, Mscosti and suvayu for help with electioncal.us: https://github.com/electioncal/us
* Hierophect for fixing issues in iMX RT (aka Teensy) for the next beta release. Arturo182 for the review and merge.
* DavePutz for looking into the ESP32S2 sleep time issue.


19:24 @v923z
* Group hug; thanks to all those, who make sure that the adafruit community stays a sane place

20:07 @anecdata (text-only)
* @jerryn for quickly jumping in to test a wi-fi PR with some counterintuitive behavior, and generally for doing a lot of heavy lifting with builds and testing around the ecosystem
* Group hug


@AnneB (lurking)


20:28 @brentru
* @adafruit for their continued and expanded mission for supporting people doing the right thing. 
* Patrick Van Oosterwijck (@xorbit) for adding some great features to the circuitpython ethernet lib and fixing a bug.
* @anecdata for exposing the esp32spi/nina-fw low power mode, @jerryn for testing
* Group hug to the community


21:13 @cater
* AFK for meeting, but group hug and thanks to all for continuing to help with mod’ing discord.


21:31 @charlesburnaford
* Group hug for everybody.  I go along with what was said about how this keeps me from going nuts in between my own problems.
* I found the calendar stuff from Scott’s deep dive rather interesting.




22:15 @danh
* @adafruit for supporting its staff in a most excellent way, supporting its business neighbors, supporting NYC, and supporting justice for all.
* @hbldh for the bleak library, which does a remarkable job of supporting a uniform BLE API on host computers across extremely diverse underlying libraries.


@davep (lurking)


23:59 @david.g (missing meeting)
* hug report to all


24:10 @foamyguy
* @adafruit for their staunch support of human rights, and being an excellent role model for how companies, organizations and people in general should behave. 
* The ACLU of DC for taking swift and important action to protect civil liberties of individuals in our nation's capital. 
* @kmatch98 for fixing a bug with background color on Labels that use BDF fonts. As well as adding some additional padding functionality to the display_text library
* @Jepler for help reviewing the above display_text changes.
* @Group hug


25:35 @geekguy
* @danh for being Mr. Wizard and always having answers to my questions.
* @MakerMelissa for supporting my development on the HT16K33 library.
* @jerryn for having the solution to my I2C bus issue.
* @tannewt for his leadership and guidance in Circuitpython development and for creating electioncal.us.
* Adafruit for supporting such a great working environment, and for always doing their best to do the right thing.


26:25 @hierophect
* @tannewt, @MarkOlsson and @arturo for reviews
* @Jepler for reporting and helping track the STM32 clock issues, and sticking with it in the face of HAL nonsense
* Thanks @jerryn for doing so much testing and identifying critical bugs on both stm32 and i.mx, it’s been hugely helpful. 
* @Adafruit for all they’ve done over the last few weeks


27:44 @hukuzatuna (Phil) (lurking)
* Group hug


28:00 @jasonp (can’t attend today)
* @tannewt for discussion and help with Evo CircuitPython lib ideas and code


28:12 @jepler
* Kattni for inviting me to help with the weekly meeting last week
* JP for working on yet another demo with MP3s and asking good questions
* Hug to Adafruit for promoting the Black Lives Matter message 
* @hierophect for listening to me on Friday when I was at the end of my patience about a (now-solved) STM32 problem
* @jerryn for testing my SD card code direct from the PR
* @kmatch98 for putting up with me during a review process, especially when I reviewed outdated code.
* Community hug


30:05 @jerryn
* @hierophect for fixing up the teensy board issues
* @tannewt for continuing work on esp32s2
* Moderators -- this is getting repetitive, but good work!


30:41 @kattni
* @krayola for continuing to work on the LED Animation library, optimising the current code, and adding new animations
* @cuppacoffee for finding some bugs with the LED animations library and filing an issue on GitHub
* @community moderators on Discord - thank you so much for keeping up with the bot onslaught, and the couple of people issues.
* Group hug for those I’m forgetting.
* Limor and Phil for stepping up when it matters most, giving the entire Adafruit team a voice, for taking a stand in difficult times, and providing a regularly updated list of info and resources for Black Lives Matter.  


@kingernorth(lurking)


31:53 @krayola
* @foamyguy for fast turnaround on code reviews of LED Animation.
* @cuppaCoffee on discord for creatively using LED Animation and finding bugs and quirks and inspiring me to do more with it.
* @kattni for more LED animation ideas and for the superb LED strip wall
* @jepler for chatting with me a few weeks ago about pixel grids and DisplayIO
* @JohnPark for LED animation ideas


32:50 @kmatch98 (text only)
* @foamyguy and @jepler for label reviews and super helpful improvement suggestions


33:01 @MakerMelissa
* @caternuson I forgot to give a hug report from a couple weeks ago. Your displayio guide explaining tilegrid in detail came in handy when working on the porting displayio to Blinka.
* Group Hug


33:35 @markolsson (not in meeting)
* @danh for helping out with my USB descriptor questions.


@Mr. Certainly [lurking]

## 34:08 Status Updates

34:55 @tannewt
* Fixed up I2C for ESP32S2 on my branch.
* Chatted with Cory who is my contact at Major League Hacking who is supporting a few fellows over the summer. Will hopefully lead to some new CP contributors.
* Started https://electioncal.us 
* This week will be heads down on SPI and UART.
* Will actually release beta.1 today or tomorrow.


37:29 @v923z
* Finished carrier board for raytac’s NRF module: https://github.com/v923z/nrf-omni 
* A couple of smaller software and hardware projects for the coming week. 

@anecdata (lurking)


@AnneB (lurking)


40:28 @brentru
* LW: Added the ability to associate MQTT topics with Python methods in MiniMQTT
   * I.e: if you subscribe to a topic like device/humidity, you can execute read_sensors() code whenever device/humidity is published to
   * Rel. Adafruit FONA for FONA808, 3G, 800 modules. Voice is a missing component, I’ll circle back on it later this month or next.
* TW: Working on an #itsnotoutyet Adafruit IO project, specifics soon :) 


41:44 @charlesburnaford
* I went back and played around with my keyboard for my synth and I made a knob box.  I figured out a way to send a configuration file to the knob box to change which controllers came out of which knobs, and not have to reconfigure the thing every time I want to use it.  It’s using system exclusive messages.  Will file an issue on the library to add this functionality.


44:20 @danh
* I have _bleio running on Linux and Windows 10 using bleak underneath. It doesn’t work on MacOS yet, but I know what the problem is, and may submit a PR to bleak. Simple peripherals like a heart rate monitor and a BLE thermometer work now. Bluefruit Connect should work soon.


@davep (lurking)


45:30 @foamyguy
* Busy week with work. Didn’t get much time for fun with Circuit Python
* Display_text PR testing
* Playing with PyPortal touch navigation interfaces


46:41 @geekguy
* Continuing work on the multi-display support for the HT16K33 library, a very large project. I thought of two ways this could be used - single where the displays are used as one large display and sequential where the displays are just cycled through for the same thing or different things.
* Tinkering with my CLUE and Bluefruit SPI Friend. I have a glucometer that has Bluetooth and I want to see if I can pull all the data from it.


47:42 @hierophect
* Last week
   * Totally rewrote the STM32 clock system! We had lots of clock related bugs and technical debt so I restructured it. 
   * The new system allows overriding the default clock with custom defaults, has some major fixes to the low power operation, raises the frequency of many dev boards, and corrects several board profiles to correctly reflect LSE presence. 
   * Also tracked down an issue on the i.MX 1060 series that was affecting the Teensy boards, so those should be working properly again. 
   * Got started on the RGB matrix.
   * I decanted my year old fermented hot sauce and it was SUPER GOOD
   * Also made some hypertufa troughs
* This week:
   * Get RGB matrix control working, and then enable it on the STM32 F7 and H7 series
   * Make some other overdue fixes to the F7 and H7 while I’m working on it
   * Repair and submit the i.MX 1050
   * Track down a recent issue with the i.MX regarding SPI
   * Finally get around to pulseio for the i.MX, maybe
   * Submit my Dynamixel library to the community bundle! Kind of forgot about that, need to wrap it up and submit. 


@hukuzatuna (lurking)


@jasonp
* No update this week


51:04 @jepler
* Last week:
   * SDIO sdcard work on STM32
   * Fixed some audio bugs
   * Helped out some Adafruit people with mp3 questions
   * Changed what “make translate” does, should reduce merge conflicts with weblate
* This week:
   * SDIO sdcard work on SAMD51
   * Getting back on the PR for adding a translation section on the contributing page of circuitpython.org
* Other stuff
   * Going to be 3D printing some simple parts for our rainwater capture system, wonder how they’ll hold up in weather conditions!


53:43 @jerryn
* Experimenting with Teensy 4.1 board - found its CP support had been broken for awhile
   * Issue resolved by Hierophect -- working well now
* Found issue with IMIXRT1010-EVK -- only certain GPIO pins work for SPI
   * Discovered when trying to use Airlift with it. Had to usr CS on D10 or SPI does not work. Other pins also had restrictions -- filed issue.
   * Finally got it working with a special build with ESP32SPI and Request “frozen”
      * Limited RAM makes it hard to import libraries from FileSystem.
* Painted the “cat cage”
* Watching the baby birds grow - all 7 are doing well.




56:20 @kattni
* Last week:
   * Began porting AHTx0 to CircuitPython - handed over to Limor due to timing.
   * Wrote AHTx0 guide
   * Fritzing party - 9 objects created
   * Recorded newsletter recap vid
* This week:
   * Library Monday!
      * Updated example names and RTD link on one lib
      * Filed issue to update example names on another
      * Did a release on a lib to get it deployed to PyPI
   * Record newsletter recap vid
   * Update CoC to remove individual user names of moderators and update to refer to @community moderators as a whole.
   * Update a guide with a FeatherWing version.
   * Update two Fritzing objects with PIDs
   * Work on CP issue 2962


@kingernorth (lurking)


1:00:10 @kmatch98 (lurking)
* Updated “label” function for improved background coloring, with padding options
* Further improvements to reduced memory labels using TextMap library, including support for BuiltinFonts
* Added code block handling to Markdown parser/renderer
* Created a rolling sparkline demo for CP


* Other topics: finished design/build of a print in place box lid with twist-knob closure latches, exploring concepts and limits for design of print in place of mechanical structures  


1:00:59 @krayola
* Been a while since I joined the weekly.  Been busy working on LED Animations.
* Pushed a fix a few weeks ago for _pixelbuf so that it behaves better with RGBW strips, by allowing assignment of 3-element RGB to RGBW pixelbufs.
* This week:
   * Have a few outstanding branches on LED Animation that I'll be sending a PR for soon, including bug fixes and code cleanup.
   * Working on PixelGrid in LED Animation so there can be 2D animations.  It automatically maps multiple PixelMaps to the grid, and allows [x, y] and [x][y] indices.
   * Working on a few sample 2D animations.
   * Look into handling background colors in LED Animations.


1:02:18 @MakerMelissa
* Last Week:
   * Updated the Adafruit 3D Model Viewer to work with the BNO055 and show calibration information.
   * Wrote a learn guide for the OLED bonnet.
   * Fixed an issue with arduino display not working in certain rotations
   * Reviewed lots of PRs
* This week:
   * Working on some arduino display issues/PRs
   * Likely continuing displayio porting to Blinka
   * Possibly working on adding a 9-dof sensor calibration script


@Mr. Certainly [lurking]

## 1:03:32 In The Weeds


1:03:54 @foamyguy - Possibility of making the “This is an old version of the Docs” warning more “in your face”. Perhaps a bolder color, or CSS rule that allows it to follow as you scroll down the page? 


1:06:11 @v923z - how to fork from circuitpython, if I have already forked micropython?


1:09:23 @krayola - displayio for rgb strips - @jepler is likely to be able to work on this but it will be in a couple months


1:15:08 @krayola - fancyled/fastled concepts and _pixelbuf


1:18:30 @tannewt - Rename master to main.
## 1:25:36 Wrap-Up
