# CircuitPython Weekly Meeting for August 21, 2023
Here is the notes document for next Monday’s CircuitPython Weekly meeting. It is at the normal time of 11am Pacific / 2pm Eastern here on Discord. Everyone is encouraged to attend! Please add your hug reports and status updates even if you’ll be attending the meeting - it’s super helpful! If you are unable to attend but would still like to include updates, feel free to include them in the notes and we’ll read them off during the meeting. Hope to see you there! @circuitpythonistas


Welcome to the CircuitPython Weekly meeting notes! Feel free to add your Hug Reports and Status Updates early. During the meeting, we go through them as a round robin sorted by username. If you can’t make the meeting and would still like to participate, add your notes with a “(missing meeting)” after your username and we’ll read them off for you. 


Add any longer-form discussion topics or general questions you have to the “In the weeds” section. 


Thanks! We hope to see you in the meeting!


Tim is hosting.


Video is available [on YouTube](https://youtu.be/Djc2nLD7uSs).


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](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/adafruit/adafruit-circuitpython-weekly-meeting/master/meeting.ical) for use with standard calendar applications and can also be viewed [in your browser](https://open-web-calendar.hosted.quelltext.eu/calendar.html?url=https%3A%2F%2Fraw.githubusercontent.com%2Fadafruit%2Fadafruit-circuitpython-weekly-meeting%2Fmain%2Fmeeting.ical&title=CircuitPython%20Meeting%20Schedule&tab=agenda&tabs=month&tabs=agenda).


If you want to be able to participate in the meeting by speaking, you will need to be added to the @circuitpythonistas role on Discord. Please ask any one of the moderators or admins to add you if you’d like to join.


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.
## 03:24 Community News


### 03:27 CircuitPython 8.2.3 Released!
CircuitPython 8.2.3, the latest bugfix revision of CircuitPython, and is a new stable release - Adafruit Blog and Release Notes.
Notable changes to 8.2.3 since 8.2.2
Improve RGBMatrix timing on SAMx5x.
### 04:18 Getting Linux running on an ESP32-S3
Ladyada at Adafruit has been hacking on a community project to get a version of Linux running on an ESP32-S3 microcontroller. She's had success using Docker to run Linux builds when other methods have had issues. Now WiFi and a number of other features works under Linux! - YouTube.
### 04:49 Big European Companies form RISC-V Venture
The RISC-V open instruction set architecture got a boost today after it emerged that five chip giants are coming together to jointly invest in a company to develop reference architectures based on the standard. The new entity will be formed in Germany with investment from Infineon Technologies, Qualcomm, NXP Semiconductors, Bosch, and Nordic Semiconductor, with the aim of speeding up "the commercialization of future products based on the open-source RISC-V architecture." - The Register.
### 05:34 Project of the Week: Recreating the TARS Robot from Interstellar
Charlie Diaz describes making a miniature version of the robot TARS from the movie Interstellar - hackster.io.
### 05:56 Pico W Bluetooth Controller
Kevin McAleer makes his first PCB, a Bluetooth controller. A Raspberry Pi Pico W is used programmed in MicroPython - Twitter/X.
  

### 06:26 Newsletter Details
The CircuitPython Weekly Newsletter is a CircuitPython community-run newsletter emailed every Monday. The complete [archives are here](https://www.adafruitdaily.com/category/circuitpython/). It highlights the latest Python on hardware related news from around the web including CircuitPython, Python and MicroPython developments. 
To contribute your own news or project, edit next week's draft [on GitHub](https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython-weekly-newsletter/tree/gh-pages/_drafts) and [submit a pull request](https://help.github.com/articles/editing-files-in-your-repository/) with the changes. You may also tag a tweet with #CircuitPython on Twitter, or email cpnews@adafruit.com.
## 07:23 State of CircuitPython, Libraries and Blinka
**This report contains information from the previous seven days. Any changes (PRs merged, etc.) made today are not included in this report.**
### 07:52 Overall
* 13 pull requests merged
  * 10 authors - kattni, andibing, tannewt, dhalbert, dglaude, tylercrumpton, Saentis, todbot, makermelissa, deshipu
  * 5 reviewers - jposada202020, jepler, gamblor21, tannewt, dhalbert
* 8 closed issues by 6 people, 14 opened by 12 people


### 09:04 Core
* 10 pull requests merged
  * 7 authors - Saentis, kattni, andibing, makermelissa, dhalbert, deshipu, dglaude
  * 4 reviewers - dhalbert, gamblor21, jepler, tannewt
* 26 open pull requests
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/6555 (Open 412 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/6913 (Open 338 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/7151 (Open 295 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/7220 (Open 276 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/7440 (Open 222 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/7618 (Open 182 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/7675 (Open 170 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/7711 (Open 163 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/7718 (Open 161 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/7811 (Open 144 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/7997 (Open 94 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/7996 (Open 94 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8033 (Open 87 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8095 (Open 62 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8091 (Open 62 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8100 (Open 60 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8190 (Open 30 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8188 (Open 30 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8233 (Open 22 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8262 (Open 15 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8281 (Open 7 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8285 (Open 5 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8293 (Open 3 days) (draft)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8292 (Open 3 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8291 (Open 3 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/pull/8298 (Open 1 days)
* 3 closed issues by 3 people, 9 opened by 8 people
* 691 open issues
  * https://github.com/adafruit/circuitpython/issues
* 6 active milestones
 * 8.2.x: 2 open issues
 * 9.0.0: 50 open issues
 * Libraries: 22 open issues
 * Long term: 594 open issues
 * Support: 16 open issues
 * Third-party: 8 open issues
 * 4 issues not assigned a milestone


* MicroPython 1.19 will soon be merged into main. One consequence of this is that “.mpy” files are not compatible between 8.x and 9/main. Use `circup install --py` to install source versions of packages during this time.
* Only after MicroPython 1.20 is merged to main, later this year, will we add support for main branch back to the bundle
* There is also a newer version of asyncio needed, currently in a PR into that repo.
* For the moment, we will add all new Adafruit boards to 8.x. Third parties adding boards are also encouraged to add the boards to 8.x. This is due to the main branch being in flux right now
* Ask us on Discord if you’re using main and run into problems using the main branch after this PR is merged, hopefully this week
### 12:43 Libraries
* 3 pull requests merged
  * 3 authors - tylercrumpton, todbot, tannewt
  * 3 reviewers - jposada202020, dhalbert, jepler
  * Merged pull requests:
        * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_USB_Host_Mass_Storage/pull/1 (Days open: 11)
        * https://github.com/adafruit/CircuitPython_Community_Bundle/pull/181 (Days open: 1)
        * https://github.com/adafruit/CircuitPython_Community_Bundle/pull/180 (Days open: 1)
  * 49 open pull requests (Oldest: 368, Newest: 1)
* 5 closed issues by 3 people, 5 opened by 4 people
  * 632 open issues
  * 19 good first issues
* https://circuitpython.org/contributing


#### Library PyPI Weekly Download Stats
* **Total Library Stats**
  * 130530 PyPI downloads over 312 libraries
* **Top 10 Libraries by PyPI Downloads**
  * Adafruit CircuitPython BusDevice (adafruit-circuitpython-busdevice): 6551
  * Adafruit CircuitPython Requests (adafruit-circuitpython-requests): 5997
  * Adafruit CircuitPython Register (adafruit-circuitpython-register): 1792
  * Adafruit CircuitPython NeoPixel (adafruit-circuitpython-neopixel): 1489
  * Adafruit CircuitPython Wiznet5k (adafruit-circuitpython-wiznet5k): 1244
  * Adafruit CircuitPython Display Text (adafruit-circuitpython-display-text): 1184
  * Adafruit CircuitPython ADS1x15 (adafruit-circuitpython-ads1x15): 1099
  * Adafruit CircuitPython MiniMQTT (adafruit-circuitpython-minimqtt): 1088
  * Adafruit CircuitPython Motor (adafruit-circuitpython-motor): 1034
  * Adafruit CircuitPython Seesaw (adafruit-circuitpython-seesaw): 976


#### Library updates in the last seven days:
* **New Libraries**
  * [todbot/CircuitPython_MicroOSC](https://github.com/todbot/CircuitPython_MicroOSC)
  * [tylercrumpton/CircuitPython_GC9D01](https://github.com/tylercrumpton/CircuitPython_GC9D01)
* **Updated Libraries**
  * [adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_PIOASM](https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_PIOASM)


### 14:41 Blinka
* 0 pull requests merged
  * 0 authors -
  * 0 reviewers -
* 5 open pull requests
  * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_Blinka/pull/417 (Open 922 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_Blinka_bleio/pull/40 (Open 682 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_Python_PlatformDetect/pull/299 (Open 85 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_Blinka/pull/694 (Open 16 days)
  * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_Python_PlatformDetect/pull/307 (Open 13 days)
* 0 closed issues by 0 people, 0 opened by 0 people
* 102 open issues
  * https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_Blinka/issues
* PyPI downloads in the last week: 10134
* Piwheels Downloads in the last month: 10238
Number of supported boards: 119






## 15:41 Hug reports
16:07 @foamyguy
* Everyone who participated in, or watched along with any of the streams and CircuitPython day activities. 
* Discord user @clever for working on and sharing info about a Chip’s Challenge clone that is running bare metal on the Raspberry Pi graphics chip. Really neat project


17:25 @danh
* @jepler for fixing a bunch of problems with the MicroPython v1.19.1 merge, especially getting the tests to run.
* @kattni and @jepler for the joint video chat we had on CircuitPython Day.
* @kattni for doing all kinds of organization for CircuitPython Day.
* All the CircuitPython Day presenters and participants.


18:25 @deshipu
* @danh and @clever for help debugging the PewPew M4 bugs during the weekend.


18:46 @DJDevon3
* @Danh for help with GIT and multiple working branches within the same library. It’s tedious but I have seen the light on why it’s best practice after I watched 2 separate submissions get merged into 1 PR.
* @romkey for confirming an adafruit_requests bug I was testing.
* @MarkGamblor for confirming a Github report with some older Unexpected Maker boards shipping with an overriding dotstar.py file
* @UnexpectedMaker for being an active developer and responding to an issue before I even had a chance to bring it up in today’s meeting.
* @Everyone who participated in streaming on Circuit Python Day 2023. There are far too many people to give hugs to individually. It was an amazing day full of projects, informative topics, and everyone just being awesome.


19:52 @david.glaude (text only)
* Hug report to everyone that participated or organized the #CircuitPythonDay2023


20:05 @jepler
* Hug report to the whole community, especially the enthusiastic participants in the chat during the Friday streams. Y’all make this work worth doing!
* Paul Cutler, Todbot, Kattni, JP, and Danh for being on streams with me. Paul in particular because being a panel moderator is at least as hard as being a panel member. I did little more than show up, while he prepared a whole outline of topics.
* Todbot for a box of cool objects that are also on his tindie store, check them out: https://www.tindie.com/stores/todbot/ – I owe you at least one cool project based on this now.
* Liz for an awesome debut (?) on the 3D Hangouts stream. Your contributions & skills in 3D printing have gone under-appreciated by me before now!
* Everyone who appeared on all the other streams. I confess to having not watched everything yet. I noticed especially that there seemed to be a lot of continuing interest in @foamyguy’s stream game after it finished, based on people in the chat still talking about it later.
* @danh for laying such great groundwork in the 1.19 merge and helping / guiding me while we worked together to get the PR’s actions checks all “green”


21:33 @kattni
* @Paul Cutler for hosting the synthio panel on CP day
* @todbot, @johnpark and @jepler for joining me on the synthio panel
* @jepler and @danh for joining me for another successful CircuitPython Day Chat
* All the folks who participated in CP Day, thank you for making organisation simpler this year by stepping up to join in and make for the longest CP Day of content
* @todbot for the excellent examples to go with the amazing little QT Py Synth board from my care package
* Hug to everyone who _watched_ CircuitPython day! Without you, what’s the point? 


23:58 @makermelissa
* Everybody who participated in CircuitPython Day
* @jepler for reviewing my alphablend PR
* Group Hug


24:16 @Paul Cutler
* @jepler, @kattni, @todbot, and JP for being on the synthio panel
* Everyone who participated in CircuitPython Day


24:30 @todbot (text only)
* Group hug to everyone on CircuitPython Day
* Extra hug to all the synthio panel members
* Extra extra hug to everyone who organized things (@paulcutler, @kattni)
## 24:53 Status Updates
25:30 @foamyguy
* Didn’t touch library stuff much in the last week. I been in OSHWA land working on submitting products that hadn’t made it in yet. I’ve built up a series of scripts that pull (and cache) data from Adafruit product API, then process it down into only the fields that change for each project. Filling in the description, checking the silkscreen for rev, and getting the PCB repo link are the only remaining manual steps. Once all the data is compiled and ready another script submits the request to OSHWA and stores the resulting response. On track to finish up the last 60ish today
* Chip’s Challenge clone that I worked on for a few streams including one on CircuitPython day. It runs on a PyPortal using Stemma QT Gamepad for input. The maps are loaded from JSON files exported by Tiled. I have a completely functional level 1 and left on with the entities required for level 2 to work on next.


27;42 @danh
* Worked with Jeff on MicroPython v1.19.1 merge issues over the past few days, especially getting tests to run. Close to merging. Jeff and I have a solution for asyncio library skew. We will do smoke tests on all architectures. We will NOT make a 9.0.0 alpha release until after the v1.20 or later merge, to avoid having multiple .mpy versions.
* We need to make 8.2.x builds for new boards, e.g. Metro ESP32-S3.
* Participated in CircuitPython day chat session with @jepler and @kattni. Theme was“CircuitPython features you might not know about and we want to highlight”. I covered keypad, asyncio, secondary USB, safemode.py, etc.


30:09 @deshipu
* Working on uGame22 again, another handheld game console, with large screen. I will make a board definition pull request shortly, when all the required pull requests merge.
* Instead of working on a game during the CircuitPython day, I improved the game selection menu and fixed a bunch of bugs.


31:23 @DJDevon3
* Project I was working on for Circuit Python Day ran into multiple bugs on the MatrixPortal S3 including hard faults. So I switched to a Feather S2 and still got one of the same bugs. Spent my 10pm on a Saturday bisecting the adafruit_requests library that prevented an SSL handshake with Github. This bug at a minimum affects all S2 & S3 boards using the adafruit_requests library beginning in 8.2.2. If you have a project using the adafruit_requests library I highly recommend sticking with 8.2.1 or prior at the current time. The developers are aware of the issue.
* Ran into a bug report on Github for the Unexpected Maker FeatherS2. Turns out Unexpected Maker was including an adafruit_dotstar.py library file in the CIRCUITPY root directory. While it might be the latest version at the time of shipment, it will age, and eventually cause problems. UM is aware of the issue and already working on changes.


33:15 @david.glaude (text only)
* Soldered an I2S amp to a Feather RP2040 USB Host (following this guide: https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-feather-rp2040-dvi/i2s made for the DVI version but works perfectly) and tried various synthio examples from @Tod.
* Tested the https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_USB_Host_MIDI simpletest (that is the MIDI Synth that is the demo from Scott, but it failed completely (piano key stroke were taking a lot of second to be received).


34:13 @fede2 (text only)
* Last week:
   * Compiling circuitpython natively on riscv64 hardware, just because.
   * I’m sorry I wasn’t able to host a circuitpython day event. I hope I can for next year, hopefully with an event inside Microsoft and in latinamerica.
* This week:
   * If someone wants to test riscv64 hardware that is probably suitable for circuitpython, please let me know and I’ll send you a MilkV duo microcontroller (~$9) for free. (more in the weeds)


35:08 @jepler
* Last week:
   * Early in the week, worked on dot clock displays but still don’t have working code.
   * Later in the week I shifted to helping Dan with the 1.19 merge by working on compile & test failures
   * CircuitPython Day! Yay! It was so good that everyone involved gets another hug report here in status updates
   * Got the 1.19 merge all green in the Github Actions testing over the week-end because it was bothering me like a toothache
* This week:
   * Helping in any way to get 1.19 over the finish line & merged, at your beck & call Dan!
   * Then probably back to the parallel display stuff
* Soon:
   * I ordered a board from JLC PCB for the first time (previously I’ve done oshpark & some other board houses a decade ago). Opted for slow shipping so it won’t be here anytime soon. The board is for programming 2kB EEPROMs. And I forgot the necessary pull-up resistor so I’ll have to bodge that in, oops.
* Random idea:
   * Circuit art flexible PCB bookmark. Someone should make one.


36:51 @kattni
* CircuitPython Day festivities
* Metro ESP32-S3 guide.
   * Added pin to CP board def that was missing; PR’d to main and 8.2.x, but first time ever PRing to a release branch
   * Fritzing object is done.
   * PrettyPins diagram is done.
   * Guide skeleton is created, time to start filling it in.


40:14 @makermelissa
* Last Week:
   * Finished up software for my Message Board
   * Designed and 3D printed the enclosure for the message board
   * Worked on the Message Board guide
   * CircuitPython Day Live Stream
* This Week:
   * Finish up writing my Message Board guide


## 40:51 In The Weeds
@foamyguy Do any of these newer libraries need to be released / added to the Library bundle?


        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_MachXO
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_ULP_Blink
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_JTAG
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_Register_SPI
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_BLE_Creation
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_JSON_Stream
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_MCU_Flasher
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_Debug_Probe
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_Prompt_Toolkit
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_PIO_UART
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_USB_Host_Mass_Storage
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_USB_Host_MIDI
        https://github.com/adafruit/Adafruit_CircuitPython_WM8960


* @kattni - We can go over these individually after the meeting. Some of them definitely do not, yet, but there are now some I don’t recognise, so they’re more recent.


42:07 @fede2 (text only) Is the microcontroller from a MilkV Duo (Cvitek CV1800B doc) a good processor for circuitpython, as a powerful alternative to an m7?
I understand that chips need time to mature, so this is a very early question about its usefulness. No uf2, no tinyusb; but it is a riscv64 (Adafruit is member of the RISCV foundation), it has two cores with one of them clocked at 1Ghz, usb mass storage with usb hub, AI and DSP, ethernet, linux support, extremely cheap ($9 for a complete Duo board) etc.
* Looks like it’s designed to run a Linux, maybe it’s better for standard Python + Adafruit Blinka.(@jepler)


46:03 @todbot (text only) quick ESP-IDF question: will the impending merge of ESP-IDF 5 allow for DAC audio out? (#3898)


47:35 @carter (text only) will the MPY compat break sync with a CP major number? Like 9x?
* Yep, after the “micropython 1.19” merge, .mpy files will not be compatible. Users will have to install python source version (circup install --py will do this). (@jepler)
* Thanks - so 7x library bundle will work with 7x, 8x with 8x, 9x with 9x, etc.?
## 49:29 Wrap-Up
Next week’s meeting is at the normal date / time 8/28 at 2pm Eastern / 11am Pacific.
The *following* meeting is moved to Tuesday 9/5 at 2pm/11am due to a US holiday (Labor Day)