Issue 19 HackSpace Magazine: Control games with a steering wheel featuring the @Adafruit #CircuitPlaygroundExpress #CircuitPython @HackSpaceMag @ben_everard
Many microcontrollers, including the Adafruit Circuit Playground Express, can emulate a class of USB peripherals known as human input devices (HIDs). These are the things that you use to control your computer – mostly mice and keyboards, but also trackballs and other controllers.
Your operating system should already have drivers to handle this input, so we can send data to our computer without needing to do any programming on the computer side. What’s more, this can control any game we like – there’s no need to modify the game in any way in order to control it with our microcontroller.
The article shows how to use CircuitPython, the easy to use Python for microcontrollers, to take acceleration values from the onboard Circuit Playground Express accelerometer chip and turn those into keystrokes over USB that any computer can use to control your favorite games.
Let us know what you are building with Circuit Playground Express in the comments below.
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
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