So I have a project I am working on that has a lot of shields and I'm wondering if it will be stable enough for all of the shields to function properly.
Arduino Uno as a base,
Ethernet Shield,
Xbee Shield and Unit,
SeeedStudio Sensor Shield to top it off with an LCD screen and a Temp sensor.
Do you mean mechanically stable?
If so then you could always arrange a clamp to hold it together.
I meant electrically stable.
It is definitely mechanically stable even at a 90 degree angle. Quite a beast though.
You need to check if any two shields want the same signal pins.
Then you need to check if the require the same hardware resource on the processor, like the UART or the SPI lines.
If they do all is not necessarily lost because you could program your way round it.
I believe all of the pins check out.
The Ethernet shield uses ICSP (pins 11, 12, 13 - also 10 or 4)
The Xbee shield uses UART (pins 0 and 1)
The Seeedstudio shield can use pins d2 - d9
Is there a way to redirect pins via software?
I think redirect is the wrong word, you can use alternative pins in software but you physically have to wire them up to where they are going. However in your case you look like you have cleared the first hurdle of pin compatibility. Now you have to hope that the libraries play nicely together otherwise you will have to hack them or write your own.
I did mean redirect, but as you pointed out, it is not possible to reassign hardware connections via software.
I guess the next question is does the LCD interface work alongside existing UART and ICSP resources?
Is SPI separate from ICSP and UART?
From the looks of things, the LCD can function completely off of any 4 or 8 digital pins but I have read mentions of SPI being involved.
the LCD can function completely off of any 4 or 8 digital pins
Yes it can, there is no need to have SPI involved nor the UART.
The ICSP pins are only used for programming by a programmer so they can be discounted.
Is SPI separate from ICSP and UART?
Yes totally.
Hope that helps
It does, thanks.
I see no reason why this all wouldn't work so I should be good to go.
I am a little confused though regarding the Ethernet shield. Why does it say in the description (sparkfun and others) that is utilizes the ICSP pins?
The ICSP pins are physically the same ones as the SPI and are perhaps a more concise if less accurate description of them.