Need a platform to make, test, and code for a digital mockup of arduino hardware. Should it be Wokwi, Fritzing, Flowcode, or Something Else?

[StefanL38]

@jediweirdo

Using radios to receive packets is that much harder than wired? This will be my first time manually implementing wireless communication into a project, so I'm curious: where would the extra complexity come from?

The complexity comes from BEEING wireless.

• electromagnetic noise,
• interference through reflections
• LOW power
• NRFs beeing well known to require a real good power-supply.

@jediweirdo

I probably will be using a library or something to use the NRF24L01s, so thankfully I won't have to figure out how to encrypt/decrypt things for wifi transfer

You can really believe in the experience of the users here:
You will have MORE trouble getting NRF24L01s to work
than
two ESP32-boards that have everything on board

• microcontroller
• enough RAM
• enough flash
• Wireless connectivity through WiFi

@jediweirdo

so thankfully I won't have to figure out how to encrypt/decrypt things for wifi transfer

There is NOTHING to encrypt or decrypt when using WiFi on a ESP32-board
encrypting / decrypting is all done "under the hood"

The ESP32-Boards can send and receive data over UDP, TCP and a special protocol called ESP-NOW.

You have to take care of using several function-calls to setup the ESP-NOW-communication
which is just writing code that can start from simply copy & paste an existing demo-project.

One source for ESP32 / ESP-NOW is random nerd tutorials

Getting Started with ESP-NOW (ESP32 with Arduino IDE) | Random Nerd Tutorials