Hey, guys! Wondering about the feasibility of making the following work:
Arduino powers a standard 2-number display.
Four buttons.
When pressed, button #1 sets the counter to 12, button #2 resets count to 0, button #3 adds to the count, button #4 takes the count down.
Seems to be pretty straightforward, but I can't seem to find any guidance on where to start.
Thoughts?
JG
Not at all difficult but what is a "standard 2-number display"?
Start with sensing the button changes... simply reporting the states to the serial monitor will do to het you up...
That should take a newbie a day or two.
Then get your display hooked up ( it could any of many types )
Make a simple counter to tick up from 0 to whatever.
A bit more complex, but if you’re careful and follow instructions that will be another day or so.
With those two capabilities, you can experiment with setting limits, start and end values then using the buttons to implement those functions.
Get an easy to drive display - like a MAX 7219, or LCD.
Wire up your buttons to 0V, eith INPUT PULLUP ( less bits to get wrong)
The rest is pretty basic code.
Call back here when you have the burtons working, and have chosen a display.
We can help you tie it together and learn along the way.
Paul__B:
Not at all difficult but what is a "standard 2-number display"?
See attached image. Obviously I'm going to use either two of these, or one two-digit unit.
Do make life easy on yourself and get a 2-digit module with driver chip such as the TM1637 included.
JordanG:
See attached image. Obviously I'm going to use either two of these, or one two-digit unit.
OK, so as wvmarle points out, your first task is to get the display working, and attempting to drive these displays directly from the Arduino is something of a fools errand. You need to start with a display module and learn to program that. A TM1637 module would be OK, you need to use a library to drive it.
Here is one to start with:
This is the first step of the project. Get the module, remove the faulty capacitors(!) look up some examples and practice using it, and we can take the next step when you have done that! (In the meantime also get your pushbuttons and some 4k7 resistors.)
Incidentally the Arduino does not "power" anything - I trust you meant using it to control the display. You need a proper 5 V supply to power it; for this sort of project a USB "phone charger" is generally the most convenient.