Reading Input Count within a certain timeframe and output either true or false to Virtual Pin

[diediegagiano]

I want to use NodeMCU on gate operator, the gate opener has an Led that Flashes indicating different states,
Ex. Constant ON- Gate Open
Constant OFF- Gate Closed
Slow Flash- Gate Opening
Fast Flash- Gate Closing
Two flashes every 2 seconds- Mains fail
So I need to count the pulses in a defined time to tell the state and provide an output accordingly.
Any help or guidance, please

[UKHeliBob]

@diediegagiano

I need to count the pulses in a defined time

• When you start a test of teh current state save the value of millis() as the start time.
• In loop(), count any pulses received.
• Each time through loop() calculate the elapsed time by subrtracting the start time from the current value of millis().
• You now have the number of pulses received in the period on which to base the determination of the current state

[johnwasser]

How about counting the number of times the light changes in 5 seconds. A power fail will be close to 8. Fast and Slow blinking will be larger numbers. A solid ON or solid OFF would be 0 changes.

const byte LightSensorPin = 4;

boolean LightWasOn = false;
unsigned EdgeCount = 0;
unsigned long FirstStateChangeTime;

void setup()
{
  FirstStateChangeTime = millis();
}

void loop()
{
  unsigned long currentTime = millis();
  boolean lightIsOn = digitalRead(LightSensorPin);
  // or lightIsOn = analogRead(LightSensorPin) > Threshold;

  if (lightIsOn != LightWasOn)
  {
    LightWasOn = lightIsOn;

    // Light has just changed state
    EdgeCount++;
  }

  // After 5 seconds
  if (currentTime - FirstStateChangeTime > 5000)
  {
    Serial.print("Changes in 5 seconds: ");
    Serial.print(EdgeCount);
    if (lightIsOn)
      Serial.println(" and the light is ON");
    else
      Serial.println(" and the light is OFF");

    // Reset for next 5 seconds
    FirstStateChangeTime = currentTime;
    EdgeCount = 0;
  }
}

[diediegagiano]

Thank you, I will try it that way, boards arrived just now.
What I am still struggling is, serial print is easy, but so send data to Blynk 2.0 App is still rather complicated for me, see I need to interpret said values and was think of sending to various virtual pins depending on the counts.
For instance Virtual PIN:
V100 = Gate Closed LED constant ON
V101 = Gate Open LED constant ON
V102 = Gate Opening LED Slow flash
V103 = Gate Closing LED Fast Flash
How would I go about it?
Then I can easily create widgets in Blynk to show the different gate Status
Any help please, I am still very new to Arduino programming only about 1mnth experience