Questions about addressable led strips

Hi everyone

Im looking at adding some addressable led strips too my setup but I don’t have a clue how you would add these too openhab

how do you send the commands for fancy patterns and colour combinations ect I have currently been using hue compatible led strips fancy something a bit nicer

what do you mean by “addressable” ?
what strips, or more precisely what strip controllers do you mean to have fancy patterns??

You couldn’t do it direct from the pi but you’ll have to get creative with some code either way.

Assuming it’s the common one…
Raspberry-Pi-WS2801B-RGB-LED-Stripe-Schaltplatine-600x296

Using the example from here and some tweaking to get OH to call the script, it could be done.

I wouldn’t opt for ardunio controller and mqtt.

Easiest would be to shop around for a a controller and custom firmware which uses mqtt.

You could use an 8266 board and mqtt. Love to hear more about the task

I’m using some for my TV stand and wrote a Python program that allows me to control them via MQTT. The animations are handled by the program, so latency in the connection to openhab doesn’t cause jitter in the output.
Some basic animations are built in, but you can write your own in Python and then run them via MQTT.

Check out the documentation for MQTTany’s LED Module and let me know if you have any questions.

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Oops. Meant to say “would” :slight_smile:

Hi

Exactly how much / many addressable LEDs do you want to add?

If less than 170 x RGB or less than 128 x RGBW then it’s reasonably easy with an Art-NET adapter and the DMX binding.

If you’ve got grander plans, you’ll need something to do the heavy lifting and get openHAB2 to send remote controls, rather than directly send the pattern commands.

Does this topic give you any ideas?

Hi everyone thanks for the replys

@mstormi

Im not sure on an exact strip or controller that’s why I made this post by addressable I mean LED strips that can display different colors on different parts of the strips the only addressable led strip I know of is ws2815 and by fancy patterns I mean flashing pulsing ect stuff like the tplink led strip and a few other brands

@CDriver my RPI is in a server rack and I would add a few of the strips in different places around my house and setting up a RPI for each strip would be a bit overkill I would prefer too use something else like an arduino that you also recommend

@Thedannymullen

I can see mqtt being part of the solution here I just don’t understand how you would set the strip too the different colors or get it too do patterns would you program these directly into the 8266 board and then just get OH to start the programed routines?

@CrazyIvan359

Interesting I will look into that more

@MDAR

This is something I do not no at the moment as I don’t have a strip and want too put some in a few places around my home I prefer too have a sort of plan before I go and buy hardware but probably alot of them

So far I gather it’s better too connect the strip too an arduino and get openhab too send the commands too the Arduino

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When you say… “A lot”

Do you mean…

This much “a lot” ----

32 universes of anything from 144 pixel per metre to 30 pixel per metre.

Or this ?
740 pixels on a staircase (5 universes, which is 52 pixels per tread)

Or just 92 pixels like this?

Or you can just top off some standard wall lights with a short strip of RGB pixels.

I’ve got 4 of these in my lounge, each with 11 pixels.
Which are controlled from openHAB2, with the DMX binding and an Art-NET to SPi adapter.

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Regardless of what you use to control them, there is a lovely little SPi line balancer (SmartShow WSExtend) you can use for distances over 5 metres and up to 200 metres.

There’s no reason why you couldn’t link from one strip to another with these line balancers.

The only down side is…

Should a single chip fail (to pass on the data) everything down stream will stop.

Oh my…

All of them videos are exactly what I’m after but not too the scale of the first video and the 3rd video knight rider light YES :smiley:
they are all awesome

Im lost for words they are that cool

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Thanks.

In that case…

CrazyIvan’s MQTTany might be a way forward, if you’re comfortable programming patterns in Python.

Or having a little headless (with dummy 4K HDMI plug) Windows machine running one or more instances of Jinx!, with openHAB2 remotely controlling them.

As per my link in my first reply.

“Budget and imagination are the only two limits in life”

Good luck.

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Coding is not really a skill of mine but there’s plenty of people who are good at it and enjoy helping people with this stuff im not afraid of a code I’m just not skilled or no much about it this is something I would like too change and little projects like this are definitely a way too learn there are plenty of places too post for help including here :wink: what device would you run crazyivan on? My main server is a hypervisor so adding another machine too run whatever is needed is not really a problem

Im still lost for words you have well thrown me off with those awsome videos I don’t even known what I want anymore just that lol

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LEDs connect too an arduino or something like that and then a system running software that openhab can send commands too?

Thanks for the help here you have given me loads too think about and look into I think it will be along time until I can get this up and running but I’m going too keep on at it :wink:

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You’ll have to ask @CrazyIvan359 for more details on his MQTTany project, it sounds fabulous and I’m looking forward to having the time to experiment myself.

Personally (and professionally) I’m a big fan of Art-NET or sACN based solutions, but that’s because I’ve been doing this stuff since 1986

You could go wild and flood your ceiling with our new SPi GRBW 1 watt downlights.

https://youtu.be/Glh7tcBw6Rk

You need quite a few to get bright white light, but the advantage is that you can create pockets of light.

For example, a low light over a sofa, with a spot in the corner for a reading light.

Or you can go full 80’s disco crazy.

It just depends on how much time you’re prepared to put into the design and configuration.

Budget is a small detail…
“Who can put a price on happiness”…

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Its good but I well prefer what you have achieved with strips and that would be more than good enough for me :smiley:

Disco crazy does sound fun :smiley:

Not a clue what that is :frowning: lol

In its simplistic terms, it’s lighting control (DMX) in an ethernet packet.

But these days, you can get dongles, like the Smart-Show NetWS that accept Art-NET or sACN Ethernet packets and output the SPi stream that addressable LEDs require.

openHAB2 can talk to these directly with the DMX Binding.

I guess they are ‘dumb’ translators, as they don’t play out patterns, they purely do as they are told, so require a pattern generator somewhere else.

For your application, a number of Arduino units, located next to the start of each strip running CrazyIvan359’s MQTTany software would be nice solution.

We tend to use a centralised pattern generator, like Jinx! or Madrix so that we (could) harmonise the whole building into one big pattern.

Just like you’d see on any big lighting rig at a show or on the TV.

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@Sharpy this is one of the many software available for 8266

https://github.com/Aircoookie/WLED/blob/master/readme.md

Plenty of videos on youtube

All you need is an 8266 bird like wemos d1 or nodemcu and a strip of ws2812. I am not familiar with the 2815 but if the commands are the same they would work.

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@Sharpy @MDAR
MQTTany runs on Linux only, not any Arduino platforms. It also currently only supports WS281x LEDs via GPIO on Raspberry Pi so far. That said, I think it might be the easier way to get the animations you want. All of the LED interfacing and setup is done for you, your animation code is given an object representing the array that you can set pixels in any way you want. Then you send an MQTT message to run the animation for one of the strips you have configured.

In terms of hardware, you are right that having a Pi at each strip is overkill. An option to use MQTTany is to use the extenders that MDAR suggested to carry the signal from one section to another and then configure it as a single strip. The animations in MQTTany don’t have to set the entire strip, they can set sections at a time.

I plan to add support for either Art-Net and/or sACN, but I don’t have a timeline for that right now.

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@MDAR thanks for posting sucscribed to your channel!

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