8 Reasons Why ESP8266 is So Popular
In the circle of Maker, It is probably no one doesn't know ESP8266, the development kit series based on the Wi-Fi chip development ,It occupy half of the sky in this two years, even makes great pressure for other communication chip manufacturer. why will ESP8266 suddenly so popular we can not figure out ?
Indeed, the rise of ESP8266 is not familiar with the way the chip business, but the sudden emergence under the power of the community. The following presents some observation experience, it may give different thinking to the chip business .
1. cheaper!
Concise and comprehensive to say that is"cheap"!
As the essay says, the $ 5 ESP8266 is cheaper than the remaining sensor fragments after the launch of the cannon. The implication is that the sensor attached to the gun will be reimbursed with the launch of the shell, therefore it must be low-cost orientation, even so, ESP8266 is cheaper than it .
Cheap is indeed a great breakthrough point. Former Wired editor Chris Anderson in TED (2010) on the"technical long tail"as the title of the speech, it is mentioned to four key to technology market, one of the keys is the price, he cited the case of DVD, when the price fell below a certain psychological barrier, the market began to take off.
Because enough cheap, so the majority of the people have the courage to try, even if the damage is not distressed, this is the first step in the success of ESP8266.
2. Funny!
The second step is"Funny"!
Since the damage is not distressed, it began to chaos!
In general, Wi-Fi travels more than 60 to 140 meters, but it has been put into 366 meters (printed circuit board antenna), 479 meters (external antenna), and put the video on YouTube (2014, as follows), so that , most people even haven't heard, did not buy ESP8266,they also began to know that there is this thing in the world,it make ESP8266 opened the popularity.
3. More compatible development environment
With more people know ESP8266 after buying and trying , they also began to find ESP8266 deficiencies while trying to reinforce it. For example, ESP8266 program development originally have to understand the FreeRTOS real-time operating system, and written in professional C language, but someone writted Arduino IDE plug-in for the development, they can write ESP8266 control program as long as the Arduino IDE development environment , Significantly reducing the entry threshold for its program development.
Arduino compatible development is another big step, after more software staff to join, put forward more other development methods. For example, the NodeMCU project can use the eLua language to develop the ESP8266 control program. The Smart.js project can use the JavaScript language to develop the ESP8266 control program. After the Smart.js project, go to Mongoose IoT Firmware, or the MicroPython project to make it can be developed in Python.
4.Design flexibility and enhancements
Not only are many users free to contribute software for ESP8266 , but also ESP8266 chips and boards have been improved, such as faster chip frequency, the addition of an analog to digital converter (ADC),enhancing the sensing capabilities of ESP8266, such as connecting the soil moisture sensors,it is a common application.
In the board, Shenzhen AI letter (AI Thinker) launched a series of ESP-xx ESP8266 cheap board. Different models offer different antenna options, pin count options, authentication options, and additional external memory capacity, so that ESP8266 can be updated to Wi-Fi wireless transmission firmware (commonly known as OTA, Over-The-Air). Plus well-known supplier of Adafruit, SparkFun alsolaunched ESP8266 board, so that the end consumers are more confidence for ESP8266.
5. Learning resources are rich
ESP8266 chip is from Shanghai Lexin (Expressif),there is only the Chinese version the initial chip information,but because become more and more well-known, and it was translated into English later, which also help to promote.
Due to the high degree of concern in the ESP8266, it also has attracted the interest of teaching books, and now it has the English version of O'reilly, as well as the Japanese version, the Italian version, the Arabic version and so on.
In addition, in the two English Maker Project sharing platform, there are more ESP8266 sharing project , so that users more easily follow the start to do, and then use it in their own creative projects in the further, the formation of snowball effect. (Refer to Instructable ESP8266 project area, and Hackster.io area)
6. Convenient application development environment
More follow-up, another well-known treader Seeed (seeed Studio) have more ideas on the ESP8266 , they
put forward the Wio Link, make highly packed for the ESP8266 in the hardware and software level. Wio Link is an ESP8266 chip-based board with six Grove modules and up to six Grove sensor modules(Grove is also available for Seeed Studio and for Seeed Studio on many series boards).
In addition, Wio Link set up Grove module connection through the corresponding mobile App , and then set the information, update to the Wio Link board through the Wi-Fi , and provide RESTful API for a variety of programs to develop calls to use,it can be used for ESP8266 application development, such as JavaScript, Java, Python, Objective C (Mac and iOS commonly used programming language), PHP, Ruby, and API has been able to mobile phones, web pages, and even IFTTT (page conditional trigger service), etc., a wide range of applications.
At this point, ESP8266's application and development has reached a very convenient level, almost simply plug and pull can be completed in the hardware.
Save all kinds of hard work before the professional electronic engineering required, simple control program, and operation can be completed directly on the mobile phone App .
7. Reward incentive plan
Other elements also include some of the network reward incentives, such as who can achieve a software function or application for ESP8266 , you can get what kind of feedback, which also support the development of the software support for the ESP8266.
In addition, Shanghai Le Xin also has Bug Bounty Program,as long as the user found Bug in its SDK, tested and decided to be effective, it will provide no less than 1000-2000 U.S. dollars in cash reward.
8. Very active developer community
Under the above conditions, both official and unofficial community of developers are quite active in sharing and discussing, and the enthusiasm of a community will be positive to stimulate the above conditions which have a better performance. At this stage, the official does not need too much action, the community will own rolling up.
In conclusion
Of course, ESP8266 is not perfect, after all, Shanghai Le Xin is enter the Wi-Fi chip market later,
many chip hardware features are not complete, such as encryption and decryption part, which makes ESP8266 has not been accepted by the formal system brand industry.
The reason why is that the weaker security will easily lead to accidents,it will be a huge and troublesome claims, the industry is usually reluctant to risk, ESP8266 low price advantage in this market is difficult to show, this area is still the traditional Wi-Fi chip Such as foreign Qualcomm, Broadcom, Avago, Marvell, or MediaTek, Realtek, and so on.
Looking follow-up, ESP8266 has the development of space in the aspects of hardware and software , they
have advanced chip ESP32, not only Wi-Fi but also have Bluetooth; Software can also be developed more, for example, by building blocks of Scratch and developing graphical programs to support ESP8266, which allows developers to extend their age.
However, anything could be in the Macker circle,ESP8266 can be popular for a while, but it remains to be seen whether it will continue to be popular.
