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SparkFun WiFly Shield Library : alpha 2 release

This is a library for the Arduino-compatible WiFly Shield available from SparkFun Electronics. The library also provides a high-level interface for the SC16IS750 I2C/SPI-to-UART IC used in the WiFly shield but also available on a separate breakout board.

The goal with this library is to make it--as much as possible--a "drop in" replacement for the official Arduino Ethernet library. Once a wireless network is joined the library should respond in the same way as the Ethernet library. This means you should be able to take existing Ethernet examples and make them work wirelessly without too many changes.

Installation

A good resource to start is the Arduino Hacking Libraries article which goes in depth about how to install libraries. There are two ways to install this library, it can either be directly downloaded and unzipped or it can be cloned using Git.

Step 1: Check the libraries directory

For both methods, you'll need to check that you have a shared library directory. It should be under the Arduino home (e.g. in OSX, it will probably be ~/Documents/Arduino/libraries). If the libraries directory doesn't already exist, you'll need to create it.

Step 2a: Add the library via Git

Use Git to clone this project into the libraries directory. If you've never used Git before, check out the Git Community Book.

Step 2b: Add the library via Archived File

Download and unzip the zip file from this GitHub project and put the contents in the libraries directory.

At the end of Step 2, you should have a copy of this project at ~/Documents/Arduino/libraries/WiFly

##Step 3: Include the library in your project Restart the Arduino IDE if you're using it. Under the Sketch menu, you should see a WiFly item in the Import Library ... option. If you don't, recheck that the library is in the right location and that you've restarted the Arduino IDE. Right now it adds a lot more then needed.

You can also manually add the library by adding the following to the top of your sketch.

#include <SPI.h>
#include <WiFly.h>

Usage

This is how you connect to a WPA wireless network with a passphrase and use DHCP to obtain an IP address and DNS configuration:

#include <SPI.h>
#include <WiFly.h>

void setup() {

  WiFly.begin();
  
  if (!WiFly.join("ssid", "passphrase")) {
     // Handle the failure
  }
  
  // Rejoice in your connection
}

If the network you want to connect to has no passphrase you can use this form:

if (!WiFly.join("ssid")) {
  // Handle the failure
}

If the network you want to connect to is using WEP use this form:

if (!WiFly.join("NETWORK", "00112233445566778899AABBCC", WEP_MODE)) {
  // Handle the failure
}

Note the description of the WEP key from the WiFly user guide:

Whatever connection method you use, once you have joined you can use the Client and Server classes (re-implemented for the WiFly) mostly as normal.

You can supply a domain name rather than an IP address for client connections:

Client client("google.com", 80);

You can also retrieve the current IP address with:

Serial.println(WiFly.ip());

This release of the library comes with three examples:

For each example you will need to modify the file "Credentials.h" to supply your network's name (SSID) and passphrase.

There are also some troubleshooting tools:

Configuration

Different revisions of the WiFly shield support different features. If you are using an older revision of the shield you will need to modify the value of 'SHIELD_REVISION' in the file 'Configuration.h' to indicate which revision of the WiFly shield you are using. See the documentation in the file for further detail.

The value defaults to the most recent revision sold at the time of code release.

Arduino Mega support

This library supports using the WiFly Shield with the Arduino Mega if four jumper wires are added. The following connections are required:

In addition, code on the Mega must not use pins 10, 11, 12, or 13.

Known Issues

This is an alpha release--this means it's non-feature complete and may not be entirely reliable. It has been tested with the shipped examples and works in most cases.

There are some known issues:

License

The SparkFun WiFly Shield library is Copyright (c) 2010 by SparkFun Electronics and is licensed under the LGPL.

Examples based on the original examples from the official Arduino Ethernet library are licensed under the same terms as the originals.

'ParsedStream.h' contains a ringbuffer implementation based on one originally found in the Arduino 'HardwareSerial' implementation.

Authors

Changelog