InqPortal

You will not find any library for your ESP8266 project that will get your IoT project launched faster or easier and with the performance capabilities of InqPortal.

Basic Tutorial
Quick Start Guide
Even Quicker Start

InqPortal – The Libraries and Admin

InqPortal is a library to get your Arduino IDE based ESP8266 microcontroller project on a network as fast and simply as possible. With three lines of code added to your Sketch, you’ll have…

  • A web server – Think of it as a tiny Nginx, Apache or IIS on an ESP8266.
  • A management system – Think… integrated cPanel or IIS Explorer.
  • An file system / File manager with Drag and Drop functionality.
  • High-speed WebSocket communications between your server and client browser applications can provide incredible throughput.
  • Connect to your ESP8266 directly like its a router for direct control on the move – Think… robot remote controller.
  • Complete UI to permit configuring your ESP8266 to your router. From here you can connect to your InqPortal from anywhere on your network and with the proper setup of your router… from the World.
  • Doesn’t take one thing away from the hardware integration capabilities your ESP8266 is famous.
  • Over the Air (OTA) binary upgrading.

Adding just a few more lines of server code and you’ll be publishing your Sketch’s variables so they can be viewed and edited remotely. The InqPortal Admin (built-in to every project) moves beyond being just a web server / OS / management system… now doubling as a window into and controller for thoroughly fleshing-out your project’s specific API. All… before having to write one line of client-side, browser code. In fact, if you’re not needing a cosmetic, front-end user interface, you can simply use the Admin as your UI. You’ll be able to see and modify your server variables in real time as well as plot value history with the built-in Histogram and full Logging. All this… plus persisting data through power failures by simply adding one line of code per variable you want to publish.

The built-in browser based Admin gives you access to connectivity, file system, logging, and performance metric histograms. You can even customize the histograms for any time base (even months) or histogram your own server variables.

InqPortal Admin page showing the Settings tab.
High Resolution Histogram showing custom application data over a 48 hour period.

Client Side

Now that you have fully instrumented out your server, you can then turn to putting a pretty face on your project. Utilizing HTML, CSS and JavaScript files and standard web-development techniques you’ll be able to provide a custom and professional looking front-end to your project… all hosted from your InqPortal server.

Because your client resides on the server, it can be pulled up from any WiFi enabled device with a modern browser. No custom Android app needed… no custom iPhone app needed… no Windows app needed… you probably get the point. Write one browser-based, cosmetic UI with dials and graphs and anything else you’ve seen on the Internet and use it from any device, anywhere… even remotely from some web-café computer.

Sample Project – InqSpeedRacer

InqSpeedRacer is a web interfaced speed trap that can be easily attached to HotWheels® track. It was designed and built for 8th grade Science classes studying basic Physics principles of motion. It was created using InqPortal.

Uses

Basically, InqPortal can be the infrastructure needed for any project.

  • The ESP8266 Microcontroller is powerful enough in its own right to be the CPU for many an IoT project… weather stations, remote control, smart switch, smart… anything.
  • With its support of hardware communications standards like One-Wire, I2C, SPI and Serial, it can be the pretty face and/or controller to your industrial sized projects.

Cost

What is the real-world cost for all this? Well… next to nothing.

  • The ESP8266 Microcontroller is a commodity priced MPU available on eBay or Amazon. Development versions are around $3. In quantity… production versions are less than a $1.
  • The InqPortal software libraries are freely available… just open the Manage Libraries… in your Arduino IDE and search for InqPortal.
  • Your time is by-far the most valuable – If you’re starting from scratch, downloading and installing the development environment will take most of the time. If you’re an olde-hand at Arduino style programming, it might take you a whopping ten minutes to complete your first InqPortal project. Go to the Quick Start Guide and now the Even Quicker, Quick Start Guide to see the high-lights of the code needed.