Microbit Sensors & Circuits
Advanced
60 mins
210 points
What you need:
  • Microbit
  • USB Cable
  • E-Ink Display

E-Ink Name Badge

Make your E-Ink display into a name and info badge about yourself 😃

1 - What is an E-Ink display?

E-ink, also known as “electronic ink” or “electronic paper,” is a type of display technology known for its low power consumption and visual similarity to ink on paper. These features make it a perfect fit for e-readers such as the Amazon Kindle and also for E-Ink price tags that display information about products on supermarket shelves.



2 - How does it work?

With e-ink technology, tiny microcapsules are suspended in a liquid that is inside a very thin layer. The microcapsules, which are roughly the width of a human hair, contain positively charged white particles and negatively charged black particles.

Applying a negative electrical field causes the white particles to rise to the surface. Conversely, applying a positive electrical field causes the black particles to rise to the surface. By applying different fields at different parts of a screen, e-ink produces a text display.

Image source How-To Geek


3 - Create a new Microbit project

Let's create a project to make our e-ink display into a name badge that displays some different information about us.

Create a new Microbit project.

4 - Add the inkybit extension

To access the blocks we need to program the e-ink display, you need to add the inkybit extension to your project.


5 - Show your name

Let's program the A button to display your name.

Add the following code to your project. The code will:

  1. Clear the display.
  2. Draw the text of your name at the upper left part of the screen, in the colour black with a regular size.
  3. Display your changes on the screen.



Join our club 😃

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