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A Python library for controlling IBIS displays

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#pyIBIS – A Python library for controlling IBIS displays

##License This program is licensed under the AGPLv3. See the LICENSE file for more information.

##Installation You can easily install pyIBIS using the Python Package Index. Just type:

sudo pip install pyibis

To use it in your code, just import ibis.

##Client-Server System I built a client-server system which is useful if you have some IBIS displays in your room and you want to control them over your local network. The library contains Client and Server classes, to see how to use them, check out the cmdline_client.py and cmdline_server.py scripts in the examples folder.

##Graphical Display Simulation Note: For the simulator to work, you need to have the PIL module installed.

The font simulation script (ibis.simulation) is useful if you want to see what a given text would look like on your display. Only dot-matrix displays are supported. You have to create an image file for every character your display can show though. There’s an example in the simulation-font directory which uses the font of my displays. To use the simulator, enter an interactive Python shell (or write a script that does what you want). In the examples below, I’ll assume that the simulator module is loaded as ibis.simulation.

###Terminology * A fontmap is a JSON file that contains pixel data for all characters in a certain font. It is used to render images from text data. * A font directory, fontdir for short, is a directory which contains image files for all characters in a font.

###Notes on filenames The filenames in your fontdir should correspond to the character they’re showing. The only exception to this is the file for the / character, which has to be named slash.png since / is not allowed in filenames even in the ext4 filesystem. I use only ext4 for my operating system, so that’s the only file that will have to be renamed. Should your filesystem impose further restrictions, you’ll have to adapt the simulator script to suit your needs.

###Generating a fontmap from a fontdir First, instantiate a DisplayFontScanner. The dotsize and dotspacing parameters tell it the size and the horizontal and vertical distance of the dots in your images, so it can parse them correctly. Let’s use the default values:

>>> my_scanner = ibis.simulation.DisplayFontScanner(dotsize = 47, dotspacing = 8)

Now, create the fontmap:

>>> map = my_scanner.scan_font(fontdir = "~/myfont", outfile = "~/myfont.fontmap")

The scan_font method needs to know where to find the fontdir and where to save the fontmap. It also returns the fontmap as a dict. That’s it, now you have a fontmap!

###Generating an image using a fontmap Begin by instantiating one or more DisplayFont`s. The `fontmap_file parameter tells it which fontmap to use, the spacing parameter specifies the spacing (in dots) between any two characters using this font.

>>> my_font = ibis.simulation.DisplayFont(fontmap_file = "~/myfont.fontmap", spacing = 2)

Now you can instantiate a DisplaySimulator. The fonts parameter must be a sequence of DisplayFont`s from widest to narrowest font (in case your display has multiple fonts, e.g. to fit more text on the screen) The `width and height parameters specify the width and height (in dots) of the simulated display.

>>> my_simulator = ibis.simulation.DisplayFontSimulator(fonts = (my_font, ), width = 12, height = 8)

Now, render an image!

>>> my_simulator.generate_image(text = "Hello world!", outfile = "~/hello_world.png")

That’s it! If you want to further customize the generated image, you can pass the following parameters to the generate_image method:

  • dotsize: The size of the generated dots. Defaults to 47.

  • dotspacing: The horizontal and vertical spacing of the generated dots. Defaults to 8.

  • inactive_color: The color of inactive dots, in the form of a RGB tuple. Defaults to (64, 64, 64) (grey).

  • active_color: The color of active dots, in the form of a RGB tuple. Defaults to (192, 255, 0) (green-yellow).

  • bg_color: The color of the region between dots, in the form of a RGB tuple. Defaults to (0, 0, 0) (black).

###Generating a fontdir from a fontmap First, instantiate a DisplayFontGenerator. The dotsize and dotspacing parameters act just like in a DisplaySimulator.

>>> my_generator = ibis.simulation.DisplayFontGenerator(dotsize = 5, dotspacing = 2)

Now, generate your fontdir:

>>> my_generator.generate_font(fontmap_file = "~/myfont.fontmap", outdir = "~/myfont_small")

This generates an image for every character in the fontmap. As with a DisplaySimulator, you can modify the inactive_color, active_color and bg_color parameters to suit your needs.

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