An Arduino project by Bruce Walker
In the autumn of 2023, I decided I wanted to create an outdoor Christmas decoration that my neighbors could interact with. I knew I could do this with a WiFi-enabled microcontroller, some addressable LEDs and the Arduino IDE. I wanted it to be something big that would stand out in the neighborhood.
Anyone near the display can connect to the WiFi hotspot on the ESP32 microcontroller. The web server on the ESP32 serves up a captive portal webpage to welcome visitors. The home page explains a little about the project and features a "Request Control" button they can tap/click if they want to control the tree. If there is only one user, they immediately get the control page. If another user currently has control, additional users are placed in a queue. Sessions are time limited, but a user can also relinquish control if they do not want to use their full allotment of time.
You can see a demonstration of the project in action here: https://youtu.be/kkJe5-mIcH8