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Esparrier

en zh-cn CI GitHub release (latest by date)

Esparrier is a Barrier/Deskflow client for ESP32S3.

This is a re-write of the original Esparrier-IDF project, moving from esp-idf-hal to esp-hal baremetal infrastructure.

Before you start

Make sure your ESP32-S3 board meets following requirements:

  • It has native USB OTG port. Be aware that some boards have USB-Serial chip instead of native USB OTG port, they won't work. Check the manufacturer's documentation to be sure.
  • It has 520KB of built-in SRAM, all retail packages should meet this requirement, but you should check the datasheet to be sure.
  • It has at least 1MB of flash. Be aware that some packages don't have built-in flash, such as ESP32S3R2/ESP32S3R8, they require external flash chip to work.

The safest option is to get an official development board from Espressif, such as ESP32-S3-DevKitC-1 v1.0 or v1.1. Also because Espressif has acquired a majority stake in M5Stack, the M5Atom S3 Lite and M5Atom S3 should be good choices as well.

How to build

  1. Install Rust toolchain.
  2. Install Rust ESP32 tools:
  3. Set environment variable for Rust ESP toolchain:
    • source $HOME/export-esp.sh
  4. Build and flash:
    1. (Optional) Set following environment variables:
      • export WIFI_SSID="YOUR_WIFI_SSID"
      • export WIFI_PASSWORD="YOUR_WIFI_PASSWORD"
      • export BARRIER_SERVER="BARRIER_SERVER_IP:PORT"
      • export SCREEN_NAME="SCREEN_NAME"
    2. Put your board in the download mode, then build and flash with cargo run --release. On M5Atom S3 Lite, you need to hold the reset button until the green LED turns on, then release the button. And you need to press the reset button again after flashing to exit the download mode.
    3. If you skip the first step, the program will use default configurations, and it won't be able to connect to WiFi and Barrier/Deskflow server, you need to update the configurations to make it work.

Run

  1. Configure Barrier or Deskflow server to accept the screen name you set in the environment variable SCREEN_NAME, and make sure you turn off the TLS.
  2. Plug the board into the USB port.
  3. The LED should be red on start, then turn blue when the board is connected to the WiFi, and finally turn dim yellow when the board is connected to the Barrier/Deskflow server.
  4. When Barrier/Deskflow enters the screen, the LED turns bright green, and when Barrier/Deskflow leaves the screen, the LED turns dim yellow.
  5. The board emulates a standard keyboard and an absolute mouse, it should work in any OS.
  6. USB HID boot protocol is used, so you should be able to use the board as a USB keyboard/mouse in BIOS/EFI or even if the OS doesn't have a driver for it.

Update Configurations

A new configuration tool is available at esparrier-config, you can use it to update the configurations on the board without manually re-flashing. Checkout the repo and follow the instructions to build and run the tool.

Below is the old way to update configurations, it's still valid but not recommended.

First, you need to install esptool.py, which can be installed with pip install esptool. Refer to the official documentation for more information.

Prepare and Update Configurations

  1. Create a JSON file, refer to config.json.example for the format.
  2. Put the board into the download mode, then use esptool.py to flash the NVS partition. 
    # Erase the NVS partition
esptool.py --chip esp32s3 --port /dev/ttyACM0 write_flash 0x9000 zero.bin
# Write the configurations
esptool.py --chip esp32s3 --port /dev/ttyACM0 write_flash 0x9000 /path/to/config.json
  3. Exit the download mode and reset the board, the new configurations should be applied.

Clipboard

The program now has limited support of the clipboard when the feature clipboard is enabled. This feature requires your board to have an user button, and the button should be connected to the GPIO pin defined in the environment variable PASTE_BUTTON_PIN, on M5AtomS3 Lite, it is PIN 41. The button should be active low, i.e. the pin should be pulled up to high level, and the button should pull down the pin to low level when pressed.

First you need to activate other screen and copy something into the clipboard, then switch to the screen connected to the board.

When the screen is activated, the board receives the clipboard content sent by the Barrier/Deskflow server, keeps the first 1024 characters of the plain text format and discard everything else.

Then you can "paste" the text by pressing the button on the board, the board will convert the text into a sequence of keystrokes, and send them to the computer. All characters except the visible ASCII codes will be discarded as they cannot be directly mapped to USB HID key codes, or they may have special meaning that can mess up things.

The program cannot "copy" content to the clipboard.

NOTE: When you copied a large amount of text or big image from other screen then moved into the screen connected to the board, the board may stuck for a while, this is because the board is trying to discard the clipboard content. Even it will not parse and hold the whole content, still it needs to receive the whole content from the Barrier/Deskflow server as there is no way to skip a chunk in the middle of a TCP stream without actually reading it. But the board should resume operation after few seconds and it will not repeatedly process the same clipboard content if you move out and move in again.

Build for other ESP32S3 boards

  • The release page provides pre-built binaries for some ESP32S3 boards, you can use them directly if your board is listed.

    • Generic ESP32S3 boards with native USB-OTG port, the indicator feature is unavailable, and the clipboard feature is disabled as well.
    • M5Atom S3 Lite, the SmartLED feature and the clipboard feature are enabled.
    • M5Atom S3, the clipboard feature are enabled, and the indicator shows emoji animations on the built-in LCD screen.
    • Seeed Studio XIAO ESP32S3, the led is used as the indicator, and the clipboard feature is disabled due to the lack of a user button.
    • Espressif ESP32-S3-DevKitC-1 v1.0, the SmartLED feature is enabled, and the clipboard feature is disabled due to the lack of a user button.
    • (Untested) Espressif ESP32-S3-DevKitC-1 v1.1, the SmartLED feature is enabled, and the clipboard feature is disabled due to the lack of a user button.

  • It's recommended to erase the flash before the first time flashing the binary to the board, you can do this with esptool.py or cargo-espflash:

    # With cargo-espflash
cargo espflash erase-flash --chip esp32s3 --port /dev/ttyACM0

# With esptool.py
esptool.py --chip esp32s3 --port /dev/ttyACM0 erase_flash

  • If there is a RGB LED (WS2812B) on the board, you can use smartled feature to enable the LED, and you need to set the environment SMART_LED_PIN to the correct pin number, on M5AtomS3/Lite, it's 35, on M5StampS3, it's 21.

    • E.g. to build and flash the binary for ESP32-S3-DevKitC-1 v1.0: 
      SMART_LED_PIN=38 cargo run --release --features smartled

  • If there is an ordinary LED on the board, you can use led feature to enable it, and you need to set the environment LED_PIN to the correct pin number.

  • Do not enable more than one of above features, the program won't compile.

  • If none of above features is enabled, the indicator function is disabled.

  • If there is a user button on the board, you can use clipboard feature to enable the clipboard support, and you need to set the environment PASTE_BUTTON_PIN to the correct pin number.

    • E.g. to build and flash the binary for M5StampS3:
    SMART_LED_PIN=21 PASTE_BUTTON_PIN=0 cargo run --release --features smartled,clipboard

  • The program will output log to the UART0 by default, you can use espmonitor to monitor the log. If your board doesn't have separated UART0 port, you can disable the default features, this will disable the USB HID function, and you'll be able to see logs from USB OTG/J-TAG port. This is useful for debugging codes not related to USB HID.

Use pre-built binaries

NOTE: Using pre-built binaries is not recommended, because it cannot utilize the full potential of the board, and you may need to change the code to fit your board. So you should build the binary yourself when possible.

  1. Install esptool.py as described in the previous section. You don't need to install Rust toolchain and any other ESP32 tools.

  2. Download the binary from the releases page.

  3. Extract the binary from the archive. There are 6 pre-built binaries in the archive, choose the one that fits your board.

  4. Prepare the config.json file as described in the previous section.

  5. Put the board into the download mode, then flash the binary and config to the board. Note the USB device name may vary, you may need to change it to the correct one. On most Linux systems, the device name is /dev/ttyACMx, where x is a number, you can find the correct device name by running ls /dev/ttyACM*.

    • Use esptool.py:
    # Erase the whole flash
esptool.py --chip esp32s3 --port /dev/ttyACM0 erase_flash
# Write the binary and config
esptool.py --chip esp32s3 --port /dev/ttyACM0 write_flash 0x0000 /path/to/merged-esparrier-generic.bin
    • Or use espflash:
    # Erase the whole flash
espflash erase-flash --chip esp32s3 --port /dev/ttyACM0
# Write the binary and config
espflash write-bin --chip esp32s3 --port /dev/ttyACM0 0x0000 /path/to/merged-esparrier-generic.bin

  6. Exit the download mode and reset the board, you should see the new USB HID device on your host. Now the board is ready to be configured by the esparrier-config-cli, or by the manual update configuration method.

Troubleshooting

If the board stops working after flashing and/or upgrading the program, you may need to:

  1. Erase the flash with esptool.py --chip esp32s3 --port /dev/ttyACM0 erase_flash.

  2. Flash the binary and config again.

  3. Windows has a USB device driver cache and it may not recognize the board after flashing, you may need to uninstall the driver in the device manager and re-plug the board. Or you can change the USB VID/PID in the config file and re-flash it, then Windows will recognize it as a new device.

  4. If above steps don't work, you can try a different flash command:

    # Erase the whole flash
esptool.py --chip esp32s3 --port /dev/ttyACM0 erase_flash
# Write the binary, please note the firmware used here without 'merged-' prefix.
esptool.py --chip esp32s3 --port /dev/ttyACM1 write_flash \
    0x0000 esp32s3-bootloader.bin \
    0x8000 partition_table.bin \
    0x10000 esparrier-generic.bin

    The root cause of the problem is still not clear, but it seems to be related to the partition table, and the above command will write bootloader, partition table, and the application binary to the flash separately.

NOTES:

WARNING: This program is only for testing purpose. It is not a complete implementation of Barrier/Deskflow client. There could be a lot of bugs and missing features. It has no concept of security, neither on the WiFi nor on the USB. It is not recommended to use it in anywhere but a private environment.

  • This code is developed and tested on M5Atom S3 Lite, other ESP32S3 boards may not work, or you need to change the code to fit your board.
  • A board with external antenna is strongly recommended, the ESP32S3 supports 2.4G WiFi only and this band is really crowded, you may experience jittering and lagging if the wireless connection is not stable.
  • The code doesn't work on ESP8266/ESP32/ESP32C3 because they don't have required USB features, ESP32S2 may work with adaptation but it's not tested.
  • It doesn't support TLS, so you must run Barrier/Deskflow server without TLS.
  • When using with Deskflow, you need to make sure the Deskflow server is using "Barrier" protocol, not "Synergy" protocol.
  • Clipboard, file transfer, and cross-screen drag and drop are not supported due to the technical limitation, there is no way a standard USB HID device can do that, maybe an auxiliary app running on the host can help but I still don't have clear idea.
  • The mouse function doesn't work properly unless you set the screen size correctly, it may move too fast/slow or even jumpy. Usually the screen size should be the same as the host screen resolution.
  • Frequently connect/disconnect may cause the board fail to connect to the WiFi and/or Barrier/Deskflow server, you may need to power off the board and wait for a while before trying again.
  • The USB VID/PID are randomly picked and not registered, you are not authorized to produce and sell USB devices using these VID/PID, so you may need to change the code to use your own VID/PID if you have any business purpose.
  • The USB remote wakeup may not work because the standard forbids a suspended device consume too much current but this program needs much more than the standard says to keep Wi-Fi connected. I still haven't figured out how to keep the program running with the current <2.5mA. Of course you can choose a board with external power source such as a battery, but it seems to be an overkill.
  • The program can accept inputs only after the board successfully connects to the WiFi and Barrier/Deskflow server, it may be too late to use the board as a USB keyboard/mouse in BIOS/EFI, some main board that has always-on USB ports may work, but I haven't tested it, or you can use a USB hub that can supply power even if the host is off.
  • The watchdog will reset the board if it doesn't receive heartbeat from the server, or the program itself runs out of control and doesn't process the heartbeat, for the number of seconds defined in WATCHDOG_TIMEOUT environment variable. The default watchdog timeout is 15 seconds, as the default heartbeat interval is 5 seconds, you may need to change the watchdog timeout if the server has a long heartbeat interval.
  • The program is compatible with Windows, macOs, and Linux. The keyboard function should work on any OS that supports USB HID devices, but the mouse function may have issues as it's in the absolute mode, not relative mode, which is known not to work on Android and iOS/iPadOS.
  • The built-in clipboard sharing function is incomplete, but it can be achieved with a ClipSync app, or the OS's built-in clipboard sharing function, such as Clip Sync on Windows or Universal Clipboard on macOs.

TODO:

  • Support media keys
  • Re-configure without rebuilding
  • Support other ESP32S3 boards
  • Partially support clipboard, now plain ASCII text can be pasted.
  • Support Mac special keys
  • Support TLS
  • NVS encryption
  • OTA update
  • BLE HID support, and then support ESP32 and ESP32C3/C6

Licenses and Copyrights

  • This project is released under MIT license.
  • The esp_hal_smartled.rs file is taken from esp-hal-community repo, which is licensed under MIT License and Apache License, version 2.0.
  • Some code snippets in the gentable.c were taken from Barrier repo and licensed under GPLv2. The main project only utilizes the output of these snippets, not the code itself, and therefore is not subject to the GPL license.
  • Animated emoji images are taken from Google Font Project, which is licensed under CC BY 4.0.
  • Any other third-party libraries or tools used in this project are subject to their own licenses and copyrights.