ESP8266: A $5 microcontroller with wi-fi that runs Python
By the way, I have to warn people who are thinking about trying this chip (as I have done in other comments):<p>The bare chip won't be very useful to you, unless you want to design your own PCB. Instead, I would recommend a breakout board. There are two major types:<p>Something like the WeMos D1 Mini (<a href="http://www.aliexpress.com/item/D1-mini-Mini-NodeMcu-4M-bytes-Lua-WIFI-Internet-of-Things-development-board-based-ESP8266/32529101036.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.aliexpress.com/item/D1-mini-Mini-NodeMcu-4M-bytes...</a>) or NodeMCU (<a href="http://www.ebay.com/itm/NodeMCU-LUA-WIFI-Internet-Development-Board-Based-on-ESP8266-/291505733201" rel="nofollow">http://www.ebay.com/itm/NodeMCU-LUA-WIFI-Internet-Developmen...</a>), which are very full-featured and include onboard USB programmers and fancy things like that, but are a bit bulky. The NodeMCU I linked is solid, the WeMos is also great as it's much smaller and only includes the useful pins.<p>The alternative is a bare breakout board, which is the minimum that you need to make the ESP breadboard-friendly and so you don't have to solder a bunch of resistors on the chip. This is best when you want to work at a lower level, and have the minimum hardware required for the ESP to work on the board, with everything else going in your circuit.<p>There are breakout boards on ebay like this one (<a href="http://www.ebay.com/itm/1Set-ESP8266-WiFi-Module-Breakout-Board-Adapter-Plate-for-ESP-07-ESP-08-ESP-12-/181784198861" rel="nofollow">http://www.ebay.com/itm/1Set-ESP8266-WiFi-Module-Breakout-Bo...</a>). STAY AWAY FROM THESE. They don't include all the necessary components, so the ESP won't work reliably without extra pullups, and they take up the entire breadboard space.<p>Because I was burnt by these, I designed my own and made it open-source:<p><a href="https://github.com/skorokithakis/tiny-ESP8266-breakout" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/skorokithakis/tiny-ESP8266-breakout</a><p>It's easier to work with, leaves room on the breadboard and includes all necessary resistors/caps and an optional voltage regulator. It's also very small. There's a dirtypcbs link on the github repo so you can just order 40 of these for $14 if you like, or you can just download the KiCad schematics (KiCad is awesome and open-source) and get it fabricated at your favorite PCB house.<p>Back to our regularly scheduled programming. Feel free to copy/paste this comment whenever there's an ESP discussion, I think it's a good primer for people who don't have ESP experience.