Overview
The Esp8266 is a popular microcontroller board that is widely used in Internet of Things (IoT) projects. One of its key features is its ability to act as a web server, allowing it to serve web pages to connected devices. In this article, we will explore how to implement a web server on the Esp8266 that allows users to input text through a web page.
Setting Up the Esp8266
Before we can start creating the web server, we need to set up the Esp8266 board. This involves connecting it to a computer and installing the necessary software libraries. Detailed instructions can be found in the official Esp8266 documentation.
Creating the Web Server
Once the Esp8266 is set up, we can start creating the web server. We will use the Arduino IDE to write the code for the server. First, we need to include the necessary libraries:
#include
#include
#include
Connecting to Wi-Fi
Next, we need to connect the Esp8266 to a Wi-Fi network. We can do this using the following code:
const char* ssid ="YourNetworkSSID";
const char* password ="YourNetworkPassword";
WiFi.begin(ssid, password);
while (WiFi.status() != WL_CONNECTED) {
delay(1000);
Serial.println("Connecting to WiFi...");
}
Creating the Web Server Object
Now that we are connected to Wi-Fi, we can create the web server object:
ESP8266WebServer server(80);
Defining the Web Page
Next, we need to define the web page that will be served to users. We will create a simple HTML form that allows users to input text:
String htmlPage = <<
HTML;
Serving the Web Page
Now that we have defined the web page, we can serve it to users when they access the Esp8266's IP address:
server.on("/", [](){
server.send(200, "text/html", htmlPage);
});
Handling Form Submission
When the user submits the form, we need to handle the submission and retrieve the inputted text. We can do this using the following code:
server.on("/submit", [](){
String text = server.arg("text");
server.send(200, "text/plain", "Text received: " + text);
});
Starting the Web Server
Finally, we need to start the web server so that it can listen for incoming requests:
server.begin();
Conclusion
In this article, we have learned how to create a web server on the Esp8266 that allows users to input text through a web page. This functionality can be useful in a wide range of IoT projects where user interaction is required. By following the steps outlined in this article, you can easily implement a web server on the Esp8266 and start accepting text input from connected devices.
