When I setup my Raspberry Pi server 8 months ago, one of its potential uses was for me to play with PHP and hopefully learn more about this language.
I found a bit of time this week, so decided to try making a minimal PHP program to control the Pi gpio from a remote computer or phone.
What I've come up with is a simple file using HTML and a few lines of PHP code.
Background
My Raspberry Pi server is using lightpd as configured in this earlier post.
I also installed wiringPi and configured the system in order to be able to access and control the gpio.
This server is also being used to automatically control a light outside the back of the house, and to monitor temperatures and graph the readings.
What is PHP
PHP is a server-side language. This means it executes (runs) on a server while allowing some degree of interaction with the client, which is most often your computer web browser.
This definition is important, because a simple PHP file will generally load when you point your web browser at it, run its code, and then stop.
Consider this simple "Hello world" example;
<?php
echo "Hello world!";
?>
If you save this file on your server as (say) HelloWorld.php when you point your remote web browser at it, it will simple return the string: Hello world!
The PHP code will only run once, but each time you refresh your browser it will run again. You can see this more clearly by adding the PHP time() function to HelloWorld.php:-
<?php
echo "Hello world!";
echo "<br>";
echo 'Time: '. date('H:i:s');
?>
So if you wanted the "time" to update, you would have to keep pressing the browser refresh button to run the file again and again. The alternative is to get the browser to do it for you, something like this;
<html><head>
<title>PHP refresh</title>
<meta http-equiv="refresh" content="1">
</head></html>
<?php
echo "Hello world!";
echo "<br>";
echo 'Time: '. date('H:i:s');
?>
You can also do this with a PHP method;
<?php
header("Refresh:1");
echo "Hello world!";
echo "<br>";
echo 'Time: '. date('H:i:s');
?>
...which is considered a better way of doing it. In both cases the update is set for 1 second intervals.
Toggle a gpio output
If we want to switch the state of a Raspberry Pi gpio pin from high to low and low to high with PHP, we need some way to control our server-side PHP program.
One way is to make use of HTML Forms, which is what is commonly used to allow users to enter and submit details, for example on sites which require user registration.
So here I'm using a button to toggle the gpio pin 7 output and a text box to display the status of the output.
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| The web browser view |
...and here is the code;
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head><title>GPIO Tog</title></head>
<h1>RaspberryPi GPIO Toggler</h1>
<body>
<form method="POST" action="">
<input type="submit" name="btnToggle" value="TOGGLE!"><br><br>
</form>
<?php
# set pin 7 mode to output
exec("sudo gpio mode 7 out");
if ( isset( $_POST["btnToggle"] ) ) {
# GPIO pin 7 toggles state
# If error codes are not 0, you have a problem
# read pin level
exec ("sudo gpio read 7", $rReturn, $errcode );
if ( $rReturn[0] == "0") {
$rReturn[0] = "1";
}
else {
$rReturn[0] = "0";
}
exec("sudo gpio write 7 ".$rReturn[0] );
}
# read pin
exec ("sudo gpio read 7", $rReturn, $errcode );
if ( $rReturn[0] == "0") { ?>
Pin 7: <input type="text" name="Pin7" value=<?php echo "OFF";?> />
<?php
}
else { ?>
Pin 7: <input type="text" name="Pin7" value=<?php echo "ON";?> />
<?php
}
?>
</body></html>
When the file is loaded by a web browser, pin 7 of the gpio is set as an output and the pin status is read. Its condition determines whether the text box displays OFF or ON.
If a user presses the button, pin 7 status is read and then inverted (low to high, or high to low). The status is then read again and the text box is updated.
This works fine unless the gpio pin 7 output is also being controlled by another source (e.g. a second browser or other control software). In this case we need to periodically read and update the pin status, which we can do using one of the refresh methods mentioned earlier.
Bird box lights 'on', bird box lights 'off'.....
ReplyDeleteGreat idea!
DeleteActually I'm looking for a small-bore water canon to mount on the top of the blue tit box. I love sparrowhawks, but I'm trying to convince them to lay-off my nesting pair for a few more weeks. By June they can take their pick from 10 plump, juicy chicks!
Steve
DeleteJust been reading this, thank you for doing it, but can you expand on it and show how to write data to the serial port using wiringpi from within the PHP?
I've tried and can't for the life of me get it to work, no errors, just doesn't work.
I'm using ttyUSB0 with a FTDI USB to RS232 converter, i'd like to be able to enter a value in a box, then write that to the serial port using wiringpi of course!
regards
Tony
Steve
ReplyDeleteThis code is exactly what I am looking for. My download of it however doesn't work properly.
It shows both boxes at the same time with the words <!php inside them. Is there a type in the code as shown here?
Thanks
Steve
Hi Steve, I don't think there are problems with the code, but one common problem if you copy/paste from an HTML page is that you may end up with the wrong ascii code for some characters. The common troublesome ones are quotes (singles and doubles).
DeleteSo I suggest you open your code in an editor and go through replacing all quotes (you may even notice some are slanting {as in dedicated open and close quotes}, when they should be simple vertical quotes).
I hope this helps.
Hi, thank you for the code, it was really useful.
ReplyDeleteIn my case I had to remove all the ‘sudo’ from the ‘exec()’ commands in other to make it work.
I believe that in order for the ‘exec()’ command to work with ‘sudo’, the user which is executing the php server must not have a password (that’s what I understood from here: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/27846099/php-exec-is-not-working-on-raspberry-apache-server ).
regards
joan
Yes you are basically correct, but if you modify the sudoers file you can keep "sudo" without providing a password.
DeleteThis is explained in an earlier post which I had linked to above in the paragraph "Background". Just click on the linked text "access and control the gpio".
I hope this helps.
we are facing same problem in interfacing while changing output from 7 no other any GPIO this not work ...what is other process it will work other pins also..please help me out same
ReplyDeleteYou may be having problems due to the confusing pin numbering scheme.
DeleteThe wiringPi "Pin7" is physical connector pin 7, but the other pin numbers do not match (for example; wiringPi "Pin2" is physical connector pin 13).
Take a look at the table on Gordon Hendersons website: http://wiringpi.com/pins/
Thanks.
ReplyDeleteI have facing another problem ,if I restart Raspberry then LED function not work ,then I need do wirings (gpio 0 out ) all process from start ..please help as same
ReplyDeleteI need some urgent help ,i want only trigger my led and i want add also two tree buttons light control please help me regarding this
ReplyDelete