Poetry Reader

Why?

  My dad loves reading poetry, and he's passed that love on to me. Unfortunately, reading poetry on the go usually means lugging around a heavy poetry book, which my dad of course doesn't want to do. I decided to fix that issue for his birthday by making a small and light handheld poetry reader.

What?

• OLED Screen

• XIAO Esp32c3

• Buttons

• Perfboard

How?

 The hardware side of this project was actually pretty simple. Using a perfboard, which is a thin, rigid material covered in pre-drilled holes, I soldered together the screen, microcontroller, and buttons (four for navigation, one for selection, and one for power).
 The more complex segment was next -- I needed to write code for the poetry reader. After several iterations, I landed on a screen where my dad can select a letter. After picking a letter, the screen displays a list of poets with last names corresponding to that letter. Selecting a poet gives him a list of their poems, and selecting a poem lets him read that poem.