I am wanting to build a message display board that I could use for the back of my caravan and type what I want to be displayed onto it from my phone and send it through bluetooth. I don't want to just buy it, I would prefer to build it as I have an intrest in electronics. I'm wondering where do I start with this and will it be difficult to do?
Thanks, Cal
For the bluetooth part, I would suggest you use a bluetooth module.
Then for the message display board, you have to specify what type of display you want to use. You could use an LED matrix or an LCD. Both have their advantages and disadvantages. You have to figure out what is best suited for your application. Factors like size, cost etc. would help decide which display you should go for.
Lastly, you would require a microcontroller. To program a microcontroller, you would need to know a programming language. Some programming languages include assembly, C, C++, Java etc. Out of all these languages, I prefer C because of its mid-level capabilities. It is much easier to understand and learn than assembly, and can be used to access low level registers (which is not as easily done with Java). Also, I've seen a lot of IDEs that use C as its primary language, an example being MPLABX IDE. (I've not seen many written in C++, or maybe I didn't search well enough.)
Well, this is my two cents for now. Hope it was helpful.
