Download and Setup ESP-IDF

This tutorial is for downloading and setting up the ESP-IDF with the windows operating system.

Important Links

ESP-IDF ReadTheDocs

Get Toolchain for Windows

Steps for Linux and Mac

Linux Setup Instructions

Mac Setup Instructions

Steps

1. Get the toolchain
2. Get the ESP-IDF Core Packages
3. Compiling and running a sample program

Getting the Toolchain

Download the Toolchain from here

If link is broken, please do go to Get Toolchain for Windows in the Important Links above

1. Unzip this to a folder of your choice, default taken as: C:\
2. Pin the C:\mysys32\mingw32.exe terminal program to your taskbar, since we will need to use this rather frequently to compile, flash and monitor the programs

Getting the ESP-IDF Core Packages

git clone --recursive https://github.com/espressif/esp-idf.git

Make sure you use the --recursive option, we need to get all the submodules

1. Run the above command in a folder of your choice ex: D:\GIT\esp-idf
2. This is used to set up the IDF_PATH for your Core Packages

Setup IDF_PATH Variable to your user profile (Windows)

Setup IDF_PATH Docs

Steps for Windows, Mac and Linux are different, so do check the above link

User Scripts are contained in C:\msys32\etc\profile.d\ directory.

1. Create a new script file in C:\msys32\etc\profile.d\ and name it export_idf_path.sh.
2. Find your ESP-IDF directory, ex: D:\GIT\esp-idf
3. Add the export command to the script file

   # Forward slashes are important (Don`t add this comment to file)
   export IDF_PATH="D:/GIT/esp-idf"
   

4. Save the script
5. Check if IDF_PATH exists by typing

   printenv IDF_PATH
   

Make sure use forward slash in the script file instead of backslash, which is common in windows

Compiling and Running a sample program

Test Program Github Link

For Users that have downloaded the esp-idf repository after following the above steps, navigation to the get-started -> blink example

Steps

1. Copy the entire blink example to another folder (of your choice) ex: D:\esp32Programs\Tutorials
2. Open your MYSYS2 MINGW32 Shell and navigate to that path (Example given below)
3. Run make menuconfig to open menu tree and configure ESP-IDF
4. Run make to compile
5. Run make flash to flash compiled version to your hardware
6. Run make monitor to view monitor output on your console

Navigate to Path

# Example
cd D:
cd esp32Programs
cd Tutorials
cd blink

# We have navigated to the directory
# NOTE, Type ls to see your output
ls

You will see output like this

Open ESP-IDF menuconfig

make menuconfig

Set the COM Port of your device

Find your device COM Port

Navigate to Serial Flasher Config (to set the COM port of your device)

NOTE: For linux or mac your COM Port might be /dev/ttyUSB0

Set the example Configuration number (OPTIONAL)

Change Example Configuration number here (D2)

For most devices in ESP32 the internal LED is attached to pin D2 which is pin number 2

Users wishing to test on different pins can change this pin number

See the source code (main.c looks like this)

We can also change CONFIG_BLINK_GPIO (which is set inside sdkconfig.h) to the appropriate pin number instead of changing it through make menuconfig

#include "sdkconfig.h"
// The variable CONFIG_BLINK_GPIO has been set through sdkconfig
#define BLINK_GPIO CONFIG_BLINK_GPIO
// OR, change to
#define BLINK_GPIO 2 // (D2), Internal LED Attached to Pin D2

Make the project

make

Please note that it can take a significant amount of time to compile all the libraries when running your first make command.

Make flash the image

Start the make flash command and you should see it connecting to your device

When make flash is completed, this will be your output

Conclusion

After all these steps, you should see your ESP32 internal LED blinking at a constant rate of once per second.

This tutorial has been about setting up your ESP-IDF with your computer system so the code example has not been explained.

In the next tutorial, I plan to show you how to integrate the ESP-IDF environment with the ECLIPSE IDE for faster prototyping