Late in 2023, the concept for this project hatched from a conversation with KoppanyH after Supercon, where I shared the Core16 proejct. I threw together this sketch to start capturing the concept.

The essence of the idea is to provide a simple drive circuit and weaving experience to enable anyone to control this with their own hardware. I was already thinking about how to minimize the number of external pins, with SAOs in mind.

I also wanted it to be accessible with ANY hardware. Since I2C can be bit-banged, the MCP23017 seemed like a great choice. The sketch above is for illustration purposes - it's not how this will be wired up in reality.

The project concept sat on the back burner, waiting for a catalyst. That catalyst happened in July 2024:

https://hackaday.io/contest/196871-tiny-games-challenge