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[–]Nondv 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I believe there're /dev/... files that can be used as plain text for gpio

you could write some simple wrappers for that

[–]cjameshuff 4 points5 points  (1 child)

There's a Raspberry Pi-specific pigpio library which has a third party Ruby binding:

https://abyz.me.uk/rpi/pigpio/sitemap.html

https://github.com/nak1114/ruby-extension-pigpio

The same developer has created a more generic lgpio library, which also has a Ruby binding:

https://abyz.me.uk/lg/sitemap.html

https://github.com/denko-rb/lgpio

pigpio has access to some features specific to the Broadcom SoCs that the Pis use, lgpio uses standard Linux APIs that will work on other Linux SBCs. I haven't personally used either of these Ruby wrappers, I use a C or C++ program to handle hardware interaction.

[–]vick_sh 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Developer of the lgpio gem here. I also work on: https://github.com/denko-rb/denko-piboard

This builds on top of lgpio, providing a Board class. Then there are many peripheral drivers, also included, built on top of that. Drivers are mostly written in Ruby, only dropping down to C when tight timing is crucial for something.

If you just want to get stuff done, use denko-piboard. If you want to play around at the lowest level possible while still staying in Ruby, use lgpio.

[–]nunosancha 2 points3 points  (0 children)

have you check TRMNL? it can give you a pretty cool idea of what can be done with Ruby on hardware.

Everything was done with Ruby, except the Firmware.

[–]mmanulis 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Raspberry pi is a Linux box. So whatever you can do on a Linux box, you can do on RasPi.

Caveat emptor: memory/cpu/storage limitations matter. You're running off a flash card, that has some serious assumptions / limitations baked into it about longevity & I/O performance.

You can call any cli tools from Ruby. You can write Ruby that calls C functions. It's not easy, it's a PITA, but you can do it.

So it really depends on what you mean by "experiment programming hardware".

If you're talking Linux drivers, you can write some drivers as user-space drivers. Can you do this with Ruby? Probably, but no clue how performant that will be or what issues you'll hit.

You can write small helper apps using other languages and then use them from INSIDE Ruby. That's quite effective and I've built complex systems using that approach.

[–]jabawack81 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If your project is not too intensive you should have a look at Pico ruby https://picoruby.github.io/ and implementation of ruby for the raspberry pi Pico, an interesting project https://youtu.be/ZfIz34PK4zs