Wiki Plugins DAP Pymodaq

Technical wiki documenting the PyMoDAQ plugins developed as part of the DAP project (BTS CIEL, Lycée Edouard Branly, in partnership with CETHIL): the Arduino plugin and the Raspberry plugin (which unifies the former Raspberry Pi 3 and Pi Zero setups).

A Sphinx documentation site using the sphinx_rtd_theme theme — the same one used by the official PyMoDAQ documentation (https://pymodaq.cnrs.fr) — written in English and deployed on GitHub Pages.

Overview

Documentation split into two sections, one per plugin:

• Arduino plugin — instruments built around an Arduino / ESP32 board (Telemetrix-ESP32): multicolor LED, fan/heater, analog and PT100 / ADS1115 acquisition, Dashboard extension.
• Raspberry plugin — control of an experimental setup via a Raspberry Pi: a PyMoDAQ actuator and detector communicating with a server embedded on the Pi via ZeroMQ.

AI Disclosure

This wiki was designed and developed with the help of artificial intelligence tools, used as genuine productivity tools. This is a deliberate choice: AI is now an integral part of the developer profession and today's job market, and we choose to adapt to it and master it rather than ignore it.

What makes the difference is the usage. We research these tools in depth in order to use them with discernment, as a genuine productivity lever. AI speeds up implementation — it replaces neither the design, nor the technical decisions, nor the understanding of the code. The vast majority of the features and the technical stack used here are familiar to us: we know what was built, why, and how to evolve and maintain it.

Concretely, a project of this scope normally represents 3 to 5 weeks of full-time work (i.e. several months alongside our studies). By leveraging AI, we completed it in a fraction of that time, focusing our energy on architecture, quality, and details rather than repetitive tasks — exactly the productivity gain sought in a modern work environment.

Project Structure

wiki-plugins-dap-pymodaq/
├── docs/
│   ├── requirements.txt          # Sphinx dependencies (sphinx, rtd-theme, design)
│   └── source/
│       ├── conf.py               # Sphinx configuration (theme, version, language)
│       ├── index.rst             # Home page (cards linking to the 2 plugins)
│       ├── _static/css/          # Supplementary CSS
│       ├── arduino/              # Arduino plugin documentation
│       └── raspberry/            # Raspberry plugin documentation
├── .github/workflows/deploy.yml  # CI: Sphinx build + GitHub Pages deployment
├── ARCHITECTURE.md               # Technical choices and organization
├── CHANGELOG.md                  # Version history
├── SPRINTS.md                    # Backlog and progress by sprint
└── README.md

See ARCHITECTURE.md for details on technical choices.

Building the Wiki Locally

Requirement: Python 3.

python -m venv .venv
# Windows:
.venv\Scripts\activate
# Linux / macOS:
# source .venv/bin/activate

pip install -r docs/requirements.txt
sphinx-build -b html docs/source docs/_build/html

# Preview:
python -m http.server 8000 --directory docs/_build/html
# → http://localhost:8000

Deployment

Deployment is automatic: every push to main triggers the GitHub Actions workflow (.github/workflows/deploy.yml), which builds the Sphinx site and then publishes it to GitHub Pages.

ℹ️ Prerequisite (one-time setup): in the repository's Settings → Pages, select "GitHub Actions" as the source.

Workflow and Versioning

• The project progresses in sprints (1 sprint = 1 feature), tracked in SPRINTS.md.
• We commit directly to main; a Git tag (vX.Y.Z) is set for each published version.
• Semantic versioning MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH. The current version is defined in docs/source/conf.py (version / release) and tracked in CHANGELOG.md.
• Root-level documentation files are updated at every sprint.