MCP23017 Binding

This binding allows you to have native access for MCP23017 I/O expander on I2C bus. It was tested with Raspberry Pi 2 and Raspberry Pi 3, but probably should work with other devices supported by Pi4J (opens new window) library.

On Raspberry Pi the user on which openHAB is running (default user name is "openhab") needs to be added to groups "i2c" and "gpio". As the MCP23017 has 3 address pins, you are restricted to 8 devices on an I2C bus. To use more devices you have to open further I2C busses. Therefore you can use overlays to enable bit banging I2C busses on the Raspberry Pi connector, up to I2C6. https://github.com/raspberrypi/firmware/tree/master/boot/overlays (opens new window)

Dependencies

Make sure that the wiringPi (opens new window) library has been installed and that the gpio command line tool is available to openHAB. The shared library libwiringPi.so is required by the Pi4J (opens new window) Java library to access the GPIO ports. Without satisfying this dependency you will see strange NoClassDefFoundError: Could not initialize class ... errors in the openHAB logs.

Supported Things

This binding supports one thing type:

mcp23017 - which is a mcp23017 chip connected to an I2C bus on specified HEX address and bus number

Thing Configuration

• Required configuration for mcp23017 thing:

Parameter	Description	Default value
address	MCP23017 I2C bus address. On Raspberry Pi it can be checked as a result of command: "i2cdetect -y 1". Value should be set in HEX.	"20"
bus_number	a bus number to which mcp23017 is connected. On RPI2 and RPI3 it will be "1", on RPI1 it will be "0".	"1"

Channels

mcp23017 supports 16 channels in 2 groups:

Group	Channels	Additional parameters
input	A0, A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, A6, A7, B0, B1, B2, B3, B4, B5, B6, B7	pull_mode (OFF, PULL_UP), default is OFF
output	A0, A1, A2, A3, A4, A5, A6, A7, B0, B1, B2, B3, B4, B5, B6, B7	default_state (LOW, HIGH), default is LOW

Channel determines MCP23017 PIN we want to use.

Group determines mode in which PIN shoud work.

When PIN should work as DIGITAL_INPUT, channel from group "input" should be used.

When PIN should work as DIGITAL_OUTPUT, channel from group "output" should be used.

Full Example

Let's imagine a setup with:

1. a wall switch connected to pin B1 on the MCP23017 chip which should turn on/off your LED light when pressed (released).
2. a relay which is connected to pin A0 on the MCP23017 chip. This relay takes care of turning on/off your light.

Pressing (and releasing) a wall switch should notify openHAB, and then openHAB should change state of relay to on/off the light. Your pin B1 should work as DIGITAL_INPUT, because it READS state of a PIN (state of wall switch). Your pin A0 should work as DIGITAL_OUTPUT because openHAB will SET state of this PIN. So your config should look like this:

• Things:

Minimal configuration:

Thing mcp23017:mcp23017:chipA  "MCP23017 chip A" [address=20,bus=1]

Configuration with default_state and pull_mode:

Thing mcp23017:mcp23017:chipA  "MCP23017 chip A" [address=20,bus=1] {
    Type output_pin : output#A0 [default_state="HIGH"]
    Type output_pin : output#A1 [default_state="LOW"]
    Type output_pin : output#A2 [active_low="y"]
    Type output_pin : output#A2 [default_state="LOW", active_low="y"]

    Type input_pin : input#B0 [pull_mode="PULL_UP"]
    Type input_pin : input#B1 [pull_mode="OFF"]
}

• Items:

Switch living_room_led_switch "Living room LED switch"  {channel="mcp23017:mcp23017:chipA:output#A0"}
Contact living_room_led_contact "Living room LED contact"  {channel="mcp23017:mcp23017:chipA:input#B1"}

• Rules:

rule "living_room_led contact"
when
    Item living_room_led_contact changed to OPEN
then
    living_room_led_switch.sendCommand(if(living_room_led_switch.state != ON) ON else OFF)
end

Caught a mistake or want to contribute to the documentation? Edit this page on GitHub (opens new window)