reTerminal Sticky

Seeed Studio reTerminal Sticky: a magnetic ESP32-S3 e-ink note device. 3.97" 800x480 monochrome ePaper with 4-level grayscale, capacitive touch, 750 mAh battery.

Firmware is native ESP-IDF v5.4 / target esp32s3 (C/C++). ESPHome is the supported no-C path. Apps are distributed by flashing whole firmware images — there is no on-device app sandbox or multi-app runtime.

Read this first for any firmware task

Two rules cause most first-time failures on this device:

1. Latch power on at boot. The device powers off unless firmware drives the power-hold GPIOs within the first moments of app_main(). See references/esp-idf-dev.md.
2. The panel is natively 800x480 landscape. Your logical canvas orientation is a choice you implement with a rotation in the pixel-write path. Pick one and keep touch coordinates in the same space. See references/display.md.

Where to look

Task	File
Pin map, buses, part numbers, electrical/physical specs	references/hardware.md
Toolchain, project skeleton, sdkconfig.defaults, build/flash, power latch, NVS, deep sleep	references/esp-idf-dev.md
ePaper driver API, refresh modes, rotation, ghosting, partial-update strategy	references/display.md
Touch/GT911 gestures, buttons, IMU, SHT40, RTC, mic, buzzer, fuel gauge, SD	references/peripherals.md
Publishing to Sticky Playground: integration.json, manifest, CI, review flow	references/playground-registry.md
Existing firmware projects, ESPHome/Home Assistant, official docs, where the wiki is	references/ecosystem-and-docs.md

Getting known-good driver sources

The registry holds a complete, buildable ESP-IDF app (sticky-2048) whose drivers are the practical reference implementation for this board: seeed_epaper (SSD1677 panel), gt911 (touch), bq27220 (fuel gauge), plus sticky_display / sticky_touch / sticky_buzzer / sticky_ai_button wrappers.

To pull them into a working directory:

scripts/fetch_sticky_sources.sh <dest-dir>

Read that source before writing a driver from scratch. It is the only public code that is known to run on production hardware.

Documentation reality check

There is no wiki.seeedstudio.com page for the Sticky (verified 404 on /reterminal_sticky/ and /sticky/). The Seeed wiki covers the older reTerminal E-series, which is a different board — its pinouts do not transfer, though its ESPHome cookbooks are conceptually useful.

Authoritative docs live at https://www.seeedstudio.com/sticky/docs/, and Seeed states they are still under active development. When something is missing, the fallback order is: registry source code → official docs → E-series wiki (concepts only) → Discord/forum. Full link list in references/ecosystem-and-docs.md.

Conventions in this skill

• Pin numbers are ESP32-S3 GPIO numbers, not header positions.
• "Native" coordinates mean the panel's own 800x480 landscape frame; "logical" means whatever orientation the application chose.
• Facts marked (unverified) come from a single source or conflicting sources and should be confirmed against hardware before relying on them.