{"id":110483,"date":"2026-07-18T11:54:18","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T11:54:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/110483\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T11:54:18","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T11:54:18","slug":"m5stack-core2-gets-open-source-firmware-to-reproduce-openais-codex-micro-features","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/110483\/","title":{"rendered":"M5Stack Core2 gets open-source firmware to reproduce OpenAI’s Codex Micro features"},"content":{"rendered":"

IAMLIUBO has written firmware for the M5Stack Core2 IoT controller to reproduce the features of the $230 Codex Micro macro pad<\/a> for OpenAI\u2019s AI coding agent platform, enabling developers to more easily monitor and control agents.<\/p>\n

The original is neat with a CNC-milled enclosure, a rotary encoder, and a joystick, but it\u2019s rather pricey (and now out of stock), only ships to the US, and the company has now launched pre-orders for a 25-key \u201cCustom Alternative\u201d going for $125. However, you can easily reproduce the same functionality with other macro pads with rotary encoders, such as the SayoDevice O3C<\/a>, DuckyPad Pro<\/a>, Waveshare MK10<\/a>, T-Keyboard-S3 Pro<\/a>, and others at a fraction of the price by simply remapping the keys.<\/p>\n

\"M5Stack<\/a><\/p>\n

IAMLIUBO went another route with the M5Stack Core2 IoT controller<\/a> since it doesn\u2019t come with any keys. Instead, he leveraged the 2-inch touchscreen LCD of the ESP32 device with six agent keys, six command keys, four analog-stick directions, and dial actions. The firmware presents the Core2 as a BLE vendor HID device matching Work Louder\u2019s Codex Micro data, and the task status colors, battery state, command remapping, and push-to-talk integration are handled by the ChatGPT desktop app. It\u2019s been tested on the macOS app, but it should also work on the Windows version. ChatGPT desktop is not available for Linux yet<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\"M5Stack<\/a>Communication diagram\n<\/p>\n

The firmware is built with PlatformIO with the Arduino framework, and you\u2019ll find the source code, instructions to get started, and technical documentation on GitHub<\/a>. It\u2019s probably best for people who already own an M5Stack Core2 device, but you can also purchase one on Amazon ($59.90)<\/a> or AliExpress for $46.90<\/a> before shipping and taxes.<\/p>\n

\"M5Stack<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s not quite the first time we\u2019ve written about this type of hardware device for AI agents, since Anthropic released the open-source Claude Desktop Buddy firmware for ESP32-S3 devices<\/a>, notably the M5StickC Plus<\/a> devkit, and the\u00a0Clawdmeter<\/a> ESP32-S3-powered Claude Code token usage monitor. More recently, I was also tipped off about the Claudeq project<\/a>, which works like Claude Desktop Buddy but over WiFi\/WebSocket\u00a0instead of BLE.<\/p>\n

\n\"OpenAI<\/a>OpenAI\/Work Louder Codex Micro macro pad\n<\/p>\n

\"Jean<\/p>\n

Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.<\/p>\n

Support CNX Software! Donate via cryptocurrencies<\/a>, become a Patron<\/a> on Patreon, or purchase goods on Amazon<\/a> or Aliexpress<\/a>. We also use affiliate links in articles to earn commissions if you make a purchase after clicking on those links.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"IAMLIUBO has written firmware for the M5Stack Core2 IoT controller to reproduce the features of the $230 Codex…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":110484,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[23915,111,580,23919,24647,335,157],"class_list":["post-110483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-openai","tag-arduino","tag-artificial-intelligence-ai","tag-chatgpt","tag-esp32","tag-m5stack","tag-open-source","tag-openai"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110483"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110483\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ai\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}