Wondering what you can do with a board using the latest Nordic nRF52 Bluetooth LE module?  Thanks to the work of Daniel Tralamazza you can explore an early port of MicroPython to Nordic nRF52-based boards like the Adafruit Feather nRF52!  The nRF52 is an interesting module because it combines a powerful ARM Cortex-M4F CPU with 64kb of RAM and a full Bluetooth LE wireless stack–perfect for exploring IoT and connecting projects with mobile devices.  The extra memory and processing power of the nRF52 means MicroPython should work even better than on earlier Nordic chips like the nRF51 that powers the BBC micro:bit.  If you’re curious to explore MicroPython on the nRF52 check out this thread on the MicroPython forums and Daniel’s fork of MicroPython that adds the nRF52 port.

Be aware this port is still early in development and you’ll need to build the firmware yourself to try it.  Check out the nrf folder from the GitHub repository to see basic compilation instructions.  You’ll want to have a POSIX/Unix build environment setup, so if you’re on Windows I’d recommend using a Vagrant-based virtual machine to compile and build the firmware.  In addition you’ll need an ARM cross compiler installed like from the GNU GCC ARM embedded project.  To flash the firmware to an Adafruit Feather nRF52 follow the DFU targets section to install the flashing script and use it to load firmware onto the Feather’s nRF52 processor over its USB connection.  Once the firmware is running check out the examples folder to see a few examples of the Python API for accessing Bluetooth LE devices (see the ubluepy examples like ubluepy_scan.py to search for devices).