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Unread 23-06-2015, 21:35
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Re: LED indicator lights

How big of a light do you want? The easiest thing to do is use digital pins with an RGB led, that'll give you 7 distinct colors. For easiest hookup, you'll want a common cathode LED, and you'll need ballast resistors.

For something brighter, you can go with a 3W rgb LED, and a constant current source. I favor this for my projects these days: https://www.sparkfun.com/products/11850 You should be able to use 3 PWM channels from the RoboRIO to drive that.

You'll want a diffuser of some type. I personally recommend white vinyl or "blank" figures: https://goo.gl/photos/5e298N1xNBeHXxFh6