“In this tutorial I’ll show how you can make a minimalist clock synchronized with the internet. I tested this with two different ESP8266 based boards: Firebeetle and NodeMCU. The microcontroller gets current time from a Google server, and displays it on a NeoPixel LED ring. It also receives current weather data from WeatherUnderground, using IFTTT and Adafruit.io platforms, and change LEDs colors based on the weather condition.
It won’t have a good resolution (due to the small number of LEDs), but it’s a good way to practice your coding and electronic skills using a small number of components. I’ll also be able to create a device that ‘knows’ current time, without the use of an external real time clock circuit, and that’s able to ‘sense’ changes on the weather.
You might integrate it with other gadgets that already have an idle LED ring. It was designed for my IoT air freshner (https://www.instructables.com/id/IoT-Air-Freshner-with-NodeMCU-Arduino-IFTTT-and-Ad/), giving it a new functionality. You might do the same to other gadgets.”