unable to modify NTPClient to use static IP address

Question

I tried the example File > Examples > ESP8266WiFi > NTPClient which requests the current time and it worked fine. Then I tried to modify it so that the ESP8266 would have a static IP address on my home network. I added the following lines before void setup()

IPAddress staticIP(192, 168, 0, 159);
IPAddress gateway(192, 168, 0, 1);
IPAddress subnet(255, 255, 255, 0);

Then, in void setup() I added a line and commented out the original line like this

// WiFi.mode(WIFI_STA);
WiFi.config(staticIP, gateway, subnet);

After running the sketch after I did this, it connected to my home network without any problems (as it did before). But this time, after it prints the message sending NTP packet... to the serial monitor, it just says no packet yet. This process is repeated every 10 seconds, but it never comes back with the time.

My troubleshooting efforts have been to uncomment the original line and comment out the line I added above. This restores the sketch to its working condition. I have done this several times over the past three days and the same thing always happens.

If I subscribed to conspiracy theories, I might think that some DHCP zealots are behind this. Unfortunately, I can't come up with a better explanation. So to ask just one question, "How can I get my ESP8266-01, flashed with Arduino 1.8.10, running on a Windows 8.1 laptop, to have a static IP on my home network and fetch current NTP timestamps from the internet?

(for reference, this is the sketch in question)

/*
 Udp NTP Client
 Get the time from a Network Time Protocol (NTP) time server
 Demonstrates use of UDP sendPacket and ReceivePacket
 For more on NTP time servers and the messages needed to communicate with them,
 see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_Time_Protocol
 created 4 Sep 2010
 by Michael Margolis
 modified 9 Apr 2012
 by Tom Igoe
 updated for the ESP8266 12 Apr 2015
 by Ivan Grokhotkov
 This code is in the public domain.
*/
#include <ESP8266WiFi.h>
#include <WiFiUdp.h>
#ifndef STASSID
#define STASSID "peopleMightFreakIfIuseMyRealInfo"
#define STAPSK "dontHaveAsecurityPanicAttack"
#endif
const char * ssid = STASSID; // your network SSID (name)
const char * pass = STAPSK; // your network password
IPAddress staticIP(192, 168, 0, 159);
IPAddress gateway(192, 168, 0, 1);
IPAddress subnet(255, 255, 255, 0);
unsigned int localPort = 2390; // local port to listen for UDP packets
/* Don't hardwire the IP address or we won't get the benefits of the pool.
 Lookup the IP address for the host name instead */
//IPAddress timeServer(129, 6, 15, 28); // time.nist.gov NTP server
IPAddress timeServerIP; // time.nist.gov NTP server address
const char* ntpServerName = "time.nist.gov";
const int NTP_PACKET_SIZE = 48; // NTP time stamp is in the first 48 bytes of the message
byte packetBuffer[ NTP_PACKET_SIZE]; //buffer to hold incoming and outgoing packets
// A UDP instance to let us send and receive packets over UDP
WiFiUDP udp;
void setup() {
 Serial.begin(115200);
 Serial.println();
 Serial.println();
 // We start by connecting to a WiFi network
 Serial.print("Connecting to ");
 Serial.println(ssid);
// WiFi.mode(WIFI_STA);
 WiFi.config(staticIP, gateway, subnet);
 WiFi.begin(ssid, pass);
 while (WiFi.status() != WL_CONNECTED) {
 delay(500);
 Serial.print(".");
 }
 Serial.println("");
 Serial.println("WiFi connected");
 Serial.println("IP address: ");
 Serial.println(WiFi.localIP());
 Serial.println("Starting UDP");
 udp.begin(localPort);
 Serial.print("Local port: ");
 Serial.println(udp.localPort());
}
void loop() {
 //get a random server from the pool
 WiFi.hostByName(ntpServerName, timeServerIP);
 sendNTPpacket(timeServerIP); // send an NTP packet to a time server
 // wait to see if a reply is available
 delay(1000);
 int cb = udp.parsePacket();
 if (!cb) {
 Serial.println("no packet yet");
 } else {
 Serial.print("packet received, length=");
 Serial.println(cb);
 // We've received a packet, read the data from it
 udp.read(packetBuffer, NTP_PACKET_SIZE); // read the packet into the buffer
 //the timestamp starts at byte 40 of the received packet and is four bytes,
 // or two words, long. First, esxtract the two words:
 unsigned long highWord = word(packetBuffer[40], packetBuffer[41]);
 unsigned long lowWord = word(packetBuffer[42], packetBuffer[43]);
 // combine the four bytes (two words) into a long integer
 // this is NTP time (seconds since Jan 1 1900):
 unsigned long secsSince1900 = highWord << 16 | lowWord;
 Serial.print("Seconds since Jan 1 1900 = ");
 Serial.println(secsSince1900);
 // now convert NTP time into everyday time:
 Serial.print("Unix time = ");
 // Unix time starts on Jan 1 1970. In seconds, that's 2208988800:
 const unsigned long seventyYears = 2208988800UL;
 // subtract seventy years:
 unsigned long epoch = secsSince1900 - seventyYears;
 // print Unix time:
 Serial.println(epoch);
 // print the hour, minute and second:
 Serial.print("The UTC time is "); // UTC is the time at Greenwich Meridian (GMT)
 Serial.print((epoch % 86400L) / 3600); // print the hour (86400 equals secs per day)
 Serial.print(':');
 if (((epoch % 3600) / 60) < 10) {
 // In the first 10 minutes of each hour, we'll want a leading '0'
 Serial.print('0');
 }
 Serial.print((epoch % 3600) / 60); // print the minute (3600 equals secs per minute)
 Serial.print(':');
 if ((epoch % 60) < 10) {
 // In the first 10 seconds of each minute, we'll want a leading '0'
 Serial.print('0');
 }
 Serial.println(epoch % 60); // print the second
 }
 // wait ten seconds before asking for the time again
 delay(10000);
}
// send an NTP request to the time server at the given address
void sendNTPpacket(IPAddress& address) {
 Serial.println("sending NTP packet...");
 // set all bytes in the buffer to 0
 memset(packetBuffer, 0, NTP_PACKET_SIZE);
 // Initialize values needed to form NTP request
 // (see URL above for details on the packets)
 packetBuffer[0] = 0b11100011; // LI, Version, Mode
 packetBuffer[1] = 0; // Stratum, or type of clock
 packetBuffer[2] = 6; // Polling Interval
 packetBuffer[3] = 0xEC; // Peer Clock Precision
 // 8 bytes of zero for Root Delay & Root Dispersion
 packetBuffer[12] = 49;
 packetBuffer[13] = 0x4E;
 packetBuffer[14] = 49;
 packetBuffer[15] = 52;
 // all NTP fields have been given values, now
 // you can send a packet requesting a timestamp:
 udp.beginPacket(address, 123); //NTP requests are to port 123
 udp.write(packetBuffer, NTP_PACKET_SIZE);
 udp.endPacket();
}

• Majenko: I suspect you also need to specify your DNS server (usually the same as your gateway, or use 8.8.8.8 or 8.8.4.4 for the google public DNS servers)
• user57451: @Majenko THANK YOU!!! THANK YOU!!! THANK YOU!!! THANK YOU!!! That did the trick! I added the gateway as dns1 and used 8.8.8.8 as dns2 Do you want to post your comment as an answer? I'll accept it for sure, If not, should I add [SOLVED] to my question or answer my own question?

Answer 1

As well as specifying your IP address and gateway you also have to provide DNS server addresses. These are normally provided by DHCP, and the ESP8266 doesn't assume that it's the same as your gateway address when using a static IP address.

Normally you would use your router's IP address as your DNS server address, but you can also use the Google public DNS servers on 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4.

The full format of the config function is:

 WiFi.config(staticIP, gateway, subnet, dns);

where dns is, like the other parameters, an IPAddress.

Answer 2

If you use Arduino IDE with <ESP8266WiFi.h> there is a different order for the arguments in the config-statement See the comment in the source code: //ESP argument order is: ip, gateway, subnet, dns1 //Arduino arg order is: ip, dns, gateway, subnet.

So after lots of trouble i changed my config in WiFi.config(STATICIP, DNS1, GATEWAY, SUBNET) and everything works smooth now. The comment means that if you use ESP-IDE (?) the argument order is: ip, gateway, subnet, dns1. When you use Aduino IDE (for ESP8266) the argument order is: ip, dns, gateway, subnet._

• Juraj: ESP-IDE? ESP WiFi library! the esp8266 WiFi library has the order of config parameters different than all other WiFi libraries and Ethernet libraries. but the esp8266 WiFi library's config function can detect the parameters and works with the common ordering too