The Ware for February 2013 is the Worldsemi WS2812. It’s a digital-to-light converter — add +5V, ground, and shift in a digital code word, and out comes PWM RGB light. The chip also features a digital output for cascading multiple LEDs in a row. It’s an extremely versatile chip that was brought to my attention by Dave Cranor during the Shenzhen geek tour in January — one of those things that you just keep a stock of at all times because it’s a dirt simple way to add a beautiful-looking LED into a tight spot. You can buy ones mounted on a little PCB from Adafruit.

I’ll give Randy the prize this month, since he was the first to correctly identify the entire packaged ware, and also gave a link to a datasheet (which I had also been looking for). Thanks, and email me for your prize!

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