Is ESPNOW supported to control pattern selection from another ESP32? Or backup plan, wired GPIO

[rddt]

@jeff @wizard Further clarifying the PixelBlaze startup problem, now that we’ve done more testing and found the problem repeatable:

When the PixelBlaze starts (power supply turned on), if the GPIO’s 0/25/26 & Ground wire are connected to the ESP32 (Fern) at the time, then it consistently produces the fail-safe state on the PixelBlaze:

We’re very surprised at this, though we do have a workaround. Our workaround is to make sure the jumper cables are disconnected at PixelBlaze startup. Then after startup, when we reconnect the cables, the system works normally.

Here’s the PixelBlaze code:
PB_River.pbb (889.6 KB)

Here are photos of the setup to better illustrate the wiring:

Just a wild guess here, but is the IO0 some kind of special pin that needs to be untouched during startup? Similar to how Pin D0 on an Arduino conflicts w the Serial Terminal. Please let us know, and thanks in advance for your assistance

[rddt]

@jeff @wizard we had a great time deploying the piece, you can see a neat video snippet here showing the cool lighting effects. However the issue in the last thread is still quite persistent, and our workaround makes for a very laborious startup:
Separately start up the PixelBlaze and Fern, configure the PixelBlaze to start in the playlist, and most frustratingly, physically plug in the GPIO wires and ground after all that to allow the systems to talk.

Any new ideas on why we may be seeing the error above? Thanks in advance for any insights here