Why do I have to open Serial Monitor to display what is in loop function?

Question

Why do I have to open Serial Monitor to display non-NaN values retrieved from DHT22,
what am I doing wrong in the code below?

#include <DHT.h>
#include <Wire.h>
#include <Adafruit_SSD1306.h>
#include <Adafruit_GFX.h>
// OLED display TWI address
#define OLED_ADDR   0x3C
// reset pin not used on 4-pin OLED module
Adafruit_SSD1306 display(-1);  // -1 = no reset pin
// 128 x 64 pixel display
#if (SSD1306_LCDHEIGHT != 64)
#error("Height incorrect, please fix Adafruit_SSD1306.h!");
#endif
#define DHTPIN D3
#define DHTTYPE DHT22
DHT dht(DHTPIN, DHTTYPE);
void setup() {

Serial.begin(115200);
delay(100);
  dht.begin();
  pinMode (DHTPIN, OUTPUT);
  /// initialize and clear display
  display.begin(SSD1306_SWITCHCAPVCC, OLED_ADDR);
  display.clearDisplay();
  //  display.drawRect(1, 1, display.width()-1, display.height()-1, WHITE);   // draws the outer rectangular boundary on the screen
  display.display();
  // display a pixel in each corner of the screen
  display.drawPixel(0, 0, WHITE);
  display.drawPixel(127, 0, WHITE);
  display.drawPixel(0, 63, WHITE);
  display.drawPixel(127, 63, WHITE);
  // display a line of text
  display.setTextSize(2);
  display.setTextColor(WHITE);
  display.setCursor(20, 18);
  display.print("Welcome");
  display.setCursor(25, 40);
  display.print("San");

  // update display with all of the above graphics
  display.display();
}
void loop() {
  // put your main code here, to run repeatedly:
  float h = dht.readHumidity();
  float t = dht.readTemperature();
  display.clearDisplay();
  display.setTextSize(1);
  display.setTextColor(WHITE);
  display.setCursor(0, 1);
  display.print("Showing Temperature");
  // display Temperature
  display.setTextSize(2);
  display.setTextColor(WHITE);
  display.setCursor(1, 18);
  display.print("T : ");
  display.print(t);
  display.setTextSize(1);
  display.print((char)247);
  display.setTextSize(2);
  display.print("C");
  display.setCursor(1, 40);
  display.print("H : ");
  display.print(h);
  display.print(" %");
  // update display with all of the above graphics
  display.display();
}

After uploading code it does will display NaN but when I open serial monitor it works fine displaying actual values from DHT22 :o

below is the fritzing of the hookup, I do not have witty cloud in fritzing, so I have used wemos D1Mini instead. on wemos d1 mini 3v3 is VCC on witty cloud dev board.

It looks like loop function doesn't execute by itself unless I open the serial monitor, why is it so? please help

Answer 1

Hard to tell from your fritzing which actual ESP8266 pin you are using, but you require a pull up resistor on the data line of the DHT22.

My guess is that you are using one of the serial UART pins for the data connection, and opening the serial monitor activates the output of the onboard UART chip which then acts as your missing pullup resistor.

Answer 2

Serial monitor sends a RESET signal during its initialization - maybe this is the problem. Sometimes these Witty boards need an implicit RESET after power up / programming.