Starting place for Netduin Go Module

Hello, recently I got a Netduino Go and also the shield base. One of the projects I would like to try to do is remake a project I did a while back with 4 arduinos communicating over rs485 (No currently I cannot tell you what this is for, but I do plan to open source the design if I can get it to work). Basically it's a master that just tells the other 3 to do certain things. I would like to remake that with the netduino go by making a module to take the place of the 3 slaves. The slaves need to have a minimum of 12 preferably more like 20 (room for expansion) digital io pins and at least 6 preferably more like 12 analog inputs. The modules themselves will probably need to run a fair bit of logic on their own and just receive commands from the main board and sometimes respond. Would this be something where I just adapt the shieldbase to do what I want? The problem I see with adapting the shield base is that it takes up a whole bus if I'm not mistaken and I need a minimum of 3 of these but would again like to be able to connect more. The next part to that is, is it possible to connect more than 8 modules to the main board. I have a basic understanding of the boards, not so much about how the processor works or how to design the circuit for it. I would prefer to use the netduino go as C# has been my primary language for around 5 years and I like its setup. Is it possible to get a starting point for the circuit and software for it from somewhere? I have a basic understanding of the electronics side of this, but the programming side I should have no problem with other than a starting point and how to get it on the board.

The modules themselves will probably need to run a fair bit of logic on their own and just receive commands from the main board and sometimes respond. Would this be something where I just adapt the shieldbase to do what I want? The problem I see with adapting the shield base is that it takes up a whole bus if I'm not mistaken and I need a minimum of 3 of these but would again like to be able to connect more.

I think the intention is to allow the Netduino GO! to connect to more than just two ShieldBase boards but not whilst it is in beta.

The next part to that is, is it possible to connect more than 8 modules to the main board.

You should be able to do this but not with the current implementation of the GoBus protocol. From the talk on the Netduino GO! forum it looks like that is a 2.0 feature. We are currently at 1.0 and the early specs for GoBus 1.5 have been released. Again, check out the Netduino GO forum.

I have a basic understanding of the boards, not so much about how the processor works or how to design the circuit for it. I would prefer to use the netduino go as C# has been my primary language for around 5 years and I like its setup. Is it possible to get a starting point for the circuit and software for it from somewhere? I have a basic understanding of the electronics side of this, but the programming side I should have no problem with other than a starting point and how to get it on the board.

If you want to implement a module yourself then you will need a little more than C# if you are going to follow the route other developers have chosen so far. The current modules which have been released all use either the STM8S or the STM32 series of microcontrollers. If you want an idea of what is involved then I've been blogging about STM8S development. You can also get C# and C sources for some of the Nwazet modules.

Welcome to the community.

Hope this helps,
Mark

This could help: http://highfieldtale...t-open-toolbox/ Cheers