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Call for Secret Labs to Kick Start Go! Bus


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#1 mcinnes01

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Posted 02 September 2013 - 10:46 PM

Hi,

 

I have been a happy user of Secret Labs products for many years, I have enjoyed the fantastic, friendly and helpful community and Secret Labs energy and commitment to improve their products.

 

Now I feel it is the communities chance to help Secret Labs...

 

I would like to propose that Secret Labs start a Kick Starter campaign to help fund the development of the Go! Bus protocol which is holding back many avid netduino users and the exciting new products Secret Labs have on backlog. The community have all been waiting patiently for ethernet, SD and the Gadgeteer hub for sometime and it seems focus has shifted and the forums have gone a little quiet.

 

I would like to know the viability to allow the community to "give a little to get a little", by funding Secret Labs so they can employ some additional resources to either work on the Go! Bus protocol, or work on the AGENT smart watch, freeing up other resource to work on Go! Bus.

 

I would love to start getting some use out of my N Go! and would love to see the netduino forums that bustling hive of community interest they were previously.

 

What are your thoughts on this?

 

Many thanks,

 

Andy



#2 carb

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Posted 03 September 2013 - 12:38 AM

Andy,

Couldn't agree more, it used to take at least a half hour to read the posts on the forum, and there was almost always someone in the chat room.

 

Now it is like a ghost town.

 

I have been working with Raspberry Pi, but would still like to dust off one of the many Netduino boards that I purchased, if and when the new firmware comes out, the shieldbase comes out of beta, go Bus, Ethernet, SD card reader etc. are released to the public.

 

There has been a lot of broken promises, but I am still hoping that they all will materialize before the Netduino become obsolete.

 

Chuck



#3 Chris Walker

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Posted 03 September 2013 - 12:50 AM

Hey Andy, Chuck: This is a good conversation to have. The economics of open source hardware is a lot different than standard commercial products. And while we continue to invest profits from Netduino Go back into new hardware and firmware, additional code contributions from the community (along with creation of third-party hardware modules) really helps drive the ecosystem forward and gives users more freedom to create. Andy--what exactly are you proposing? BTW we have resources working on both GoBus and new GoBus modules. We can't put more resources into it than earnings from Netduino sales, but we are spending quite a bit this year to continue pushing boundaries with GoBus. Right now the focus is on implementation of GoBus 1.5 firmware for STM32 (which will be the new firmware for Shield Base and the Gadgeteer Adapter). The Ethernet module will be a small superset on top of that. Then we'll move our focus to the STM8S firmware (for the majority of new modules). Chuck--Netduino has a long life ahead of it, for both hobby and commercial uses. Thank you for being part of our community. Chris

#4 Nevyn

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Posted 03 September 2013 - 06:38 AM

Couldn't agree more, it used to take at least a half hour to read the posts on the forum, and there was almost always someone in the chat room.

 

Now it is like a ghost town.

 

It's disappointingly quiet around here these days.

 

Regards,

Mark


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#5 Juzzer

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Posted 03 September 2013 - 09:20 AM

Interestingly the GHI forum has gone quite quiet of late as well.

Think it's time for me to build some Go bus gizmos....



#6 carb

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Posted 03 September 2013 - 10:43 PM

Mark,

 

I am hoping it is because of the long summer and everyone has just been busy, as for me I am working away from home and have to use Hughes net to login to the internet.

 

Chuck



#7 mangga2

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Posted 04 September 2013 - 05:44 AM

Hi All,

 

I am new to Netduino. In fact I am new to the microcontroller field. It is only in the past few months that I notice Arduino, and then Netduino. I have bought a GO! starter kits first to learn and understand it. I have yet to experiment with it. But I can begin to imagine how it may be used in my work life. I am also ploughing the web to learn about related/competing technologies, to look at the hardware parts that can be put together. All to understand its potential. I need to understand whether Netduino GO is able to win in the market, before I put in more time and money to use it.

 

So far this is what I understand of Netduino GO after some research:

 

1) Netduino is a brand of microcontrollers riding on the open-source hardware wave. Right now it is used by hobbyists but hopes to go into commercial/industrial applications.

 

2) The GO thing is the new direction of Netduino. It uses the GO!bus to connect modules which perform specific tasks, leaving the main GO unit to do the supervising task. Right now, not many modules are available yet. For example, for the kind of application I am contemplating, I am hoping there would be a ZigBee communication module. But this doesn't seem to have been announced by anyone. Incidentally, I guess I might try buying components from several vendors to try to put them together. But there is going to be a lot of trials and errors.

 

I am old so I can remember the days when the IBM PC was created. Then many models of PC were developed. Each brand claims to have some superior features. Because IBM held the right to the BIOS. Each brand has to create its own BIOS. So there were variations of machine behaviour from brand to brand. But over time they died out. Consumers converge to just one standard. It is the standard which has the most applications. Today looking at the microcontrollers I am making comparisons. Could it be that in a few years there may be just one or two brands left that have the most components and applications? Also, remember the videotape fight between betamax and VHS.

 

As a technology user I have to go with the winning one in order to maximize my investment returns. So I wish that Netduino GO would be the winning one. I have used c# before, and I agree that the multi threading event driven model of .net is superior, and I especially like the Visual Studio debugger. But right now I don't see many modules. Perhaps I have to wait another two years to consider any serious application using Netduino GO?

 

Anyway, good luck to the Secret Labs guys. I hope they succeed soon.



#8 mcinnes01

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Posted 04 September 2013 - 09:11 PM

Hi Chris,

 

I completely understand the economics behind open source aren't quite as straight forward as standard commercial products and this is why I believe the community could dig in and help out...

 

Whilst Go! Bus may equally benefit from community input from some of the more advanced users I thought there may be a way some of us other users could help out. Whilst throwing money at a problem doesn't always fix it, I was interested in both the community's and Secret Labs opinion on how we could inject some help in to realising the Go! Bus dream. As Go! Bus is Secret Labs brain child its very difficult for people to necessarily contribute on a community platform and this is where my thought of the community and possibly potential hardware vendors helping fund this endeavour.

 

Hardware vendors can benefit from using Go! Bus once it is available to facilitate their own commercial products and ultimately this drives interest back in to the Netduino community. I completely understand that you can't invest more than the returns from sales of the Go! line in to developing it further, but without the new toys like ethernet etc I'm sure you would agree that Go! sales have slumped from the initial level of interest and this catch 22 situation of needing interested to drive sales, to fund development, to create interest, to drive sales.

 

This is where a possible funding scheme like kick starter could help Go!, Netduino and Open source hardware in general...

 

Kick Starter could be used to break the the vicious cycle and could enable Secret Labs to get an extra person working on the Go! line.

 

I guess if you could think in terms of what resources could benefit Go! and what would be required financially or otherwise, the community could work something out?

 

I would be happy to donate in this way, and you can either take the approach you did with AGENT, offering ethernet modules etc, or simply allow people to donate for Go! Bus 1.5 to become a reality sooner :)

 

Andy



#9 mcinnes01

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Posted 04 September 2013 - 09:20 PM

@Juzzer you seem a pretty smart guy looking at your own STM board and your port of NETMF, I would love to see what you could develop for the Go! Maybe a Wifi Module or 1-Wire module or something all together previously unimagined?

 

@Chris if people like Juzzer were able to spend a little time how could they get involved with physically developing the Go! bus protocol?

 

Andy



#10 Chris Walker

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Posted 04 September 2013 - 09:31 PM

Hey mangga2, Welcome to the Netduino community! Just FYI, Netduino is used in commercial applications today. The hardware is designed to commercial quality standards, and so it's easy for companies to simply "plug in" to designs where they're making hundreds of units. When they start building 1,000s (or 10,000s) of something, they simply derive from the Netduino open source design to build their commercial products. Commercial entities are starting to pick up and customize GoBus for their needs as well. It's early days for that still, but every time someone talks to me about how they could use GoBus in their commercial projects it makes me smile. BTW, we're using GoBus in some of our other commercial products as well. On Netduino vs. Netduino Go... Netduino Go is designed for software developers who want to build electronics without having to learn about the intricacies of hardware, SPIs and UARTs, etc. It's also designed for power-users who love working with raw hardware and need more IOs. We'll continue to evolve it along both those lines. Chris

#11 Chris Walker

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Posted 04 September 2013 - 09:33 PM

@Andy -- the best way to help out with GoBus is to either build hardware which uses the standard or to build a firmware implementation of the protocol for your favorite microcontroller. More modules equals more demand which equals more resources to continue innovating with plug-and-play electronics. Chris

#12 mangga2

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Posted 05 September 2013 - 03:23 AM

Hey mangga2, Welcome to the Netduino community! Just FYI, Netduino is used in commercial applications today. The hardware is designed to commercial quality standards, and so it's easy for companies to simply "plug in" to designs where they're making hundreds of units. When they start building 1,000s (or 10,000s) of something, they simply derive from the Netduino open source design to build their commercial products. Commercial entities are starting to pick up and customize GoBus for their needs as well. It's early days for that still, but every time someone talks to me about how they could use GoBus in their commercial projects it makes me smile. BTW, we're using GoBus in some of our other commercial products as well. On Netduino vs. Netduino Go... Netduino Go is designed for software developers who want to build electronics without having to learn about the intricacies of hardware, SPIs and UARTs, etc. It's also designed for power-users who love working with raw hardware and need more IOs. We'll continue to evolve it along both those lines. Chris

 

Chris,

 

Thanks for explaining. It is good that we end-users/developers get as complete a picture as possible to be able to contribute. I could team up with a hardware guy to develop the module if I can't find it on the market. The important thing is to know and abide by the standard. So do tell us where to look up the standard and work.



#13 Chris Walker

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Posted 05 September 2013 - 06:49 AM

Hi mangga2, The early GoBus 1.5 spec is here: http://forums.netdui...ucing-gobus-15/ Chris

#14 Juzzer

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Posted 05 September 2013 - 06:54 AM

I'll dip my toes in the water and build something...

BLE?

Is there a wish list somewhere?



#15 Nevyn

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Posted 05 September 2013 - 07:31 AM

I'll dip my toes in the water and build something...

 

I've documented my experience if you are interested - it's GoBus 1.0 though, not 1.5.

 

Regards,

Mark


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Blogging about Netduino, .NET, STM8S and STM32 and generally waffling on about life

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#16 Juzzer

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Posted 05 September 2013 - 07:34 AM

Cheers Mark,

 

Will have a squizz and then put my thinking cap on for the first module idea...

 

Justin



#17 CW2

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Posted 05 September 2013 - 09:15 AM

Will have a squizz and then put my thinking cap on for the first module idea...

 

How about an Ethernet module?  :P



#18 Juzzer

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Posted 05 September 2013 - 09:46 AM

How about an Ethernet module?  :P

 

I was going to walk (and make something blink or beep) before i ran....but hey  :ph34r:



#19 CW2

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Posted 05 September 2013 - 09:53 AM

I was going to walk (and make something blink or beep) before i ran....but hey  :ph34r:

 

All right then - make a LED blinking module, let's say two LEDs, driven by ENC28J60 Ethernet controller  ;)



#20 Juzzer

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Posted 05 September 2013 - 09:55 AM

All right then - make a LED blinking module, let's say two LEDs, driven by ENC28J60 Ethernet controller  ;)

 

lol - touché






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