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There have been 70 items by JonnyBoats (Search limited from 27-September 23)
#15657 Measuring Angle of Attack
Posted by JonnyBoats on 18 July 2011 - 10:22 PM in General Discussion
#17204 A Software guy drowning in the Hardware world...
Posted by JonnyBoats on 28 August 2011 - 05:25 PM in General Discussion
In reading this thread (and lots more like it on other forums) I believe that often times people overlook that there is a big difference between knowing enough to get something to work and thoroughly understanding it.
Consider changing the oil in your car. That is something most people can do without an understanding of how an internal combustion engine works. By the same token there are some basics that one needs to know in order to do it safely and not ruin the engine. Things like "Shut the car off before crawling underneath to drain the oil" and 'Be sure to check the oil level on the dipstick before restarting the car and then check for leaks."
Now consider a simple electric lamp. One needs to have a power source, a lamp and some wire to connect them. One does not need to understand the difference between AC and DC current, or for that matter even care.
A good electrical engineer will understand Maxwell's equations, just as someone with a degree in computer science should thoroughly understand design patterns. That having been said, I know lots of people making a living as a programmer could not implement a state machine if their life depended on it.
The plain fact is that for _most_ of the things that beginners want to do with single board computers, knowledge of graduate level engineering is simply not required. What is helpful is the level of knowledge typically required to earn a boy (or girl) scout merit badge. Much of what one needs to know is best learned in a group environment with hands on labs. One could take EE courses at a university or one could simply go to a local hackerspace and learn by doing, benefiting from the experience and knowledge of others.
For those wanting an on-line resource to gain greater exposure to basic EE, two sites I have found helpful are the EEV blog and The Signal Path. If you are rusty on the math or other academic topics (like differential equations) the Khan Academy is a great resource.
Just keep in mind that learning electrical engineering and building simple projects are not always the same.
Finally allow me to say something to the EEs here. For a programmer who already knows C# (or VB) an .Net the Netduino is an ideal first single board computer. Why? because he already has the toolchain (Visual Studio) installed and running on his computer. While there are great, open source toolchains such as GNU on Unix available for a multitude of single board computers, for a programmer who uses Visual Studio on a daily basis that would simply be one more hurtle to getting started with micro-controllers. Similarly for a person with Unix PC who regularly programs in GCC, the Netduino may not be ideal.
Mention was made of the TI MSP430 which at a cost of $4.30 delivered has to be one best deals going. Personally if I am going to make a mistake and destroy a micro-controller I would rather make the mistake with one of my TI 430s than one of my Netduino Plus at $60. Heck, many places charge more that $4.30 just to ship a Netduino! The point being that there are lots of boards and parts available and it is usually best to try many of them and learn rather than fret over finding the one best one.
#29110 Prototype module prototyped on a prototype Protomodule
Posted by JonnyBoats on 15 May 2012 - 03:33 PM in Netduino Go
I've attached an image of a bare PCB next to the discovery board. Note that the actual prototype area on the discovery is the parts below the routed slots. The part above those slots is the ST Link programmer, which is what I connect to the SWIM connector to program the chip on the protomodule.
#29082 Prototype module prototyped on a prototype Protomodule
Posted by JonnyBoats on 15 May 2012 - 02:51 AM in Netduino Go
The detachable board on the STM8S has the necessary decoupling capacitors and features a 16 Mhz quartz for precision frequency counting / generation. Does the ProtoModule include a resonator or a quartz as well? For reference, here is the STM8S, detached from the STLink interface, with a Go! connector soldered to it:
#17173 Netduino+ WeatherStation / Environment Monitor / Webserver
Posted by JonnyBoats on 28 August 2011 - 01:37 AM in Project Showcase
#29081 Blog post about the beta of another NETMF port to the STM32 F4
Posted by JonnyBoats on 15 May 2012 - 02:13 AM in Beta Firmware and Drivers
Additional information on NETMF for STM32.
#16750 .NET Gadgeteer availibility
Posted by JonnyBoats on 16 August 2011 - 04:00 AM in General Discussion
Sneak peek inside the lab...
When we build new products, we usually spend about 6-9 months: design, parts sourcing, testing, building test jigs, etc.
To make Gadgeteer affordable, we needed to make our own plastic sockets for Gadgeteer accessories. [These sockets are drop-in replacements for the normal, more expensive sockets. You'll also be able to make your own boards and accessories...all open source.]
We just received the first batch of sockets, so I took a photo of a handful of them.
Now we'll do temperature testing (to make sure they survive the industrial reflow oven) and hand-assemble a few prototype boards.
BTW, a big thank you to the MSR team in Cambridge for their work on Gadgeteer (past, present and future).
Chris
Disclaimer: We haven't officially announced a Gadgeteer product lineup... We do sometimes cancel projects. But I thought I'd share a sneak peek update since you have shared your enthusiasm about Gadgeteer
Chris,
I was looking at the specifications for the connectors used by the .Net Gadgeteer and I see they are rated for an average life of only 500 insertions, which seems incredibly low.
What is the MTBF for your connectors?
#19379 .NET Gadgeteer availibility
Posted by JonnyBoats on 18 October 2011 - 11:05 PM in General Discussion
We actually did a bunch of engineering on a SAM9G45-based open-source Gadgeteer mainboard. Basically, we offered to create a $99 open-source Gadgeteer mainboard, an open-source NETMF port for SAM9G45, and a bunch of open-source Gadgeteer accessories if MSR would open-source the Gadgeteer software. They worked hard on that and were able to open source the smaller core but unfortunately they didn't have the engineering resources to write all the Gadgeteer drivers.
So they felt that they needed to launch Gadgeteer with a closed-source partner. So we had to scrap a ridiculously awesome board.
Chris
Is/was your mainboard similar to this: http://www.armkits.c...CFdU55QodtTGCMw ?
#18168 High resolution light measurement
Posted by JonnyBoats on 18 September 2011 - 11:27 PM in General Discussion
One cheap way to do this is with a TI MSP430 board which only costs $4.30 delivered (https://estore.ti.co...-kit-P2031.aspx ) This is probably the cheapest way to do a one-off project and the TI chip has reasonably good support.
The best way to look at this is that there is no one perfect single board computer. The key is to use one appropriate to the task and remember that they are cheap enough that you can break the task down and use more than one board.
#18175 High resolution light measurement
Posted by JonnyBoats on 19 September 2011 - 02:42 AM in General Discussion
The issue is the .Net Micro Framework. If you are willing to forgo .Net and program directly to the chip in C, you can get the job done.
What s not as simple or easy is to combine the use of .Net with native code and direct control of hardware interrupts etc. It may very well be possible, and I hope you succeed as we would all like this capability. You should be prepared for some setbacks along the way.
Can an Atmel AT91SAM7X512 microcontroller support the functions of the Taos TSL235R?
I am still not convinced that I need to throw more components at this problem. Netduino has an ARM7 48MHz processor- why should we deny that there is plenty of speed right on this development board? If I were to remove the processor from the Netduino and program it directly, or remove the .Net firmware and run C/C++ on it, I am sure that this sensor would run fine. I've read in these forums that version 4.1.2 of the Netduino firmware is supposed to offer run-time native code interop. I've also read about someone's project called "Fluent", which runs code something like 20 to 30 times faster than the managed code. I've also read that you can run FreeRTOS on the Netduino platform. Can't you run a quadrocopter with FreeRTOS? Isn't that real-time?
Does version Netduino 4.1.2 have runtime native code interop? If not, when will it have this functionality? Where can I get this "Fluent" project? Where can I find resources on how to run my own C/C++ on this board?
I understand the opinion that more tools will help me solve this problem, but I would rather use what I have instead of having to then deal with connecting, learning, and powering these other pieces.
Thanks,
Nick
#19039 What's in the magical, mysterious, box of crappy surplus?
Posted by JonnyBoats on 11 October 2011 - 06:52 PM in General Discussion
#19061 What's in the magical, mysterious, box of crappy surplus?
Posted by JonnyBoats on 12 October 2011 - 02:19 AM in General Discussion
As a teaser, this is an image of what I added to the box.
For those of you following, I had no takers for a box opening party, but hopefully we can organize some Netduino Days at hackerspaces and other locations in the future.
#18782 What's in the magical, mysterious, box of crappy surplus?
Posted by JonnyBoats on 04 October 2011 - 03:14 PM in General Discussion
#17876 What's in the magical, mysterious, box of crappy surplus?
Posted by JonnyBoats on 12 September 2011 - 12:11 AM in General Discussion
#15676 Netduino Fritzing part
Posted by JonnyBoats on 19 July 2011 - 01:47 PM in General Discussion
#27354 Building custom go!bus modules for Netduino Go
Posted by JonnyBoats on 16 April 2012 - 05:54 AM in Netduino Go
As part of this conversation, we should put together a workflow of best practices for building modules.
Chris
Absolutely! That would be great. Lets also have a workflow for prototyping modules.
#27351 Building custom go!bus modules for Netduino Go
Posted by JonnyBoats on 16 April 2012 - 05:40 AM in Netduino Go
Would it help if we bought a few thousand of each and bundled them in 10-packs for $9.95?
Chris
P.S. All of the PNs are in the .BRD design files.
What would be even better would be a couple of sockets and pre flashed STM8S bundled together for $4.95
#27346 Building custom go!bus modules for Netduino Go
Posted by JonnyBoats on 16 April 2012 - 05:23 AM in Netduino Go
#27341 Building custom go!bus modules for Netduino Go
Posted by JonnyBoats on 16 April 2012 - 04:41 AM in Netduino Go
#22974 Powerful Aquarium Lighting
Posted by JonnyBoats on 19 January 2012 - 04:22 AM in General Discussion
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