Arduino - FAIL

[StuartJPP]

I have worked in the embedded firmware industry for 20+ years and I have tried to avoid the Arduino craze as I see them basically as toys. I have done a few things with them in the past just so that I haven't been left totally out of the loop.

Today I launched the Arduino IDE, which I hadn't done for about 8 months and of course it prompted me to update, so I did. Result...what used to work no longer does (not my software but the IDE itself). Next thing I had to do after updating was downgrade to a version that actually does work.

WHY OH WHY is software so flaky these days? Could it be that they are "FREE"...i.e. cost nothing to buy but cost everything to get working reliably?

The company I work for is teetering on liquidation because some bright spark thought that the new core product should be based on what is basically a Raspberry Pi....instead of a "proper" embedded design...these things (Arduino/Raspberry Pi/Beagle Bone/Insert fancy name here) should be treated as learning aids only and are toxic for industry. At best they should be relegated to proof of concepts only.

Let this be a warning...

[MarkyD]

I'm using V1.7 from .org  No problems sofar

[D4N]

Software is more problematic nowadays because of all the dependencies that may be newer or older (or completely absent) than what will actually work.

 

The problem with using simple hardware is that it is easy for people to copy, in this case why would they buy it?

I think Pi's and arduous are great though and you can do a lot with them with a dab of solder and a bit of imagination.

[stash_old]

Sorry have to disagree Stuart - while your company may have made the wrong choice its really horses for courses. I was in IT for over 40 yrs and while there is some truth in what you say it has always been and still is a case of "update at your peril".

I have built numerous Ardunio projects for Astro (focuser,filter wheel etc) all of which behave just as well as main stream s/w and h/w - just cost a lot less!.  The main problem now days and its the same in lots of other industries, everything is rushed out and not thought through or tested. Hence modern highly complex trains are still stopped by leaves and the wrong type of snow - something the Victorians over came 150 yrs ago - i believe the sand box has been retro fitted to many trains .

As for free software it does make me laugh that people are prepared to spend 1000's on Astro h/w then use free software , expect miracles  and moan about the free s/w. A lot of effort is put in by these dedicated people which mostly goes unrewarded.

So sorry you had problems but please don't knock what , i believe, has been of great importance to the Astro arena. 

[Gina]

I've used Arduinos successfully for all sorts of things.  OTOH I don't update without due reason.

[StuartJPP]

I was probably a bit harsh to be honest, the issue I had is well known and has been for a while but instead of fixing it, they would rather add new board support instead of doing the difficult work of making it work properly...that is where I see the fail.

From a hobbyist point of view, I can totally see the benefit of the Arduino movement and that is why I am using one now instead of building my own hardware. But it still needs to work properly...free or not (and yes I did buy at least one genuine Arduino board).

My first experience with Arduino was positive, it worked right out of the box and I hope this is just a hiccup and it gets fixed and continues to be what it is...

 

[hughgilhespie]

I think we have become too blase about these little microcontrollers. The simple fact is that they have completely revolutionised electronics and put an almost unimaginable amout of power in the hands of hobbyists. We can now contemplate doing things that would have been totally impossible just a few years ago.

I built my first microcomputer in the 1980's - a Nascom 1 machine with a Zilog Z80 processor. It was truly amazing - even though there was less than 1000 bytes of user memory. Since then things have become sooooo much more powerful and paradoxically, easier at the same time.

Roll on the Arduino, Raspberry Pi, Teensy, Beaglebone............................

Regards, HUgh

[ncjunk]

I feel you were a bit harsh but then I understand the frustration as I have some code that only works up to a certain version of arduino software - must fix that someday.

BUT - in the 80s it cost a fortune to buy and build anything. I remember being at home looking through my maplins catalogue in order to see what was new and drooling over the 6800 processor and wanting to play but it being too expensive.

I can now buy, and have, an arduino that fits in my wallet for the price of a packet of crisps with 8 AI and 8 AI, inbuilt serial comms, low power consumption etc etc.....seriously I'm living the geeky 16year old me dream.

Not only that but when ever there's a problem I can google it and find the answer. So yes it's frustrating that the software is sometimes flaky but I can usually find the answer. Would I use it at work in automation? no, because I need to be sure that the components are of a high enough quality to work for years without failing and there are always doubts with these chinese electronics.

At home though it's a different matter, I have 3 spare arduinos in the garage so can just replace it if it fails - the focuser though has been working for 4 years now without a faiure.

99.9% of it does work properly I think you need to accept the minor failures due to the major benifits - free software, cheap hardware - I just can't believe I can buy something so useful and so cheap with a free ide that works....I don't want the 80s! give me want we have now with some bugs any day of the week.

[SilverAstro]

2 hours ago, ncjunk said:

.seriously I'm living the geeky 16year old me dream.

Hehee, good read and well said and I'm living a second childhood

( gosh remember the soul searching over the mighty expensive BeebB, - - and they kept fixing that later till it had so many variants that no one knew which version to buy next !  )

On 12/08/2016 at 21:15, StuartJPP said:

I was probably a bit harsh to be honest, / My first experience with Arduino was positive,

But no harm in having a bit of grizzle/harshness on a chat, saves going out and kicking bus shelters down ?!

[Davey-T]

2 hours ago, ncjunk said:

 

BUT - in the 80s it cost a fortune to buy and build anything. I remember being at home looking through my maplins catalogue in order to see what was new and drooling over the 6800 processor and wanting to play but it being too expensive.

 

Just be grateful you didn't have search through the Exchange & Mart finding stuff to build your own "computer" then if you were clever / lucky enough it could play a mean game of noughts and crosses 

Dave

[SilverAstro]

17 minutes ago, Davey-T said:

 lucky enough it could play a mean game of noughts and crosses 

(violins) when A transistor cost more than An arduino ( /moog)

Speaking of Moog synth. - when you could not afford one so you pottered about with a few transistors in multivibs !

[Davey-T]

Built some Walkie Talkies using Acorn valves, closest thing to transistors back in the day 

Dave

[Gina]

The Moog sure was something   I bought two records of Moog music - "Switched On Bach" and "The Well Tempered Clavier".  I still have them but my hearing no longer appreciates the sharpness of some of the sounds.  I was a Hi-Fi enthusiast in those days with separate deck, tone arm and cartridge (is that right - my memory has faded), home made speaker boxes and all that.  Oh and I made my own amplifiers too, of course.

[SilverAstro]

12 minutes ago, Gina said:

with separate deck, tone arm and cartridge (is that right

made my own amplifiers too, of course.

Yep that's right, not forgetting saving up for the sapphire and/or diamond stylus, ,, and aspiring to a Thorens deck all of which I still have and work, but not often !  ( oh gosh, just googled and it looks like they are still in business and making them, wow!)

Of course, with 6V6 in the output ?

Ah nostalgia, well that seems to have diverted Stuarts thread just a bit ! lol!

 

 

[Gina]

Diamond stylus of course - I had the top Shure one with an elliptical stylus.  Yes, I had a Thorens belt drive deck too. 

[SilverAstro]

34 minutes ago, Davey-T said:

using Acorn valves, closest thing to transistors back in the day

Ohhhh, shhhh ! This is too much nostalgia !! I remember those, and a vhf rx I built with one to search out the sound subcarrier of the recently arrived * TV. Trouble was that it was a super-regen which was prone to oscillate - and wipe out the only TV in the street, which was not ours which is why I was after the sound channel !

* well I say recently arrived - it was about 100m away at Kirk O'Shotts

[stash_old]

I still have my Akai 8 inch reel to reel  and a Akai 8 track cart - both work 

 

[Dave_D]

On 12/08/2016 at 19:54, StuartJPP said:

I have worked in the embedded firmware industry for 20+ years and I have tried to avoid the Arduino craze as I see them basically as toys. I have done a few things with them in the past just so that I haven't been left totally out of the loop.

Just out of curiosity, are you referring to the 'arduino package' as a whole, or to the actual ATMega controller?

[Guest]

On the subject of flaky software. Having been a computer programmer in the control industry for 40 years and knowing how hard it is to predict all possible circumstances, situations and failure modes even when you have some control over the operating environment the idea of driverless cars is plain just scary.

 

[Gina]

That's my view too.

[Davey-T]

Just think of the day when everybody is riding in driverless cars and a solar eruption wipes out the GPS 

Dave

[Guest]

I don't think you even need a solar eruption. My understanding is that the US military can switch it off whenever they want and might do so in the case of a national emergency.

[wimvb]

GPS used to be exclusively military, but aren't there private GPS satelites nowadays? Wonders a former 8085 afficionado.

Btw, it seems this thread is wandering off into the sunset...

Back to the arduino. I use it for quick prototyping. But when I have a working design, I most often rewrite the code for an ATtiny, using Atmel studio (also a freebie btw). This way I avoid Arduino libraries and dependencies, and I get slimmer code.

[SilverAstro]

On 19/08/2016 at 12:31, woodblock said:

I don't think you even need a solar eruption. My understanding is that the US military can switch it off whenever they want and might do so in the case of a national emergency.

More usually they used to degrade the accuracy rather than switching it off 'at times of national emergency'. It was originally high accuracy for mil.use and lower(variable) for the commercial side of ops.

These days they are not so keen on degrading because they found that using that facility destroyed user confidence and thus sales.   ( they may even have put out an assurance a few years back that they will no longer use that facility, but no one believes that either ! )

Even worse, it encouraged the Europeans, Russians and Chinese to build their own systems, (yet more sats up there )

'foot' and 'shooting' are words that came to mind too late