Re: [DIYbio] Arduino vs raw chips

I wasn't even aware you *could* code Python without the GC. :)

I also wasn't aware that Arduino was C++, I thought it was just C with
some fluffy framework stuff added, that's an interesting tidbit.

Pity there aren't any chips running Lua out there; nice middle-ground
between slower/bigger Python (as much as I love it, it's a Big Hammer)
and C, and you could actually imagine Lua on a sub-32-bit chip. Still
garbage-collected of course..

On 24/03/15 23:39, Simon Quellen Field wrote:
> I have changed the subject line because this discussion is no longer
> about an Arduino-based thermocycler.
>
> I normally avoid the "my chip is better than yours" type of food fights,
> but here we have several people I admire and respect weighing in on
> different sides with strong opinions, but without clearly stating what
> their preferred alternatives are. This makes it difficult to understand
> the strongly held beliefs.
>
> Having built hundreds of microprocessor based systems since the early
> 1970's, and making a living designing and building compilers for some 30
> years, I am definitely in the EE camp when it comes to soldering up
> prototypes (despite being educated as a biochemist). But I still can't
> see why the vitriol against Arduino has surfaced, and that has not been
> explained well. Analogies with Legos don't actually explain anything.
>
> When someone mentioned Java and Arduino in the same sentence, it was
> apparent they had not played with an Arduino in a while. It is
> programmed in C++. There is a hidden main() routine in the library,
> which does two things: it calls the setup() routine, then calls the
> loop() routine in a while loop. Other than that, it is plain C++, which
> happens to be my favorite programming language (stating my biases here).
>
> The original poster was new to electronics. For that person, the Arduino
> is ideal. Telling them to roll their own design out of bare chips,
> design and etch their own printed circuit boards, and understand how the
> timers on the chip are programmed is really just telling them to give
> up. I don't think that is what anyone was suggesting, but no one
> actually gave an alternative to the Arduino in their arguments.
>
> The Arduino has several things going for it:
>
> * The one I would recommend is cheap
> <http://www.aliexpress.com/item/Freeshipping-1pcs-lot-Nano-3-0-controller-compatible-for-arduino-nano-CH340-USB-driver-NO-CABLE/32263477572.html>.
> I buy them 20 at a time to hand out to my /Electronics For Artists
> <http://www.amazon.com/Electronics-Artists-Adding-Motion-Artwork/dp/1613730144>/
> and /Solar Powered Art <http://artists.sci-toys.com>/ students, who
> (like the original poster) have no prior experience with
> electronics. They have USB, a reset button, four LEDs, 2 voltage
> regulators, and 22 available IO pins, all for *$2.54* (shipping is
> free). And they are tiny -- the whole board is less than an inch and
> three quarters long, and less than three quarters of an inch wide.
> Embedding that in a design is cheaper than building a USB interface
> to your raw chip, and I can't see any advantage in building your own
> PC board instead of using this little guy.
> * You don't need a programming device.
> * You can re-program the chip in the finished product.
> * You can debug the device using USB.
> * You can have it send out clear error messages via USB.
> * You can power it using any cheap cell-phone charger, or use
> batteries (the voltage regulators are already there).
> * It is real-time. Devices based on Linux can't do real time
> measurements and control. Python has to disable the garbage
> collector to do real-time, and there aren't many Python programmers
> who know how to code without the garbage collector.
> * There are large libraries of debugged code for interfacing to all
> kinds of sensors and actuators.
>
> Against that, there is the promise of an alternative that has "a more
> stable build", "a better kit", "a solid kit", "more professional
> building blocks" that require "a little bit of homework". But no
> examples, other than to rule out the PIC.
>
> What is the recommended alternative?
>
> -----
> Get a free science project every week! "http://scitoys.com/newsletter.html"
>
>
> On Tue, Mar 24, 2015 at 10:29 AM, Jonathan Cline <jcline@ieee.org
> <mailto:jcline@ieee.org>> wrote:
>
> Hmmmmmmmm
>
> "wastes days of their time " .. starting out with the equivalent of
> Legos might create a fast model prototype but then wastes more time
> when moving from prototype to a more stable build. Requires
> rebuilding from scratch. Think longer term. Most likely any kit
> board is a tool which will be reused in a new project later which
> then runs into the typical obstacles and has to be replaced with a
> better kit, creating an upgrade cycle which wastes time. Start out
> with a solid kit first.
>
> "the community is smaller " .. in fact the Arduino community is a
> drop in the bucket, though a vocal and photo-polished one, compared
> to the larger design communities using more professional building
> blocks. Note "professional design" does not mean complex it only
> means a little bit of homework is necessary and maybe less glossy
> photo's.
>
> "less and more reasonable code" .. the code is in a high level
> language so it is likely the same. "copy/paste some ubiquitous
> code" .. If it is ubiquitous then there is nothing specific tying
> it to Arduino anyway.
>
> It is not necessary to defend your use of Arduino in past projects.
> Arduino is simply not a good recommendation in 2015 for new designs
> or redesigns. If you're building an automobile today you don't need
> to use an engine with a hand crank. When you designed the
> DremelFuge you considered the design options and settled on an
> industrialized component with suitable motor, a Dremel. You might
> have evaluated shiny plastic objects from Toys R Us like a kiddie
> toy blender but you smartly passed on these as underpowered. Just a
> little bit of homework up front gives the design significant legs.
>
> I didn't suggest anything about PIC in this thread either so there
> is no need to compare. If you would really like, you can review
> past opinion from the 90s on PIClist regarding why college students
> or more advanced younger dudes should not start or continue projects
> with the Basic Stamp (PIC based) - for same reasons as above: more
> expensive, typically under-powered so rapidly outgrown, technology
> likely later to cause frustration, though great for high school
> students and younger, and also not recommended as the basis for
> solid designs (i.e.: things which aspire to be more than toys).
>
>
> ## Jonathan Cline
> ## jcline@ieee.org <mailto:jcline@ieee.org>
> ## Mobile: +1-805-617-0223 <tel:%2B1-805-617-0223>
> ########################
>
> On 3/24/15 3:30 AM, Cathal Garvey wrote:
>
> That's all well and good, but putting together a thermal cycler
> with an Arduino requires no shields, less and more reasonable
> code, and no additional equipment (programmers, etcetera) over
> and above the Arduino and USB. It requires an AC solid state
> relay, LM35 sensor, a heat gun and a computer cooling fan.
>
> Telling people to use PICs because they'll save €5 on the cost
> of the chip, even if it wastes days of their time because the
> community is smaller and more techie and purist, is a bit
> useless. People want to get stuff done, and people are rarely
> without the €5 needed to grab an arduino, copy/paste some
> ubiquitous code, and get stuff done.
>
> On 24/03/15 10:05, Jonathan Cline wrote:
>
> It is several x more expensive as a building block, similar
> to the Lego
> analogy -- and always needs to add more pieces. It is not
> for real
> ("college undergrad level") projects. The household name
> comes from
> the marketing push and the plethora of required 3rd party
> pieces --
> which makes money for those other companies (including the kit
> suppliers, like Ada), who also do more marketing, and so on. The
> lameness of Arduino needing shields which boost business for kit
> suppliers and make it a well-known product placement in
> catalogs is no
> justification for using it in an engineering design.
> "There's a reason
> xx is a household name" could apply to many xx's which are
> similarly
> worse choices. Unfortunately the projects built with
> Arduino are also
> falsely labelled "diy low cost" when in fact they are not at
> all low
> cost in comparison and others are also led astray. When a
> lot of script
> kiddies talk volumes about a technology, it does not mean
> the technology
> is beneficial. A lot of the talk is simply confusion or
> from lack of
> education. Technology which works does not get as much
> verbiage in
> comparison precisely because it "just works" once the
> initial learning
> curve is overcome.
>
> The software application which allows cutting & pasting the
> code you
> mention into your projects likely works on any number of
> better hardware
> kits since it is in a high level language.
>
> So I repeat my recommendation and have improved it slightly --
>
> Requirement #1:
> * Sell the Arduino on ebay.
>
> ## Jonathan Cline
> ## jcline@ieee.org <mailto:jcline@ieee.org>
> ## Mobile: +1-805-617-0223 <tel:%2B1-805-617-0223>
> ########################
>
> On 3/24/15 1:17 AM, Cathal Garvey wrote:
>
> Arduino is fine and highly productive for beginners
> compared to PIC
> whatevers. There's a reason Arduino is a household name and
> PIC-number-number-number-__number is not.
>
> I've built functioning thermal cyclers on Arduinos
> without issue, and
> with easily reasonable code (although I was using a
> pre-written
> finite-state-machine library, the availability of which
> is just more
> reason to use a widely used platform like Arduino).
>
> On 24/03/15 02:38, Jonathan Cline wrote:
>
> Requirement #1:
> * Throw away the Arduino.
>
>
> I am going to add to the FAQ:
> "Do not use Arduino for real projects. It is like
> building an
> automobile out of Legos and then expecting to
> actually drive it."
>
>
> Also, fyi to Nathan. LM339 is a comparator not an
> opamp so it is not a
> good signal buffer. Use an opamp. See my article
> in Biocoder #6.
>
>
> ## Jonathan Cline
> ## jcline@ieee.org <mailto:jcline@ieee.org>
> ## Mobile: +1-805-617-0223 <tel:%2B1-805-617-0223>
> ########################
>
>
> On Wednesday, February 25, 2015 at 4:49:50 AM UTC-8,
> Andy Morgan wrote:
>
>
>
> So, I've slightly redesigned the Arduino PCR
> thermal cycler
> (http://www.instructables.com/__id/Arduino-PCR-thermal-cycler-__for-under-85/?ALLSTEPS
> <http://www.instructables.com/id/Arduino-PCR-thermal-cycler-for-under-85/?ALLSTEPS>
>
>
> <http://www.instructables.com/__id/Arduino-PCR-thermal-cycler-__for-under-85/?ALLSTEPS
> <http://www.instructables.com/id/Arduino-PCR-thermal-cycler-for-under-85/?ALLSTEPS>>)
>
>
> to make it a bit better, by replacing the two
> wiremound resistors
> (100watts) with a cartridge heater (300watts)
> (http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/__Cartridge-Heater-3-8-Diameter-__3-2-Length-220VAC-300W-/__380898256650?pt=AU_B_I___Electrical_Test_Equipment&__hash=item58af4e270a
> <http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Cartridge-Heater-3-8-Diameter-3-2-Length-220VAC-300W-/380898256650?pt=AU_B_I_Electrical_Test_Equipment&hash=item58af4e270a>
>
>
> <http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/__Cartridge-Heater-3-8-Diameter-__3-2-Length-220VAC-300W-/__380898256650?pt=AU_B_I___Electrical_Test_Equipment&__hash=item58af4e270a
> <http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Cartridge-Heater-3-8-Diameter-3-2-Length-220VAC-300W-/380898256650?pt=AU_B_I_Electrical_Test_Equipment&hash=item58af4e270a>>).
>
>
>
>
> But the thing is: I have ZERO experience with
> electronics, and I
> don't know whether the cartridge heater will
> require too much power
> from the Arduino board or power supply, and all
> the explanations
> I've found on the internet seem to go WAY over
> my head.
>
> Does anybody know whether the cartridge heater
> will work?
>
> Any help would be greatly appreciated.
>
>
>
>
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