But in this day and age... just use a cheap
microcontroller/microcomputer and add some wireless comms, then
require your customers to provide their own interface (read
smartphone, laptop, tablet).
Since the customer has already paid for a very nice phone, tablet, laptop, or desktop computer, making him pay another $30 for an inferior user interface (smaller screen, stuck to the device, etc.) will seldom be optimal.
Now that cheap boards are available with WiFi and web servers built-in, I can control everything from my desk, or from a coffee shop, or a beach in Bermuda. I can monitor a dozen devices at once on one screen. I can send screen shots in emails, or publish them. I can see the data plotted on a huge monitor. I get to use my mouse, and not get fingerprints all over the screen.
There will be times when you want everything to be in one gadget. I like having my GPS built-in to the car, and there might be value in having a $30 tablet glued onto some particular piece of lab equipment, but I'm having a hard time finding an example. I thought, maybe a microscope controller, but then I look at the one I built, and it has a 1080p monitor so I can see the detail, and I can point with the mouse at a single pixel, which is hard to do on a $30 tablet. A weather station? Much better to be able to check it from my phone, from an armchair by the fire, or from that beach in Bimini.
If the device you are building costs $10, adding a $30 tablet is a lot of budget overhead. But if it costs $1000, you can add the tablet, and still have it remotely controllable over the 'net, so why not have both?
As for programming the Android, just make it a web page, using HTML and Javascript. Now it works on the tablet, or remotely, with only one program to write. And you never have to worry about Android getting upgrades that change the API.
The killer is that the tablet doesn't have the GPIO pins available. So go with the $9 computer and the web page, and control it from any of your other web-connected devices. If you want the interface glued to the device, glue on the tablet, and its web browser can control the device, via WiFi. Or Velcro it to the device you are using this week, and move it to the next device next week.
On Thu, Dec 3, 2015 at 4:10 PM, Nathan McCorkle <nmz787@gmail.com> wrote:
On Thu, Dec 3, 2015 at 3:50 PM, Jonathan Cline <jcline@ieee.org> wrote:
> I would say writing the basic Android app itself fits into the "stupid easy"
> category while the analog circuit part does not.
I'd have to disagree on the first part. To back up a bit, Arduino is
an IDE and a library... you can write 'pure atmega' code, or even
assembly, in your source files.
The big difference I find with Android development vs Arduino
development is: download size, number of clicks/keystrokes to get
"working", ease of straightforward and compatible examples... i.e.
there's essentially only 1 version of Arduino library code API, but
the few times I've tried writing an Android app (with a year or two
between each attempt) everything was different. The API had a major
overhaul, IDE changes, etc...
I've never implemented any of the Android app ideas because of this. I
just can't remember how to do it, and when I have a cool idea, I can't
jump right in. With Arduino it's a single click to jump in (after
installation, which is minimal work, much less than getting Android
dev setup).
I guess you could call me lazy, but this is something the Apple crowd
have balked over for years, the 'fragmented' ecosystem of Android. Its
so much easier to open a text editor, type "import flask" and bam, I
have a web app (that could be accessed on Android or otherwise).
Also Arduino hardware is cheap... $2.50 is the going rate at the cheap
end of the spectrum (translates into longer shipping time) including a
USB controller. The ESP8266 chips are only a tad more expensive, and
have WiFi. That chip's successor, the future ESP32, will be dual-core
with WiFi (since the processor is used for handling the WiFi comms).
Honestly though, Android tablets and phones are commonly going for $50
or less... they aren't going to be the best, but a $30 android phone
is certainly going to be more tech-heavy than what you could otherwise
buy in parts.
But in this day and age... just use a cheap
microcontroller/microcomputer and add some wireless comms, then
require your customers to provide their own interface (read
smartphone, laptop, tablet). If some lab community thinks that's too
much of a hassle (puling your dirty phone out in the clean lab, or
contaminating your phone with lab juice)... then they can supply the
$30 Android device. In today's world supply chains seem to change
rapidly, especially with this highly integrated stuff. In that sense,
low-level designs are longer-lasting, just make sure they can be used
with whatever interface-of-the-month is (next month will probably
feature something face-mounted).
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