Project Idea Help

granty1988

Hi there everyone, i was about to enplore on a new porject and had a few ideas, i was wandering if its plausable, if so how is it done and if not how else would it be done.

My idea is to use a parallax BS2 and Board (not boe) and a Parallax Servo Controller Board, my idea is to record serveral different actions on to the controller board and have the different actions activated by inputs connected to the basic stamp. Again i was wandering if this was possible and how i would do it (e.g. what lines of code do i need to use).

just to let people know i can only programme in pBasic

Thanks for any help

Michael

SRLM

Well, the PSC (Parallax Servo Controller) USB version has two modes of operation: USB and serial. When doing USB, there is a GUI that you can record movements and animations. However, this does not translate to PBASIC. That's just FYI (has tripped up some in the past). Anyway, the PSC does not store any data at all related to the animation, so your animation sequence will be on the BS2. Probably the easiest way to do this would be to have "frames": byte sized or nib sized blocks of code that reside in the EEPROM, and that you read as you get there. An external EERPOM would certainly be best for this sort of application, due to the limited onboard EEPROM space. The frames could consist of each channel that you want, and would be organized sequentially. You could then "output" the frames at a set pace.

Mike Green

What you're describing is what the BS2 is used for all the time. There's lots of existing sample code, tutorials, and magazine articles. Almost all Parallax products have links to sample code, documentation, and other references on the webpage for the product. Start with that, particularly for the Parallax Servo Controller. If you're going to be using Parallax sensors, start with those links. There's a tab on the main Parallax webpage for "Resources". If you click on that, you'll get a list with "Downloads" and "Nuts and Volts Columns". Off "Downloads" you'll see another list with "Stamps in Class Downloads". There you'll find all the Parallax tutorials. "What's a Microcontroller?" goes into basics. "Basic Analog and Digital" is also very useful for the sorts of things you'll need to do. The StampWorks Manual has lots of good ideas. The Nuts and Volts Columns are also good references.