Propellurino an arduino shield
Chris Micro
Posts: 160
Hello together,
short time ago I started to play a little bit with the propeller processor. This processor is a really nice thing.
So I made my first propeller project called "propellurino" which can be plugged on the top of a arduino board.
Now the arduino can controll the propeller processor on its top by a sereal connection. As a result we get a 9 core systen with 176MIPs peak ( 160Mips propeller + 16 Mips arduino )
short time ago I started to play a little bit with the propeller processor. This processor is a really nice thing.
So I made my first propeller project called "propellurino" which can be plugged on the top of a arduino board.
Now the arduino can controll the propeller processor on its top by a sereal connection. As a result we get a 9 core systen with 176MIPs peak ( 160Mips propeller + 16 Mips arduino )
Comments
I've got no experience with arduino...
I've got some of those.
To be programmed, the propeller uses the serial converter chip on the arduino board.
Why do you not buy an arduino board? They are very cheap ( around $30 ) and there is a lot of software because it is an open source project.
To use a propeller with an Atmegaa32 it is best to buy the propeller demo board an connect it to some Atmega32.
Hey, your arduino "clone" looks nice.
The intention of my little project was, that I wanted to enable the people to use the arduino software basis and develpement system.
So, the propellurino is more a coprocessor for the arduino and to give it some more interfaces like vga, keyboard and midi.
chris
As a product developer I'm good at taking good ideas from wherever they come. While I'm not a big fan of the Arduino, they were very smart in producing a "processor platform" that can serve as the base for lots of experiments -- the "shields." I'm borrowing this idea (and say so in my May column) with my Propeller Platform. The idea is that I have a basic Propeller module to which I can add extra hardware (Propeller "shields") and save a few bucks by using the ExpressPCB mini-board service.
What's that, is it a cheap way of making PCBs?
ExpressPCB may not be the *best* (for a lot of reasons) but they are very popular with experimenters.
Post Edited (JonnyMac) : 4/19/2009 7:36:49 PM GMT
What is this May column that you reference, JonnyMac (and where can I read it)? Are you planning on releasing your design to the public (Chris or JonnyMac)? Is someone else out there making Arduino-like boards with documentation so anyone can build a shield for it? The closest thing I saw anywhere was SpinStudio, but the lack of documentation so one could make an add-on was a big turn-off (i.e.: no information on dimensions...). I haven't used the Arduino boards yet or programmed an Atmega or used Arduino's Wiring/Processing language, but I sometimes I wonder if I should since there seems to be a lot of support around it! (But since the Prop is so easy to write code and does things so easily that would require tricky programming in other platforms, I'd much rather stick with the Prop!).
Chris, is there an advantage to using the Arduino as the main controller versus just using the Prop? (Better/more software support or knowledge already? Existing shields? Built-in features on the Atmega like hardware UART or onchip ADC?) It just occurred to me that the Propellurino in your design could act as a standalone board, yes?
The major things that would have to be supplied externally (to a Prop) would be buffers for the 5V tolerance with optional pullups and maybe an external ADC. The Prop can do sigma-delta ADC, but each channel requires a cog counter and whatever other functions are managed by those cogs would need to include something to service the cog counters for the ADC function. None of this is a big deal, but does add to the cost and the PCB area needed.
A library could be written for ImageCraft's C that would allow Arduino code to be compiled for the Prop. Once Catalina is finished, it might also be able to serve as a base for running Arduino code on a Prop.
I write for Nuts & Volts magazine (www.nutsvolts.com). My column runs in the odd months (Jan, Mar, May, etc.) and is called "Stamp Applications" -- it's a legacy title started by the original columnist (Scott Edwards) way back in the early days of the BASIC Stamp 1. The last two years I've focused on the SX and am now going to use the Propeller for a while. My goals is -- hopefully -- to show mortals like myself how to use the Propeller and write their own [noparse][[/noparse]albeit simple] PASM objects; this is forcing me to port my favorite SX VPs to PASM. I posted my version of a servo driver in ObEx that will be used in an upcoming column. At the moment I'm also working on some Sony IR stuff and a bi-phase-tri-color LED object. All of my objects are straightforward and written in PASM.
As far as the boards, he files are available from N&V (also hosted in the Parallax resources section once the magazine is on the street) and, as I stated in an article a few months ago, any person is free to use them for commercial gain -- they just can't claim exclusivity, or take credit for my hard work!
cool where did you get the board?
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New ICON coming, gotta wait for the INK to heal, now we have colour!
The project it self is not so complicated. Mainly it is the Propeller-Prototyp Schematic exept I replaced on PS2 Connector by a Midi-In Connector and other minor modifications. It cost me aproximatelly 1 day to make some experiments how to connect the propeller to the arduino and find a suiting reset circuit.
I started on friday with drawing the schematic and routing the board, which were about 16 hours an I finished at 3am in the morning ( this took me that long because it is very complicated to squeeze the parts on the small arduino form factor without using SMDs ). On saturday I improved the bord Layout a little bit. Then I made the PCB with my basic etching equipment which is alwas a little mess and takes me several attempts until I have a usable PCB. Finally in the nigt at 2am I got the Akkeson demo "turbulence" running on my new born propellurino
I etched the PCB myself. Than I printed the layout diagram on paper and glued it on the top of the PCP. This is very usefull to know where the place the parts. I saw this technic first in a video of Linus Akkeson.
There are a lot of arduino users which have a lot of experience with their plattform. Peculiar these are electronic artists which want to solve their "artitistic" problems and not to dig to deep into the technical problems. So for them its quite usefull to have a shield which simply works and is easy to access from the arduino. Many of them like synthesizers and because there are a lot of synthesizer objects for the propeller its probably a could idea to have a propellurino.
It could be used stand alone with the EEPROM. But for programming, the serial converter on the arduino is used.
They call it wiring, but they use simply the C-Compiler AVR-GCC and made some functions to acces the peripherials to hide the complexities like "PORTB&=~(1<<TESTLED);". But you could also use simply the standard C-Syntax.
Well, yes, if the propellurino becomes open source and I can make some PCBs it is a very cheap thing to build.
Hello Mike, in my opinion there are to ways of bringing the two worlds of ardunio and propeller together. Either the way of buildung a arduino like propeller or to build a propeller shield for the arduino.
I chose the second way, because there is this big arduino user community with their huge software resources. For them its probably mentally easier to accept a new peripherial arduino shield than to switch to another processor plattform and being forced to learn another programming language. It is eaier to provide some software interfaces to the propeller and to remain with the easy to handle arduino development enviroment.
Another thing is that in my opinion the propeller lacks a little bit a main supervising processor like the cell-processor from IBM. In such a processor you could run the main C-Programmcode and in the others you could do the number crunching. Using the Atmega with its big code resources is a bit of this principle ( even the processing power ratios between Atmega an propeller differ a little bit from those in the cell-processor )
Post Edited (Chris Micro) : 4/20/2009 5:55:19 AM GMT
John Abshier
It was the search for more ram that led me to the Prop
The AVRs are mostly (sub ) 2V-5V parts but will not run at the higher speeds on lower volts
They are not cheap but Samtec makes the kind of through-board connectors you're looking for; this is what Parallax used for its AppMod modules. Samtec has version for the base as well as through with pins that go through. I never imagined stacking more than one PCB onto the Propeller Platform so I didn't in fact suggest Samtec connectors in my article.
I'm fully down with getting a couple boards and I'm sure there's gotta be several others. It seems that idea has far more merit than what it apperars it is being attributed. I had been riding the fence, trying to decide which platform I was going to commit to between uC's bc it was presumed undesireable to throw mental resources at the commitment of memorizing a new language. Recently the Pro won out. It looks like there are far too many simple integration capabilities w/high-level hardware compared to what I've seen with other controllers. On the other hand, the Arrrr-duino platform lookseasy to use, its cheap (very), and thes a $h!t load of info floating around about it. Having the ability to integrate and combine the two is an awesome concept.
I don't know what your board production schedule/qty/cost has been in the last ten day, but it shouldn't be more than 150 for 10 of those w/shipping/tax/mask and screen. I doubt that it would be too hard to squeeze 15 or 30bucks from a few ppl (not like this is a cheap endeavour) then in a wk or two we all go tboards and can figure out how to work em.
BTW-You should tm propellerino. If not at least you have attribution here first. Unless you heard it somewhere else.
Big Mac,
I, unfortunately, missed your columns since you started w/the Prop. Fry's seems to have stopped carrying it in VTA county fo rthe last few months - that's probably a Nuts and Volts conspiracy to make me get a subscription. So w/o seeing the arts. me thinks that Spin would be more mag reader friendly. I may be wrong and your goal is to get more assy documentation out there, but it would be cool to see articles about projects that the ed. matls. didn't go over and written in a language that more readers know.
!ASM
Did you write the 16x16tri color clock on the LED matrix article? After just reading the closing paragraphs I reckon you did. Do you have a picture of how you rigged the LED I/O? It just seems like it would be a mess. (Prob should post it in the SX forum - not ISO compliant)
BADHABIT
I hope that I have soon some software which can be run on the board. I think I will order some PCBs from a manufacturer.
I hope the your name "propellerino" will not be confused with my "Propellurino"
Okay, I know I need to lose a few pounds, but "Big Mac" is going a little far....
The column referenced here (May 2009) is just hitting the streets and if you don't get it Parallax will have a digital reprint in about a month or so. My goal is to show intermediate users (like me) how to get the most of the Propeller by combining Spin programs with simple Assembly objects. In my opinion, a lot of the canned Assembly objects are over the head of many experimenters (including me) and may be causing them to hesitate with the Propeller; I hope that I can prove regular folks like me can write in PASM, too. Of course, as I get into big projects the "foreground" code will be Spin-based and will be explained as well as I can.
In the FWIW category, I received this from from a Nuts & Volts reader today:
<snip> Your article sold me on the Propeller. In my repeater controller I had 8 levels of interrupts. Programming that required great care and attention. The lights went on when I read how the Propeller has 8 independent processors running in parallel. It looks simple to launch 7 programs and not worry about preserving registers and writing complex interrupt code.
Your article was very clear and easy to comprehend. You nicely explained the relationship between Spin and ASM. I am thinking about getting a development board to start playing. I may even get one of those ethernet boards so I can access the serial port of the Propeller over the Internet to start playing with things like reading a sensor in the house from the office at work.
Nice work with the article.
I hope that others find the Propeller material in my column as useful -- Ken and I have been discussing this a lot lately, and we have a bunch of fun ideas.