Getting the Prop out to everyday JOE... thoughts?
Oldbitcollector (Jeff)
Posts: 8,091
Gramps and I have been talking recently at length about how the Propeller fits into the technology world,
and have drawn some interesting parallels from the history of the computer industry...
Back in the 80's, like many, I owned a Commodore 64. (Back then I owned a computer, to use a computer. Now I own a computer because it's how I communicate.) Various "computer enthusiasts" owned one of many computer designs in that era. Apple, Sinclair, Atari, Amiga, CBM, etc. Each of these machines had it own native language. Each of these machines had their own strengths and weaknesses.
The "microcontroller" industry appears to be at that same place right now... We have Propeller, Amtel, PICAXE, PIC, Ardunio, TI, etc. Many of these have their own native languages and have strengths and weaknesses.
Fast forward twenty years...
Now everything is pretty much PC or MAC. While there are a handful of languages which can run on either. (ie: linux varients) everything is pretty much one camp or the other. We no longer need "usergroup type meetings" or "support groups" because everything is designed for anyone who can point-and-click. And the everyday JOE has a reason to have at least one machine in the home, and now that laptops are so cheap, many families have more than one.
All of that to ask these questions...
* How will the "microcontroller" find it's way to everyday JOE? Robots, and tiny job modules?
* Where does the Propeller fit into this picture?
* Will we see some amazing application which creates the demand from everyday JOE like the PC?
* Will we see the many variants of microcontrollers wind up a footnote in history with one or two choices a decade from now?
* What is our place as early adopters of this technology to insure it's future?
(Sorry if your name was JOE. [noparse];)[/noparse]
OBC
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and have drawn some interesting parallels from the history of the computer industry...
Back in the 80's, like many, I owned a Commodore 64. (Back then I owned a computer, to use a computer. Now I own a computer because it's how I communicate.) Various "computer enthusiasts" owned one of many computer designs in that era. Apple, Sinclair, Atari, Amiga, CBM, etc. Each of these machines had it own native language. Each of these machines had their own strengths and weaknesses.
The "microcontroller" industry appears to be at that same place right now... We have Propeller, Amtel, PICAXE, PIC, Ardunio, TI, etc. Many of these have their own native languages and have strengths and weaknesses.
Fast forward twenty years...
Now everything is pretty much PC or MAC. While there are a handful of languages which can run on either. (ie: linux varients) everything is pretty much one camp or the other. We no longer need "usergroup type meetings" or "support groups" because everything is designed for anyone who can point-and-click. And the everyday JOE has a reason to have at least one machine in the home, and now that laptops are so cheap, many families have more than one.
All of that to ask these questions...
* How will the "microcontroller" find it's way to everyday JOE? Robots, and tiny job modules?
* Where does the Propeller fit into this picture?
* Will we see some amazing application which creates the demand from everyday JOE like the PC?
* Will we see the many variants of microcontrollers wind up a footnote in history with one or two choices a decade from now?
* What is our place as early adopters of this technology to insure it's future?
(Sorry if your name was JOE. [noparse];)[/noparse]
OBC
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Comments
It seems to me that Parallax is reaching the limit of what its current strategies are likely to achieve, and has probably got about as much market share as it is going to get from them. It's very highly regarded by enthusiasts and hobbyists (as these forums demonstrate) but can't seem to get any traction outside these areas. I know Parallax has ambitions to expand into the mainstream semiconductor market, but I have not heard of any definite plans yet - while I believe it may have been discussed at UPEW and other meetings, I've not seen any official announcements. So I feel entirely free to push my own opinion - for whatever that's worth
They "Arduino" type approach you mention is one possibility - but I think this is a bit of a red herring. The Arduino is an attempt to do precisely the opposite of what Parallax needs - i.e. it is designed to bring hobbyists to a chip that already has a mainstream presence (the AVR). Adopting an Arduino-type strategy might help Parallax grab a bit more of this particular market niche, but in fact it already does quite well there and really needs to do exactly the opposite.
The "killer app" type approach you imply (i.e. robots or other specific niche applications) is also a possibility - but unfortunately this is also highly unlikely. If anyone here already had the "killer app" idea, they would already be making them by the squillion and we would not need this thread.
My own perspective is a little different to most on these forums - I came to the Propeller from a purely software background. While I can appreciate all the whiz-bangery that goes on in the Propeller which makes it a doddle to interface, and also makes it a great (but expensive) platform for "one off" applications, what drew me was something else entirely - the simplicity it brings to multi-core programming.
What the Propeller has that no other chip has is a a concurrency mechanism that allows anyone to easily program up to 8 concurrent tasks without having to resort to the complexity of coroutines or threads or fork/join or 'exec' or sockets or specialized languages or all the other horrible multitasking mechanisms that are required on other chips - and at a price that is an order of magnitude below any other multi-core offering.
However, the biggest problem with the Propeller is that Parallax only offers one way to exploit this amazing feature easily - i.e. SPIN. Without sidetracking this thread onto the advantages and disadvantages of SPIN (it has many of both), I believe SPIN is simply not attractive to most people outside these forums. Even within these forums we seem to spend much of our time developing alternatives to SPIN, but most of them either (a) do not exploit the concurrency feature of the Propeller or (b) are much more obscure even than SPIN!. And while either of these is true, they are not really viable alternatives.
My answer - as you'll no doubt be very surprised to hear - is therefore purely software oriented. Also, while it may have its genesis here in these forums, ultimately it will have to come from - and be strongly backed by - Parallax themselves. If Parallax don't want to see the Prop relegated to being a footnote on Wikipedia (such as is the case with the Transputer) then it needs to take a leap from being basically a hardware engineer's dream of a company to offering complete hardware and software solutions that are attractive to the mainstream - which from my perspective basically means finding better ways to exploit the Propeller's unique abilities from within more mainstream tools and languages.
My advice would be for Parallax to take the best of whats currently on offer in these forums - e.g. bst and Homespun both beat the Propeller Tool hollow as SPIN/PASM assemblers, PropBasic beats SPIN hands down as an introductory language, ViewPort offers the best debugger (Parallax don't even offer one of their own as far as I know), and Catalina/BlackCat/CodeBlocks offers the best C development environment - and seriously push them as an integrated set of mainstream tools that also happen to be specifically designed to exploit the Prop's unique capabilities.
If they were to do this, then getting the Prop out to the everyday Joe becomes much easier - because there will be many more people willing and able to do it!
Ross.
EDIT: accidentally deleted my last paragraph!
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Post Edited (RossH) : 7/14/2010 1:14:08 AM GMT
"* How will the "microcontroller" find it's way to everyday JOE? Robots, and tiny job modules?"
Some time back in the early 80's I used to go to the Personal Computer World shows in London. One year there was a micromouse competition going on there. These little mouse robots were built in various degrees of sophistication by individuals and school groups etc. One that impressed me most was built by a guy who could have been 12 years old. He had a plastic lunch box as a chassis with some wheels and motors attached. A servo or two. The "brain" of this contraption was a ZX81 computer strapped onto the top with elastic bands. I just loved the "Heath Robinson" style of this machine ad admired the kids ingenuity.
So, "everyday JOE" had what yo are talking about 30 years ago!
What is the modern day equivalent to that boys ZX81? Something self contained, in a box, rugged, battery powered, with a simple programming language, lots of I/O, video/LCD. Preferably self hosting, no PC required. I cant' think of one.
It's a damn shame that all these modern day hand held games machines don't have the programmability of a ZX81 and don't have any I/O. Heck, how cool would it be if one could get I/O from a mobile phone and program the thing like an early micro-computer?. The world would be full of useful compute power for tinkering with.
Kids today have a hard time to connect their computing power to real world robots and gadgets.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micromouse
"* Where does the Propeller fit into this picture?"
No idea but Chips concept of self hosting Spin programming on the Prop II brings exactly the capability described.
"* Will we see some amazing application which creates the demand from everyday JOE like the PC? "
As I said, JOE has had this micro-controller possibility 30 years ago. What happened? I don't see any major change in that situation. Although I am impressed and glad that Parallax is still ploughing that furrow. It's heartening even to see the Ardunio become so popular. It heartens me that the JOE tinkers of this world are not extinct.
"* Will we see the many variants of microcontrollers wind up a footnote in history with one or two choices a decade from now?"
Hmmm... dunno.
"* What is our place as early adopters of this technology to insure it's future?"
This part I don't get at all. How are we "early adopters" when as we have both said the technology has been in our hands for thirty years. Even single chip mico-controllers are a pretty ancient idea.
Summary: Young brains do love to program things and if they can get their programs to do something in the real world some of them are even happier. And still today they can become very enthusiastic about a new computer technology. Case in point is the huge enthusiasm for the Android mobile phone platform. It's not about the PC any more.
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For me, the past is not over yet.
While computers are still primarily used as tools in businesses, electronics have come a long way in the consumer field. Probably mostly in the form of entertainment (music, movies, games, web, communication, etc.). Electronics have become so small and powerful (just think of all the smart phones, and multi-function MP3 players), that measly microcontrollers will probably stay where they are now - in finished products, or as toys for "nerds". If it's not shiny, or if it can't give you an STD, the general public will have no interest in it - and that's now more than ever I'm afraid..
Essentially, there are people who would buy micros because they know what they are and have the capacity to use them. That's us, and our friends, and perhaps some other niche casual users, looking to have a good time with tech. I would include academic / science / research in this crowd as professionals who do not have the volume, but do purchase and share experiences like everybody else.
Then there are commercial buyers. We all know the drill there, and basically Parallax and others are "working on it". Doing stuff like Coley has done recently makes a lot of sense, and will grow the chip that way.
The rest of the people buy stuff.
What if they are able to buy a radio, game machine, TV remote, toy robot, measurement device, SD card copier, PC accessory, etc... that contained a Propeller? What if it just worked well? What if it had a port on it, or was easy to repurpose?
That's where my thoughts are. One small example would be the PropScope. It's a nice product, and there is a thread on using it for a signal generator. That's damn cool.
As a kid growing up, it was fun to take the stuff apart and build new stuff. That's still true today, isn't it? Back then, products were often simpler, meaning the pieces didn't do all that much on their own. Now that's changed significantly. That has implications for these products that have short life cycles, then end up trash. Wonder whether or not it's possible to build things that include the very basics needed to put them to use?
Maybe a picture frame that could end up being a book reader, or a radio that could end up as a second baby monitor station, or that does the weather band, or stays on one station, or switches on a schedule? Maybe that calculator could control the lamp, or be used as a fun instrument, instead?
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What you say Ross? No, that would be GCC, Zog and vi [noparse]:)[/noparse]
Anyway in this threads context I think C is irrelevant. Taking that young guy with his micromouse I mentioned as an example "JOE" I don't think he would have even bothered if he had to work in C. He has enough complexity in his project already.
I hear what you say about PropBasic but does it really have such a huge advantage in simplicity over Spin for the JOEs of this world?
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For me, the past is not over yet.
Unless you're shooting low, getting the Propeller out on the streets is all but impossible.
Just my 2 bits, I'm not as experienced as most of you here, anyway.
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Ok, I'll admit that vi is the best editor in the world, and I certainly wouldn't want to annoy Zog
I don't want to push my own barrow (well, not too far) but I seriously do think that BASIC, C and other more mainstream software tools are very relevant to this thread. I'm not saying that success is impossible without them, but Parallax would then appear to be relying very heavily on the hobbyists and enthusiasts in places like these forums to generate wider penetration of the Prop.
With the greatest respects to the great minds and fantastic talents of the people in these forums, I can't help thinking that this is a risky business strategy. I'm not saying Parallax is a 'startup' company, but it is worth noting that 9 out of 10 startups fail even though they have financial backing, better technology and very talented people.
Ross.
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Catalina - a FREE C compiler for the Propeller - see Catalina
I had forgotten 12 Blocks - I should have added that to my list!
I agree with your sentiments. People like us (who like cool technology for its own sake) will use the Propeller no matter how bad the tools are. Others will not use the Propeller no matter how good the tools are. But you're still thinking primarily of enthusiasts.
I think the best way to make sure the Prop succeeds (so that enthusiasts like us can continue to have fun using it) is not to try and make the Propeller more attractive to enthusiasts - it is to make the Propeller more attractive to boring old mainstreaqm companies for use in washing machines, appliances, cars, or various items of industrial plant and equipment. The handheld gadget market is not available to the Propeller at this stage for purely economic reasons (basically, the same job can be done by much cheaper chips) - but it too will come in time if the Propeller lasts long enough and becomes cheap enough.
Ross.
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Catalina - a FREE C compiler for the Propeller - see Catalina
I'm with RossH
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When OBC opened with mention of Commodore 64s and "computer enthusiasts" I assumed he was not talking about "Joe Sixpack" but possibly his nerdy younger brother who is more likely to be called "Brian".
So Microcontrolled you are right about Joe, no point to try. Let's see what we can do for Brian.
Ross. Yes I believe you are right, the industrial world is stuck on C. Good or bad. But I reiterate that C is irrelevant for the Brian's of this world. They need to get their attention grabbed by something that can be seen to be interesting and be up and running after two minutes of scanning the instructions. That was the beauty of:
10 PRINT "HELLO"
20 GOTO 10
back in the days of Commodores and Sinclairs that does not exist any more.
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For me, the past is not over yet.
* How will the "microcontroller" find it's way to everyday JOE? Robots, and tiny job modules?
* Where does the Propeller fit into this picture?
The microcontroller is everywhere today from greeting cards, clocks to the cars we drive.
The Prop though at least in its current version has yet to attract the big boys. But then again the market is high competitive and there are more processors than insects out there. You really got to stand out to get noticed in a market like this. Just look at Xmos - no industry design wins either.
Personally the way the Prop was rolled out was a disaster and probably set the tone for the way the big dogs view it. The company rolled it out as a device for hobbyists not industry professionals. No C compiler, no debugger. Just a odd interpretive language and assembly. That was fine 20 years ago but not today, developers today want the whole enchilada not a burger with no condiments. It was like Parallax was saying 'we're a hardware house and don't do software - go develop it yourself'.
And you can't even get Parallax to attend the embedded systems conference to show their wares. It's like Parallax doesn't care if the market notices them or not.
* Will we see the many variants of microcontrollers wind up a footnote in history with one or two choices a decade from now?
4 bitters are still around and so it the 8051 along with 75mhz Z80s. If a micro is good it will be around and develop a solid brainshare. Heck I remember years ago when the pros were saying the 4 bitter and 8 bitters were dead meat and would be replaced by ARM's. But you still have 4 bitters powering all sorts of devices from greeting cards to clocks.
Others died and were resurrected. The 68k line became the Risc like Coldfire, MIPS croaked and Microchip turned it into the PIC32. Others like the PowerPC chip which was intended for desktop use became a embedded favorite for the automotive sector and as a softcore for massive FPGA's.
If the past is any indication the embedded world will remain a veritable zoo.
With that said, the Prop user community is to be applauded for the work they've done developing some nice toolsets for the Prop.
I hope Chip taps them for providing software development tools before the Prop II rolls out to make it even more attractive for various industries to adopt. At the very least Parallax ought be extending serious kudos for their efforts.
I'll bet it doesn't look like a circuit board, or is programmed in C.
OBC
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Yes, it all depends on exactly what you're trying to achieve. Maybe OBC can clarify whether he had JOE or BRIAN in mind? (apologies to all JOE's and BRIAN's out there).
I am probably concentrating too much on OBC's last two questons:
* Will we see the many variants of microcontrollers wind up a footnote in history with one or two choices a decade from now?
=> Yes - new products will always pop up, but only one or two will ever last longer than a few years. Unfortunately, it's not always the most innovative ones that survive.
* What is our place as early adopters of this technology to insure it's future?
=> Play to the Prop's strengths - find applications that benefit from a fast and (relatively) cheap multicore chip. The Propscope that Potatohead mentioned earlier is a good example - an application where the Prop can do with one chip what other solutions might need four, six or eight chips to accomplish. That removes the price barrier. Mainstream languages remove the "but we can't re-use our existing software" and also the "but we can't retrain our software developers" barrier.
Ross.
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Catalina - a FREE C compiler for the Propeller - see Catalina
Are you sure? Other rumours say they are doing very well.
"No C compiler" Well, that's nothing to do with a bad roll out or otherwise. Fact is C is not at all suited to the Propeller architecture.
Now Parallax could have made a C friendly chip instead but then it would have been just another AVR/PIC like chip and doomed to immediate failure as I don't believe Parallax could make a dent in that market space against the big boys playing there.
Thank God they made something unique and a million times more interesting instead.
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For me, the past is not over yet.
Exactly, it does not. That's what I was trying to say with the Micromouse story. For sure no C.
I still think it looks like a ZX81 [noparse]:)[/noparse]
A small box, an LCD screen. A keyboard and or USB keyboard socket. SD card, ethernet, WIFI, A bunch of easily programmed I/O. A dead easy language and environment to work in from switch on.
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For me, the past is not over yet.
For the Propeller to succeed commercially -- and make its way, by subterfuge, into JOE's hands -- the design wins have to come from OEMs, not from hobbyists, not from schools, and not even from systems integrators.
-Phil
Ok - this will be my last post on this topic, since I'm getting a bit offtrack (sorry, OBC)!
If you turn this around the other way ...
"The Propeller architecture is not at all suited to C."
... then I maintain that this becomes one of the reasons why OBC needed to ask his question in the first place. Or, putting it another way - given the unique capabilities of the Prop, why hasn't it taken off?
But actually, whenever this one comes up I dispute it anyway. Ok, I can't claim the Prop is ideal for C - it very obviously is not - but it is certainly capable of it, and in fact C is way better than both SPIN and PASM for many applications (i.e. ~4 times faster than SPIN, and much less complex than PASM). The Prop II will be even better at it.
However, this is a bit beside the point - if we really want the Prop to take off, we should stop focusing so much on what the Prop doesn't do well, and concentrate instead on the things it does!
I agree with Phil post - we need to get the Propeller into the hands of OEMs. But you also have to give them the tools they'll need to use it.
Ross.
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Catalina - a FREE C compiler for the Propeller - see Catalina
I've been reading the posts on powerplay.org. In short, powerplay is a cheap "$10" computer for the international poor in developing countries. It sold here briefly for $30.00 US. It is based on the 6502 CPU thanks to some expired NES patents, Famicom technology. As I understand it, the design of the unit is cheap and not well made. (Tradeoffs everywhere)
I've read several of what I would classify as "Brian" posts from young people who want to start hacking on the thing and are stuck in poor character editing and learning 6502 assembly as their first language. Not an easy starting point for sure.
Let me clarify the two classes (at least from this perspective) of "Brian" and "JOE".
BRIAN - The nerdy younger brother who could be grabbed from something that starts him on the "artsy" side of
what the Propeller offers, but would become easily discouraged by an immediate drop in a complex language.
(Needs a wading pool before venturing out into the deep, and needs immediate gratification.)
everyday JOE - The public at large who thinks that what we do with these little chips is either some type of
Black Magic, or is silently worried that we might be doing something dangerous or illegal. Concerns not
generally voiced, but likens all of this Spin and cog stuff to some kind of Voodoo.
everyday JOE, used to worry that computer users back in the 80's were all about the stuff featured in
things like the movie Wargames, now they own computers themselves so they can communicate with
their AOL email addresses and see the grandkids on Facebook.
OBC
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Post Edited (Oldbitcollector) : 7/14/2010 3:14:45 AM GMT
As always true. But I also remember the enormous "buzz" surrounding these new 8 bit microprocessors when they first emerged. Even before you could even buy a board with them on. What a computer on a chip?. The young Brians I was surrounded by just had to get hold of them. Some because it was a natural extension to their electronics activities some because they just wanted something to program. As we see here on this forum people love this as an end in itself.
The arduino shows this passion still exists.
I agree, a bigger Prop impact into the industrial world benefits all of us and is probably necessary. After all we are already here[noparse]:)[/noparse]
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For me, the past is not over yet.
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One of the bigger hurdles I think Parallax faces in commercial market penetration is the perceived brand image. Far too many people whom I've spoken with sees Parallax as a hobbyist/electronic toys manufacturer, despite the fact that the Prop could beat up many other microcontrollers, and steal their lunch money. Ken has mentioned that the Propeller line will receive it's own website, and I think this is an excellent idea. Adverts in embedded electronics publications wouldn't hurt either. Go where the engineers, and decision makers go, and assure them that the prop-line of processors are the real deal. And if at all possible, have several variants of the processors, and create a family tree to meet various industry needs. Also, the OBEX can use a bit of housekeeping. All submitted objects should require at least a general description. Many have none at all! That does not look too professional.
"Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you." Matthew 7:6
Wow... King James too...
However, we can't hide our light under a bushel. Everyday JOE has a reason to use a computer twenty years later.
How about a Propeller based product?
OBC
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OK: "The Propeller architecture is not at all suited to C."
The way I see it is:
1) C compiled to native PASM is a no go. The instruction set does not suit it and there is no space in the COGs.
Well there is no 2). If you can't compile to the hardware then that's it. Games over for C in the industrial sector.
As work arounds one can compile to byte codes or such. That's a no go as well as it is too slow. People accept that for Java I don't know why not for C.
The Prop is special in that one can compile to "almost native" using LMM. But that still it lacks the expected speed of C and has a large code size.
Now don't get me wrong, I think Catalina (and ICC) is brilliant. I would happily ignore 1) above and make the trade off of accepting LMM to get to work in C on the Prop. It's just that I'm not sure that industrial users are quite so willing.
On Prop II Catalina will be great. I think Parallax should provide it out of the box along with Spin.
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For me, the past is not over yet.
I know this is a bit off-topic, but I couldn't resist making a comment about what you said. About 3 months ago, I was picking up some components from a Radio Shack. To my annoyance, the guy at the counter snidely asked if I was "building a bomb". I was reluctant to answer considering that just about every piece of junk that the store carried contained the caps and regulators I was purchasing. I deal with this at airports all the time as well. Apparently, people spend too much time watching action movies, and not enough time using their brains, that whenever they see exposed wires, it can't be anything else except for part of a bomb. *sigh*
Again, sorry for being off topic.
Why should it be much bigger than the 45 dollar Zipit www.zipitwireless.com/default.aspx?skinid=1 or the credit card sized 140 dollar IGEP www.igep-platform.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=46&Itemid=55
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For me, the past is not over yet.
But just try to find a willing jury. Who has the time?
-Phil
Not off-topic at all.. This is exactly the mentality that I was referring to. Perhaps these are the people who will have to reached the long route by some major manufacturing company buying 50 thousand Propellers and inserting them into some piece of consumer electronics. Nothing new, but I'm really hoping for Everyday JOE to grasp microcontrollers for microcontroller sake. Too much to hope for? Perhaps with the correct "Killer Application" -maybe not.
As for the device that Heater is talking about, it needs an AV-out so that less of the action movies are watched and more creative processes start happening with the family television.
OBC
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For me I believe the future is in iPad devices which will replace most laptops and many desktops. You will have wireless keyboard, mouse and large-screens connected while at a major place of work. Unfortunately I don't think the Prop II·will get a lookin here and Prop 1/1.5 will not cut it.
I disagree Ross. It just hasn't been thought of yet! Just like SuperCalc brought Apple to the Accountants. This little $2,000 desktop micro ran what accountants were paying $20K+ to run on their mini/mainframe computers, which incidentally would make the mini/mainframe die (as in slooow down)when they ran it. The Mac (and laser printer) brought Desktop publishing, database and spreadsheets to business.
You are correct regarding the Arduino type products. Even if Parallax could steal all these hobbyist designs it will not make a dent on AVR sales because of the other applications. It may however, give Parallax the volumes it needs to kickstart something better. Many designs I see the Arduino products in could do it easier or better with a prop.
I agree the focus needs to be on the multiprocessor architecture and the simplicity this creates without the need for multitasking or interrupts. The work being done on OS and other languages is proceeding at increased pace. We have Basic, C, Spin and PASM to name a few. Basic and C are more relevant to the masses because they are understood by many. PASM is required by objects of choice and will be done, and have been done.
Like you said, let's not start a war on languages as there is the place for Basic, C, Spin, and I believe an revised Interpreter that can run a cutdown C (like there was on the PalmPilot).
I don't think Parallax have to take onboard bst, homespun, ViewPort, etc. But I do think they need to promote it better. Maybe we need a sort of PalmGear or Applestore concept where objects, etc can be sold cheaply, just to return a few $ for developers. I just don't know here.
Heater said about mobile phones, etc being used to program things. Unfortunately, kids are more interested in playing games. They are so sophisticated today that they cannot possibly program them. Back 30 years ago, kids/adults could program these micros to do all sorts of cool things. Today they are already done. There is not the real interest in programming today and it has become so complex you cannot really write a program without a course. Take VB .net - where do you start if you don't know where to start.
I agree that something along these lines is imperritive.
There are two distinct concepts appearing here...
heater: Yes, your Brian analogy is spot-on regarding the hobby market. Something simple. I used a simple C program on the Palm Pilot in the late 90's. There is a market here for simple Basic, C, maybe Forth (know nothing here), etc.
I would have to say a small box, expandable, LCD (but it could be a big VGA, so some screen), keyboard (later it may/will be touch screen, but not yet, or it may be by WiFi or Bluetooth), SD card (it will be microSD), WiFi and/or Bluetooth, USB port (for simple products which do not require full USB compliance), I/O expansion. Note I did not say ethernet - WiFi will replace it here. The language will be from a group of options - Basic, C (cut-down I believe), Extended Spin (2 or 3 syntaxes - one more C alike with "{", and maybe one more basic alike), all with LMM optionally mixed in. I also see interpreted Basic and C (i.e. bytecode) as well as compiled to LMM. PASM will be the domain of fast objects maybe with LMM mixed in.
The multi-core will continue to be used as a main thread/cog with·the other cogs·providing the intelligent peripheral objects and parallel code objects. The BIG advantage here is NO INTERRUPTS to deal with - this must be REALLY pushed. The second advantage is CONFIGURABLE INTELLIGENT PERIPHERALS coded by software objects. For example, our uart is not a uart in the old sense, but a really intelligent peripheral, and it can be made so much more in a software object. This leads to the next advantage - only one chip, not a family of chips - due to the configurable nature of the multiprocessor cores and counters.
just my 2c
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Links to other interesting threads:
· Home of the MultiBladeProps: TriBlade,·RamBlade,·SixBlade, website
· Single Board Computer:·3 Propeller ICs·and a·TriBladeProp board (ZiCog Z80 Emulator)
· Prop Tools under Development or Completed (Index)
· Emulators: CPUs Z80 etc; Micros Altair etc;· Terminals·VT100 etc; (Index) ZiCog (Z80) , MoCog (6809)·
· Prop OS: SphinxOS·, PropDos , PropCmd··· Search the Propeller forums·(uses advanced Google search)
My cruising website is: ·www.bluemagic.biz·· MultiBlade Props: www.cluso.bluemagic.biz
Propeller II could do it, but 1) it ain't here yet and 2) the window of opportunity may be boarded-up by the time we see it.
While I agree an iTouch is very interesting especially to my teenagers, today's killer app is tomorrow's cannon fodder unless it's truly better than a phone in some compelling new way.
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