I remember reading that it was originally developed to control movie props. The above makes more sense. Maybe it has multiple meanings.
Not so. When John Barrowman and I were still at Parallax we had created the Prop-1 Controller (now an EFX-TEK product) using the BASIC Stamp 1. It was targeting stage, TV, and movie props as well as light industrial control and things like animated displays.
At the time the Propeller was code named PNut (P for Parallax; you can see this in the interpreter listing). Having come from a big industrial company I was encouraging the use of a very techie yet sensible name and suggested P8X32 (Parallax, 8x 32-bit processors); this later got an "A" appended to it. That doesn't quite roll off the tongue like "BASIC Stamp" did and Chip wanted a hobbyist-friendly name so that the device didn't seem so intimidating. Sadly, this may have backfired a bit because some pros looked askance at the beanie logo printed on the chip -- until they tried it (and some needed a lot of coaxing) they didn't take it seriously.
Thank you for the clarification. So it is possible I read about a micro that was for props and manufactured by Parallax then. I didn't think it was the prop since that would be a small target for such a unique micro.
Ahh, but you are missing the rest of the story, where did "Propeller" come from?
Chip has a Propeller hat in his office, which was given to him by another person. The hat was the nexus for the name, not the other way around.
Chip still uses the P-Nut compiler at home, that's what he hacks on for P2 development. The chip name came from the language I think. Propeller came from the hat he was given.
For a long time, we didn't know what to call the chip. So, everyone at Parallax submitted names and I'm pretty sure Ken Gracey came up with the winner: "Propeller". Never mind any logo - that was going to be the name.
Rich Allred and I were trying to make a logo when the idea of the hat popped up. It just snapped to grid in my head. It was playful and it perfectly embodied the spirit of the chip. Originally, the hat was at an angle, with the propeller having some movement, angling the hat upwards, as if it was taking off. Rich really made it look exciting. Before being placed in print, the hat was stabilized, but it still looked really good, I thought.
Over time, the marketing forces within Parallax were taking a lot of criticism over the goofiness and "unprofessional" look of the logo. I ignored all that and figured it was just a filter to keep the wrong kind of customers away. I mean, if a satellite is in orbit around the earth and it has a childish logo on it, does that mean it's not a good satellite, despite the fact that it got all the way up there and is functioning properly? Could it really have been made by children? Who would think like that?
I used to have a cool avatar on the Propeller Forum that was Fozzie Bear holding a banana like a telephone. He had the Propeller hat on. He was like a tech-support person. I really liked that avatar. Marketing didn't, and it became a source of ongoing rumbling. Now, I've got nothing but professional nothingness and I don't really want to see my chubby face on there. I'd like the Fozzi Bear back. Is there any way this can happen? Where's Moderator Monkey? His sister made the avatar and she probably still has it. Could I please get it back, Jen?
I used to have a cool avatar on the Propeller Forum that was Fozzie Bear holding a banana like a telephone. He had the Propeller hat on. He was like a tech-support person. I really liked that avatar. Marketing didn't, and it became a source of ongoing rumbling. Now, I've got nothing but professional nothingness and I don't really want to see my chubby face on there. I'd like the Fozzi Bear back. Is there any way this can happen? Where's Moderator Monkey? His sister made the avatar and she probably still has it. Could I please get it back, Jen?
I used to have a cool avatar on the Propeller Forum that was Fozzie Bear holding a banana like a telephone. He had the Propeller hat on. He was like a tech-support person. I really liked that avatar. Marketing didn't, and it became a source of ongoing rumbling. Now, I've got nothing but professional nothingness and I don't really want to see my chubby face on there. I'd like the Fozzi Bear back. Is there any way this can happen? Where's Moderator Monkey? His sister made the avatar and she probably still has it. Could I please get it back, Jen?
Sure, Chip! I'll see if I can find it.
Wokka wokka wokka!
I kinda get the propeller logo. Still can't figure out Jen's avatar though...
I may have complained about the hat on the chip at one point...
If I'm using the Prop for a professional reason, I really don't want anybody to see it (sorry Chip).
I'm competing against things like FPGA and Labview.
So relatively, the Prop is dirt cheap and a lot more fun. But, I don't want it to look like I'm using toys where real tools are needed...
Who's Lizzy Borden? This is going to make me feel old, isn't it...
The logo doesn't matter too much in the end, because everything winds up hidden in metal boxes at the end anyway...
Maybe the real problem is that Chip made Propeller too powerful and a lot of us are using it for maybe more
professional reasons that it was originally intended...
Thanks, Jen. How come nobody ever said anything about YOUR avatar?
Are you kidding? We forumistas talk about that axe -- sometimes it's a chainsaw! -- all the time!
-Phil
Oh, oh, Perry. You just had to mention Lizzy Borden, didn't you? I did that once in this context to my everlasting regret. I think Carrie Nation is off the table, too.
Who's Lizzy Borden? This is going to make me feel old, isn't it...
The logo doesn't matter too much in the end, because everything winds up hidden in metal boxes at the end anyway...
Maybe the real problem is that Chip made Propeller too powerful and a lot of us are using it for maybe more
professional reasons that it was originally intended...
While I do see that some don't like the prop logo, I don't think it really matters any more, at least since "Apple" and someone even took a bite out of their logo Remember that followed with Peach, Apricot, Macintosh, etc. Oh and BTW did you hear about the japanese manufacturer who was intent on releasing the LEMON PC. It's true - it was my friend who convinced them otherwise!!!
Have you seen some of the company names out there... Letterman's company is something like WorldWide Pants.
I think it's way more important to have a recognisable name that is easy to say, and a recognisable logo too. Anyway, replacing the logo would have been easy.
Personally, I think it is an excuse. Things that are out-of-the-ordinary take longer to be understood. This is the case in point for the propeller. How many times do we have to educate people on the forum that interrupts aren't on the prop. How many times to we have to say that the peripherals on the prop are soft - what do you want. And last, Parallax does not have the marketing $$ to educate the market (into what they are missing).
Where do you think the prop would be today if a company such as MicroChip, Atmel, NXP, TI, etc had released the prop. Do you think they will copy the concept when it really takes off... absolutely!
One thing I do think has held the prop back is Spin and PropTool. I think the problems of spin could have easily been overcome. Many have objected to the strict indentations rules (personally I love it) so this should have been made an option. Perhaps the syntax could have been improved (once again by options). But the biggest problem has been a lack of INCLUDE, DEFINE and IFDEF (now covered by homespun and bst), and macros. I think a BASIC syntax could have been placed on spin too. I would have liked to see LMM features added to the compiler. All these things will come, but way too late IMHO.
Unfortunately, C is demanded. Personally, I don't really see why. It makes programming micros cumbersome. Just look at some of the other micros around.
FWIW, one of the arguments I make for the prop is:
"You know how every microcontroller has a 300 page datasheet, and you have to read through it and it takes you a month to figure out all the peripherals, special registers, and the standing on your head part? Well, the Prop only has 1 peripheral, counters, the rest is all bit-banged in software. If you want an I2C interface, you can either inline it to conserve resources if it's a slow data rate, or you can have a COG server that handles high speed comms. And there's the OBEX, with premade objects for communicating with a lot of different hardware and peripherals."
Ahh, but you are missing the rest of the story, where did "Propeller" come from?
Chip has a Propeller hat in his office, which was given to him by another person. The hat was the nexus for the name, not the other way around.
Chip still uses the P-Nut compiler at home, that's what he hacks on for P2 development. The chip name came from the language I think. Propeller came from the hat he was given.
I think I still have the P-Nut compiler somewhere as well. When we started doing the Hydra, we received the kit even before Parallax announced the Propeller. Before we received the Hydra kits, we received the P-Nut compiler with some sample code from Andre and Chip.
Where do you think the prop would be today if a company such as MicroChip, Atmel, NXP, TI, etc had released the prop?
Judging by the way Zilog treated it's paradigm-busting Super-8 micro ... nowhere. Companies run by bean-counters haven't the patience to see innovative products slowly gain a foothold in the market.
Ray, that's why they have unlabeled chips for sale.
Yes; it's hard to believe, but there are engineers and their managers outside the Parallax world that are not as fun as those of us in it. It seems ridiculous, but the logo inhibited some.
The logo and the name are the smallest problems the propeller have.
The real big problem is the lack of an integrated debugger in Spin-Tool (or rather SimpleIDE). There are solutions with Viewport and PASD, but rather fiddly and not from parallax with support from parallax.
FWIW, one of the arguments I make for the prop is:
"You know how every microcontroller has a 300 page datasheet, and you have to read through it and it takes you a month to figure out all the peripherals, special registers, and the standing on your head part? Well, the Prop only has 1 peripheral, counters, the rest is all bit-banged in software. If you want an I2C interface, you can either inline it to conserve resources if it's a slow data rate, or you can have a COG server that handles high speed comms. And there's the OBEX, with premade objects for communicating with a lot of different hardware and peripherals."
What you put as an advantage is in reality one of the bigger disadvantages of the propeller. You don't need a month to figure out the two or three registers you have to set to get I2C or uart working. It's similar in most microcontroller. The only special and difficult one is the propeller. It's not even as code in ROM. You have to code it yourself and waste RAM.
The OBEX is my datasheet where I can look for month and try to understand what the programmer wanted to do and what he did in reality. For me the only real place to look for help is that: http://www.parallaxsemiconductor.com/appnotes. Good manuals with proven/tested code. There should be much more!
To me, Spin and PASM are an almost ideal combination for rapid application development. I mean, you can just sit down and start coding and still end up with a well-structured, useful program. The lack of block group indicators (e.g. braces) is an advantage, IMO, not a disadvantage, since it frees up vertical space on the screen for actual code, instead of mere punctuation. Granted, the Propeller Tool has issues. It's okay as far as it goes; it just doesn't go far enough, and significant further development of it stopped way too soon. There are even some still-unresolved bugs in the editor. But, even with its warts and incompleteness, it makes development of Spin/PASM code easy and provides a quick code-and-test cycle for a bottom-up small-piece-at-a-time coding style. Moreover, work is underway on a new Spin/PASM compiler that will -- hopefully -- grease the skids for more advanced features.
I'm actually happy that I was never bitten by the C bug. Had I discovered the Propeller with a strong C background, I might have decried the lack of C tools for it, wanting the Prop to look like a nail, so I could use my hammer on it and not have to learn something new. That landscape is changing, though, and even the hammer-wielders are getting a new nail to pound on. But they'll be missing a lot if they avoid learning to Spin some power tools.
xanadu
Posts: 3,347
Comments
Cheers
Richard
-Phil
A radial aircraft engine with eight cylinders.
-Phil
Not so. When John Barrowman and I were still at Parallax we had created the Prop-1 Controller (now an EFX-TEK product) using the BASIC Stamp 1. It was targeting stage, TV, and movie props as well as light industrial control and things like animated displays.
At the time the Propeller was code named PNut (P for Parallax; you can see this in the interpreter listing). Having come from a big industrial company I was encouraging the use of a very techie yet sensible name and suggested P8X32 (Parallax, 8x 32-bit processors); this later got an "A" appended to it. That doesn't quite roll off the tongue like "BASIC Stamp" did and Chip wanted a hobbyist-friendly name so that the device didn't seem so intimidating. Sadly, this may have backfired a bit because some pros looked askance at the beanie logo printed on the chip -- until they tried it (and some needed a lot of coaxing) they didn't take it seriously.
Phil- That graphic is really nice!
C.W.
Chip has a Propeller hat in his office, which was given to him by another person. The hat was the nexus for the name, not the other way around.
Chip still uses the P-Nut compiler at home, that's what he hacks on for P2 development. The chip name came from the language I think. Propeller came from the hat he was given.
Rich Allred and I were trying to make a logo when the idea of the hat popped up. It just snapped to grid in my head. It was playful and it perfectly embodied the spirit of the chip. Originally, the hat was at an angle, with the propeller having some movement, angling the hat upwards, as if it was taking off. Rich really made it look exciting. Before being placed in print, the hat was stabilized, but it still looked really good, I thought.
Over time, the marketing forces within Parallax were taking a lot of criticism over the goofiness and "unprofessional" look of the logo. I ignored all that and figured it was just a filter to keep the wrong kind of customers away. I mean, if a satellite is in orbit around the earth and it has a childish logo on it, does that mean it's not a good satellite, despite the fact that it got all the way up there and is functioning properly? Could it really have been made by children? Who would think like that?
I used to have a cool avatar on the Propeller Forum that was Fozzie Bear holding a banana like a telephone. He had the Propeller hat on. He was like a tech-support person. I really liked that avatar. Marketing didn't, and it became a source of ongoing rumbling. Now, I've got nothing but professional nothingness and I don't really want to see my chubby face on there. I'd like the Fozzi Bear back. Is there any way this can happen? Where's Moderator Monkey? His sister made the avatar and she probably still has it. Could I please get it back, Jen?
Lots of chips have tiny logos on the die. See:
Molecular Expressions
Duane J
It's on now! FREE FOZZIE!
http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?140669-FREE-Fozzie-Bear&p=1104501#post1104501
Sure, Chip! I'll see if I can find it.
Wokka wokka wokka!
How come nobody ever said anything about YOUR avatar?
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I may have complained about the hat on the chip at one point...
If I'm using the Prop for a professional reason, I really don't want anybody to see it (sorry Chip).
I'm competing against things like FPGA and Labview.
So relatively, the Prop is dirt cheap and a lot more fun. But, I don't want it to look like I'm using toys where real tools are needed...
Jen's avatar is a Lizzy Borden nod, a woman holding an axe behind her back!
The logo doesn't matter too much in the end, because everything winds up hidden in metal boxes at the end anyway...
Maybe the real problem is that Chip made Propeller too powerful and a lot of us are using it for maybe more
professional reasons that it was originally intended...
-Phil
Oh, oh, Perry. You just had to mention Lizzy Borden, didn't you? I did that once in this context to my everlasting regret. I think Carrie Nation is off the table, too.
Sorry, Lizzie Borden: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lizzie_Borden
While I do see that some don't like the prop logo, I don't think it really matters any more, at least since "Apple" and someone even took a bite out of their logo
Have you seen some of the company names out there... Letterman's company is something like WorldWide Pants.
I think it's way more important to have a recognisable name that is easy to say, and a recognisable logo too. Anyway, replacing the logo would have been easy.
Personally, I think it is an excuse. Things that are out-of-the-ordinary take longer to be understood. This is the case in point for the propeller. How many times do we have to educate people on the forum that interrupts aren't on the prop. How many times to we have to say that the peripherals on the prop are soft - what do you want. And last, Parallax does not have the marketing $$ to educate the market (into what they are missing).
Where do you think the prop would be today if a company such as MicroChip, Atmel, NXP, TI, etc had released the prop. Do you think they will copy the concept when it really takes off... absolutely!
One thing I do think has held the prop back is Spin and PropTool. I think the problems of spin could have easily been overcome. Many have objected to the strict indentations rules (personally I love it) so this should have been made an option. Perhaps the syntax could have been improved (once again by options). But the biggest problem has been a lack of INCLUDE, DEFINE and IFDEF (now covered by homespun and bst), and macros. I think a BASIC syntax could have been placed on spin too. I would have liked to see LMM features added to the compiler. All these things will come, but way too late IMHO.
Unfortunately, C is demanded. Personally, I don't really see why. It makes programming micros cumbersome. Just look at some of the other micros around.
"You know how every microcontroller has a 300 page datasheet, and you have to read through it and it takes you a month to figure out all the peripherals, special registers, and the standing on your head part? Well, the Prop only has 1 peripheral, counters, the rest is all bit-banged in software. If you want an I2C interface, you can either inline it to conserve resources if it's a slow data rate, or you can have a COG server that handles high speed comms. And there's the OBEX, with premade objects for communicating with a lot of different hardware and peripherals."
I think I still have the P-Nut compiler somewhere as well. When we started doing the Hydra, we received the kit even before Parallax announced the Propeller. Before we received the Hydra kits, we received the P-Nut compiler with some sample code from Andre and Chip.
-Phil
Yes; it's hard to believe, but there are engineers and their managers outside the Parallax world that are not as fun as those of us in it. It seems ridiculous, but the logo inhibited some.
FYI- I wouldn't ever consider the logo a determing factor, and happen to like it as is. Never judge a book by its cover!
The real big problem is the lack of an integrated debugger in Spin-Tool (or rather SimpleIDE). There are solutions with Viewport and PASD, but rather fiddly and not from parallax with support from parallax.
What you put as an advantage is in reality one of the bigger disadvantages of the propeller. You don't need a month to figure out the two or three registers you have to set to get I2C or uart working. It's similar in most microcontroller. The only special and difficult one is the propeller. It's not even as code in ROM. You have to code it yourself and waste RAM.
The OBEX is my datasheet where I can look for month and try to understand what the programmer wanted to do and what he did in reality. For me the only real place to look for help is that: http://www.parallaxsemiconductor.com/appnotes. Good manuals with proven/tested code. There should be much more!
Yes. That's my opinion, too.
Block group indicators helps a lot. Whithout them identation is a nightmare (Move code from here to there and all is damaged).
Yes, Yes, Yes. homespun and bst -> same as Vieport and PASD. Macros -> I am still waiting.
LMM, XMM... are all special features. They can come as the last. Here in propeller world they always come as the first.
I'm actually happy that I was never bitten by the C bug. Had I discovered the Propeller with a strong C background, I might have decried the lack of C tools for it, wanting the Prop to look like a nail, so I could use my hammer on it and not have to learn something new. That landscape is changing, though, and even the hammer-wielders are getting a new nail to pound on. But they'll be missing a lot if they avoid learning to Spin some power tools.
-Phil