External memory

jmalaysia

Does anyone have any experience using external memory with a BS2e?· Without going into too much detail,· what I would like to do is this:· Provide a USB port·so a user could plug in a flash drive (preloaded with data/program) and transfer that data to the BS2 eeprom.· Ideally,· the flash drive would be inserted,· write data to a specified program slot,· sequentially,· then be removed.

Mike Green

It would be much easier to do with a BS2p/pe/px because of the STORE statement. With the BS2e, you have to have a program in each slot to read from something like the memory stick datalogger to the EEPROM using the WRITE statement. Have a look at those statements in the PBasic manual and at the documentation and examples for the datalogger.

Unsoundcode

A device like you describe is already on the market sold by EME systems http://www.emesys.com/index.html. The site also contains very detailed explanations of how to use one Stamp to program another http://www.emesys.com/BS2clone.htm. The author of the articles, Tracy Allen,·is a·regular member of the Parallax forums.

Jeff T.

Unsoundcode

I have to add that Mike's suggestion of a Parallax Datalogger is something I have been intending to do for a while now. The Datalogger is the ideal device for holding a tokenized file. I have a system that reads and writes tokenized programs from/to a BS2 using homebrew software. I use·a BS2 OEM's removable EEPROM to read from and create the token file then I have a program to download the file to another BS2. The original idea was to be able to remotely program a BS2 over a network/internet, which works fine, but my next step was to use the Stamp/Datalogger combination for something that would eliminate the need for a PC. I know it's doable with a BS2 just not tried it with multi slot processors.

Jeff T.

jmalaysia

I figured the BS2p would be easier to work with,· but unfortunately I wrote the code for a BS2e.· Actually I started with a BS2 and overloaded it so I stepped up to the BS2e.· I didn't realize that WRITE was restricted to the current selected slot on the BS2e until I started messing with it,· or I would have went with the BS2p in the first place.· I don't mind switching to a BS2p,· but I think I would have to recalibrate all my timing circuits due to the faster processor speed.· I'm definitely in the "learn as you go" mode.

What is the best manual for programming info?· All I have is the "what is a microcontroller?" book and it just doesn't answer my questions.

I am an electronics tech by trade for over 20 years.· I have programming experience in Basic, Fortran,· Pascal, and Atlas.· It has been years since·I did any programming but it's slowly coming back to me.

Thanks for your help