Tabloid electronics!!

The lack of documentation of the code for most of these projects is the gripe I have with SC micro projects.

Circuit Cellar have provided code and full descriptions quite openly for as long as I can remember and it hasn't hurt them (that I am aware of)

I know very little of PIC code, and have been told by many to not use PIC if you can help it. (My past experience has been with Zilog Z-80 and 180 assembly)

I guess SC think it'd chew up pages with unattractive gunk and scare off the vintage radio people or something.

Meh, as far as I know PICs seem perfectly fine and make their way into plenty of commercial applications. Micro nerds seem to yap on about the superiority of Atmel chips, but the same people tend to bleat endlessly about Linux as well, which bores me to tears. The only serious assembler I ever did was for 8051s, and I feel no great urge to go there again.. Given micros are so damn cheap, I code with MikroC and only plonk in bits of assembler when there's no other way to get the required timing.

PICs did not make their way to being the #1 (in sales) 8-bit microcontroller in the world without being useful for commercial applications.

PIC's have their pros and cons just like every other micro.

and the AVR-GCC C compiler as well. While it's great to have a fully fledged C compiler available for free, you have to be a computer science geek to use the thing. The AVR "freaks" tend to be a bit more passionate their micros than the PIC devotees.

C is the way to go, with assembly only used as needed. Those who dick around with full-blown assembler projects on micros have more free time that they know what to do with. Badly written C "spaghetti" code is bad enough to understand, but assembler may as well be Klingon or Stargate Ancient. I can understand why SC don't publish it. Circuit Cellar go to more trouble with flow charts and block diagrams and things. SC generally only do that if the author happens to go to the trouble to do it themselves.

Dave.

Geez Google, If this message doesn't make it, I'm giving up posting - again...

Well, I have to say I agree with yourself & Poxy - Dave.

If you've invested some time learning to use a specific (and popular) micro brand and programming interface why waste more time on a different platform - especially if it's more complicated and doesn't do anything much that differently.

I blame Don McKenzie for getting me started on AVRs by his creation of the DT006 board. Just kidding Don, I think your board design - and your involvement is great.

So, I've pretty much stuck with AVRs and AVR-GCC. I also confess to knowing way too much about Linux, and to top it off I've been trying to use Eagle for board design - now, where's that site that sells 'I'm a Geek' t-shirts?

And yes, I'm all 'emo' about AVRs and GCC Poxy, although not so much in a positive way. 'They hate me' and 'life is so unfair when you try to program them'. Again, just kidding, because the net has some fine people like

BTW, Dave. Just a question if I may. Have you tried to use Eagle at all? It's free - for small boards - and although the interface is somewhat Zen-like (maybe more Star-Wars like where 'the force' is required), it does some things OK. Just thought I'd ask - although you're probably busy with something up your sleeve (any hints as to what that might be?).

To explain a little. I work as a computer programmer. You fine electronic people work to get things happening with a minimum of fuss, I've yet to learn enough about electronics to bridge the gap and I'm hoping that a mag like SC may be able to help with this in the future.

Cheers, Phil.

I rekon the best ever electronic mag was the low budget magazine TALKING ELECTRONICS. It looked like it was printed on butcher paper but I loved it. Learnt much more about electronics through that mag than any other publication. wish Jaycar or DSE would give Colin Mitchel some more support. I remember DSE stocked Colins bug books but never stocked the kits.

The PIC thing for me is partly just getting the job done, and an element of lazyness - there's a pile of projects and info on the net to leech ideas off and MikroC is free for small code sizes, which up 'till now has covered what I need to do, although I think I may need to buy it soon as my code is starting to bloat. The bottom line is that without applying excessive amounts of brain cells or time, I can get something working correctly and put it to use.

Part of my work is system admin, and I run Linux servers where I can (although I actually earn more from the sites that have Windows servers due to the volume of care and feeding the demand) , and I have one on my home network to do all sorts of neato things, but I still run Windows as my desktop OS, partially because there's a pile of vital apps that aren't on Linux, and partly because I think Windows is a pretty damn good workstation OS, and Linux just isn't.

As you mention, there's huge scope for SC to start covering things such as micro interfacing, but also to do articles on the range of free tools that are available such as Eagle and high-level coders such as MikroC and the like.

Yes, Talking Electronics was excellent, and how tempting was the blank PCB taped to the front cover of the early issues. But because it wasn't a monthly mag like the others, it didn't have the same profile or get the recognition.

No way DSE or Jaycar could have matched the prices TE was selling the kits for direct. Colin sure did know how to keep the prices low. I remember being able to pay using postage stamps!

Dave.

Indeed. No need to switch for most people. Most ranges and flavours of micros will do more than you'll ever need.

Try the open source gEDA suite, then you can graduate to the propeller hat!

Haven't tried myself, as I've got Altium Designer. I've heard it's getting very popular though.

You have mail.

Dave.

At $3.50 each (even as late as c2000 from DSE) TE was a bargain. Not only for the electronics, but those quirky articles about society, business and people out to get you!

I had thought Colin had retired long ago, but 3 months ago I passed a Talking Electronics Shop in South Melbourne (along the 250/1 bus route).

Is he still involved and has anyone been in there?

Peter