The Creator SW is pretty awesome. I find it easy to use. Today, my friend and I referenced the data sheets for the UDBs rather than the examples. This was way more successful. We had noticed a coding issue, that in the project examples things were being called and it seemed like infinity as to the possibilities to write because it seemed that there wasn't a library to reference. But, in usual engineering style, the data sheets proved us wrong. Suddenly, what seemed massive and ever growing darkness, suddenly had a solution.
Lesson:
- The UDB's data sheets are worth the read and reference.
Part of the day was spent driving to one of the local electronics store. It is run by retired electrical engineers that had their start in the Navy. they sale used surplus electronics and new kits. They've an Arduino line. I hate calling as they are always short. When I phoned today, about a kit, the guy said of course they had them in stock. When I asked how many, he huffed in annoyance and said 15. Then he hung up. A forty minute drive later (because that is local for me) we arrived to a store with an empty shelf. They apologized about their mistake. I had collected other supplies and gently set them on the counter and walked out. We drove another 30 minutes to a different store, purchased two servos off the same shelf, came home, and started coding (without the kits we'd originally set out for). One servo acted weird. We changed some code, it quit working. We tried the second servo, it didn't work either. After going through code again and feeling good about our limited programming skills, we retested the servos. The second one acted normal, the other was still weird. I then looked at the packaging. I'd never seen a continuous rotating Parallax Servo before and was double befuddled as I'd pulled two Servos from a shelf labeled Standard Servo. Someone had put a blue jellybean in the read jellybean bin.
Lesson:
- No country for old men…I mean…errr…people are human, we are perfectly imperfect and mistakes happen. No need to dwell on a problem when there is more fun finding an alternative solution.
- When pulling multiple quantity from the same shelf, check that the inventory matches the bill of materials. Even if it is only two items.
I've purchased the Cypress Temp Kit for the PSoC 3 or 5. Review of what is actually in the kit has yielded parts to hack and modify for PSoC 4 interfacing. Same with the CapSense Touch expansion kit. I do plan to hand craft my own CapSense touch interface for the final prototype using acrylic and copper tape.
I'd also purchased a fat lot of LEDs for the ID, but realized I could create the prototype sufficiently with one LED and ultimately save I/O pins.
The same conclusion came about for motor control today. Rather than outputs to turn a motor on and inputs for decoding an encoder (something funny in that), I found a stepper motor would be a better solution and not have to track encoder data. Still more to do on this.
Still more to do on all of this.
Lesson:
- Smile! Getting to be creative and find alternate solutions and concepts is uber fun! Especially when, at the end of the day, you and your friend get to celebrate with a beer for making LEDs blink and Servos spin with a PSoC 4.
