> > *Frankly all this /sys/class/ file read/write and device-tree overlay > stuff is a nightmare and nobody seems to care if changes break anything > (it especially breaks the documentation such as it is). To expect/demand > that a non-programmer jump into it to be able to do anything is absurd.* >
I do not know . . . I guess I will always view "solutions" that include labview, or node-red( this type of thing ) as an excuse to not have to learn how to write code. Which I view as an incredibly lame excuse . . . because. This gives people who do not understand a system the ability to build that system. Further, it keeps them from understanding the system it's running on, unless they push themselves. Which I doubt most will do. What will your friend do when he runs into a problem that is not easily solved with, or is not solvable with this current solution ? Anyway, with the above aside, I get why you are interested in node-red now. I've a friend here who is a very good EE too, but does not like to code. So perhaps this is something he would do too. If I did not write code for his hardware projects that need it. On Thu, Feb 25, 2016 at 12:40 PM, Wally Bkg <[email protected]> wrote: > Sorry, but I've been away for awhile, but to answer your question, the > main reason I'm thinking node-red and its bonescript nodes instead of "just > programming in whatever" is basically two reasons: > > 1) My buddy has zero programming skills or experience, although he is > expert in electronics having built several non-autonomous robots (RC > controlled), and lives "off-grid" with a solar power system he's installed > and maintains. He's also 80+ miles away so my "hands-on" help is very > intermittent at best. > > 2) There are multiple buildings and distributed solar power systems, all > covered by WiFi. While all his monitoring and control is pretty > straightforward, the network code for multiple controller interaction and > status reporting would totally blow him away. But node-red, and mqtt > nicely offers a solution to this with "visual programming" (ever heard of > LabView? I'm not a fan but it works well for scientists and engineers who > aren't programmers). It seems to me he *is* the person the authors of such > systems had in mind. Its just too bad that things aren't "smoother" out > of the box. > > While I don't see node-red and bonescript as particularly useful to me, if > it "just worked" after installing an image (or better if it worked with the > images shipped in the eMMC) it would be easy to recommend as a starting > point or alternative to Arduino (Arduino is a great starting point if one > is motivated to learn programming but it falls down if you need networking). > > Frankly all this /sys/class/ file read/write and device-tree overlay stuff > is a nightmare and nobody seems to care if changes break anything > (it especially breaks the documentation such as it is). To expect/demand > that a non-programmer jump into it to be able to do anything is absurd. > > I'm planning to down load the new 2016-02-21 image (or what follows by the > time I actually get a chance to do it) and re-evaluate the situation, > hopefully things are getting better. > > --wally. > > > On Tuesday, February 2, 2016 at 5:31:50 PM UTC-6, William Hermans wrote: >> >> Wally, what was the original purpose of this post ? E.G. what was it your >> buddy wanted to accomplish ? If it's just twiddle a couple of GPIO's and >> read an ADC or two. That can be done fairly easily in Nodejs, without even >> any plugins. So not need for Node-RED, or C/C++ if not wanted. >> >>> >>> -- > For more options, visit http://beagleboard.org/discuss > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "BeagleBoard" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- For more options, visit http://beagleboard.org/discuss --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "BeagleBoard" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
