e: [aprssig] D7's,D700's and TinyTrak

[Alex Carver]

What I found insulting was being told I was behind the
times when I didn't say (on purpose) exactly how I was
implementing my design and that someone already tried
it.  So what?  Trying it again is a waste of time, is
that what I am to infer from that comment?

Keep in mind the words you used: "it had been done
years ago".  Lots of things can change in "years"
especially in the microelectronics realm.  New designs
for ASICs come out all the time.  I'm sure the
MAX232's and other related hardware have gotten some
updates between now and then.  Even Parallax has had
some upgrades with things like bigger Basic Stamps and
their Javelin Stamp running a subset of Java.

The BS2 could have serial ports if I choose to use a
bit-banging method of serial.  It does not, however,
have the ability to do serial I/O on more than one pin
simultaneously which is what I desire hence the reason
not to use it.  Parallax documents such in their Basic
Stamp manuals.  Only one serial I/O instruction can
occur at a time.  So the code would have to be
extremely streamlined in order to catch any data
appearing at any "port".  I'm aiming for essentially
several serial drivers with small buffers on one or
two buses to shift data around from the various
devices attached.  You're right, that will require
something a bit more powerful than a BS2 though I
doubt I'd even think of doing it with a PIC either. 
I'm trying to decide whether I want to use an Altera
or an Intel.



Peer review is one thing.  Insults and just saying
"well, it didn't work last time, so it probably won't
work this time" is not peer review, that's just
laziness.  Had it been worded something like, "You
know, so and so did this a few years ago but it didn't
work well for him.  I am, however, curious about what
you have thought that you feel will work better." is
far more inviting than what was actually written.

What I won't bother with is explaining the idea to
you.  You've already established that you believe any
attempt at a microcontroller addition to the D700 is
faulted and not worth the effort then or now.  So why
expend the effort to explain it to you?  

Of course, having purposefully inserted an insulting
comment (and saying so) into your reply is a pretty
good measure of your character.

> Message: 2
> Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2007 18:47:32 -0400
> From: "Brian B. Riley" <brianbr at mac.com>
> Subject: Re: [aprssig] D7's,D700's and TinyTrak
> To: TAPR APRS Mailing List <aprssig at lists.tapr.org>
> Message-ID:
> <DF321B53-B7A9-4C28-9CFD-C5D3A965472A at mac.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII;
> delsp=yes; format=flowed
> 
> Whooee, you must have thin skin if you found that
> insulting.
> 
> Now a PICAXE 08M could have 3-4 serial ports and
> that is the little 8  
> pin critter. A BS2 has 16 pins and theoretically
> each of them could  
> do serial. If you consider a 'port' to be to be
> bidirectional, at two  
> pins per 'port' that gets you 8 ports on a BS2. If
> you are rolling in  
> bucks you could do a BS2P40 and that has 32 i/o pins
> and that would  
> get you 16 ports.
> 
> That said, for anything beyond Wes' original
> implementation you are  
> right that a Stamp won't do the job. However, it
> doesn't have  
> anything to do with the number of ports. A Basic
> Stamp , even the on- 
> steroids BS2PX would have a hernia handling serial
> i/o on several io  
> ports simultaneously.
> 
> I went back and reread your explanation and appears
> to me only to add  
> more complexity without ever addressing the original
> flaw which lies  
> in how  the D700 does things ... and before you run
> off with your  
> jockey shorts in a knot (yes that is mildly
> insulting) what I am  
> doing is criticizing what I saw as flaws in your
> proposal and  
> pointing out that it had been done years ago and
> found lacking. If  
> you and your idea cannot stand up to peer review
> then why should  
> anyone take it serious? If indeed you have thought
> of a better way  
> then restate your thesis and show us how it
> resolves/bypasses the  
> underlying D700 problem.



 
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