Subject:
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Re: RCX & RIS, a fading glory?
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.robotics
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Date:
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Tue, 4 Feb 2003 11:06:58 GMT
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Original-From:
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PeterBalch <PETERBALCH@COMPUSERVEstopspammers.COM>
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Viewed:
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474 times
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Kyle
> What I thought was harder, was that the PC programming software wouldn't
> easily be able to tell How many motors you have or how many sensors.
Plug-And-Play works well under Windows (at least, it does under XP).
The chip on the sensor or motor can say what it is - an ASCII string that
says 'motor' or 'servo' - and who it is - a unique id like 2908347525.
> Lets say I add one in my robotic hand that
> already had 4. Did I wire it up on the end of the bus? in the middle?
The cpu "brick" uses the id number to address to peripheral - not the
peripheral's position on the bus.
> Without some type of marking on the outside
> of the motor though (maybe LEDs that the software could light up?) it'd • be
> hard to make sure you and the PC environment are talking about the same
> motor/sensor without having to enter long numbers.
You come home from the shop with your brand new motor. You plug it into
your cpu "brick" and plug the cpu into your PC. You select the PC menu
command New Hardware. The PC talks to the cpu, the cpu talks to the bus and
asks everyone whose attached to identify themselves. The PC sees the new
motor and says 'You've got a new "motor". What do you want to call it'. You
take a felt-tip and write on the motor "XYZ" then tell the PC 'It's called
"XYZ"'. From now on, the PC always refers to that motor as XYZ. No-one need
ever see the long id number 2908347525.
It's all straightforward stuff and the sort of thing that comms programmers
do every day.
> Debugging embedded software isn't easy, even in the current RCX. While
> I think the added flexibility from this type of design would be great,
> I also think it is a potential source of frustration for the kids who
> don't have a strong programming background. This I think it's a huge
> challenge for the Programming environment developers to try to ease
> that frustration.
Yes. That is the huge challenge. Lego did a wonderful job with the
Minstorms programming language. It introduces you to real-time embedded
programming in a tremendously gentle way. But then you find it's so
limiting. And runs so slowly.
I think a graphical language is the ideal for beginners and there is no
reason why such a language shouldn't have all the power of a textual
language.
Does anyone have any references to research done on graphical programming
languages for children?
Peter
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | RE: RCX & RIS, a fading glory?
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| From: PeterBalch [mailto:PeterBalch@c...serve.com] (...) motor. You plug it into (...) You select the PC menu (...) the cpu talks to the bus and (...) themselves. The PC sees the new (...) you want to call it'. You (...) tell the PC 'It's called (...) (21 years ago, 4-Feb-03, to lugnet.robotics)
| | | Re: RCX & RIS, a fading glory?
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| (...) You mean 'plug and pray' don't you?? ;) (...) This is one way. Yes. I never claimed that this was an impossible problem to solve. And I agree that for you and I who have experience in the computer programming field (I know I work in that field (...) (21 years ago, 4-Feb-03, to lugnet.robotics)
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