Teensyduino run on STM32F104 or Stellaris ARM controllers?

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onehorse

onehorse

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I just spent the past two days trying to get my new ST STM32F401 Nucleo and TI TM4C123G develpment boards working for me. I had a devil of a time rewriting one of my Arduino sketches to get it through the mbed compiler and it took me half the day just trying to output to a display or the serial monitor a HEX register value. And I can't get the I2C to work. I haven't found the mbed.org site very user friendly and I am waiting for the 150 Mb compiler code suite provided by TI to download after erroring out on the first install. All in all a very frustrating two days when I compare the relative ease I was able to run Arduino sketches on the Teensy and the ready help I've received here on this forum.

Well the point of all this other than a little venting is to ask: Is there some way to run with a Teensyduino environment on these other ARM processors without having to relearn hi-power C programming, use these ginormous compiler programs, or create all new libraries? In particular, I would like to preserve the same commonality I now enjoy by being able to run Arduino sketches on both the Pro Mini AVR processor and the Teensy 3.1 ARM processor. What would be required to use these other ARM processors like a Teensy?
 
There's no viable hardware-sales business model for third parties like PJRC to invest development time into ST and TI's semiconductors, when they sell loss-leader dev boards.
 
I appreciate your point. ST and TI are literally giving away these boards. I thought it would be an easy way to get further into the ARM world, but I have found the barrier much higher than I thought it could be. Don't worry, I am the proud owner of four Teensy 3.1s and an audio board. I won't abandon your platform, which has performed as advertised and with ease, nor this forum, where I have been welcome. Thank you.
 
Paul, I'm sure you're right, but I wonder what would happen if Freescale, ST and TI, et.al. realized that they'd be better off making a deal with you to consult on their loss-leader dev boards so that they could achieve the amazing ease of use onehorse and the rest of us know and love? The idea wouldn't be to get you to port your code everywhere--it would be to license the closed source parts of the Teensy 3.x to them and educate them enough that they could and would do the porting themselves. Maybe PJRC would allow them to use some trademark to indicate Teensy compatibility.
 
IMO, the loss-leader dev boards are not intended for the same audience as Arduino/Teensyduino are, by a long shot. Freescale has their tower dev boards for that. I've done professional embedded systems work for a long time, using sophisticated development hardware/software that makes sense in that setting where labor costs are high and better tools are essential. Not so for hobbyists and most undergrads.
 
My naive thought was that it might be easy to port Teensyduino to other ARM processors. It is because my time is extremely valuable that I don't want to waste it learning the details of assembly language just to get a *%&! register byte printed to Serial! The Arduino/Teensyduino allows nearly full use of the power of these processors in a user friendly environment, which is easy to learn quickly so productivity is maximized. Is it really too much to ask (I guess it is) that ST, TI, and Freescale match the Teensy in ease of use as well as power?
 
onehorse said:
My naive thought was that it might be easy to port Teensyduino to other ARM processors. It is because my time is extremely valuable that I don't want to waste it learning the details of assembly language just to get a *%&! register byte printed to Serial! The Arduino/Teensyduino allows nearly full use of the power of these processors in a user friendly environment, which is easy to learn quickly so productivity is maximized. Is it really too much to ask (I guess it is) that ST, TI, and Freescale match the Teensy in ease of use as well as power?
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Please re-read post #5, and look at it from the vantage point of TI, NXP, Freescale, et al who are looking at BIG design wins for their revenue stream.
 
pictographer said:
Paul, I'm sure you're right, but I wonder what would happen if Freescale, ST and TI, et.al. realized that they'd be better off making a deal with you to consult on their loss-leader dev boards
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I have often wondered this too. If anyone knows the right people at ST & TI (or others), please send them my contact info. I'm no longer interested in talking with Atmel.

I'm already in contact with Freescale. :)

But honestly, we're all still at a very early stage of development in the "maker" market.

onehorse said:
Is it really too much to ask (I guess it is) that ST, TI, and Freescale match the Teensy in ease of use as well as power?
Click to expand...

Well, Intel and Texas Instruments certainly are trying with Galileo and Energia. Judging from the number of people and amount of gear in their pavilion, and of course their top tier sponsor fee, I'm pretty sure Intel spent more in just 1 weekend at Maker Faire than PJRC makes in an entire year.

I believe we're all still learning, myself included, how to make these complex systems more usable.
 
Thanks for the discussion all. It's easier to struggle up the learning curve with good company!
 
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