Goodbye

Frank B

Senior Member
I think it's time to say goodbye here.
Maybe forever. Maybe only for a few months.

Edit: rmvd blab blah here

Take care, I wish you all the best.
Take a vacation.
 
Last edited:
Frank

From a personal perspective I really don't want to see you go. While maybe a lot of stuff goes over my head (mainly because I don't know what I am doing) I always learn stuff from your posts and assistance. There are a few PRs that I put in (no where near what you do/did of course) some still open - while they take a while eventually a lot most of them do get pulled in - more of timing issue - with everything that went on and going on with Covid related issues definitely has had an impact. So stay and be patient and know that you are appreciated.

Mike

PS> and no I will not ban you. Sorry.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Frank,

I second what Mike said!

I will be sorry to see you go. Hopefully not for too long. You have contributed a lot of great things here.

I can understand your frustrations. At times I go off to do other things as well.

Again if you do go away, I hope it is only for a short period of time.

I also wish you well!

Kurt
 
Ok, banning myself does not work.
Tim, please be so kind.

Thanks.

Glad to do you a favor Frank - but not that - even if I could. Pretty sure Sr+ is a class protected from Sr+.

Have a good vacation. Hope things work out for a good break and return.

As noted since I couldn't find words for this post ... your code and Forum reply contributions have been great to watch excellence in action.
 
Frank,

i would be sorry if you would leave here, but i totally understand your frustration. Thats what the internet bacame the last years, a place where your passion, work and knowledge gets ripped by the ones that are to lazy to fix soemthing theirselves, think theirselves or even say thank you to others that fix their problems.

I hope you will only have a nice time off and return sometime soon when you remember all the nice people still left and forgor about the others.

Stay brave!
 
Frank, hope you'll consider returning after a good rest.

Indeed a huge backlog of issues (many with viable fixes) has piled up. It's my fault they're not merged quickly.

The sad reality is the pandemic drained away nearly all my dev hours for over a year while PJRC ran short-staffed, and a *lot* has piled up during that time! We've only just recently been able to rehire. And only just recently has software dev restarted, with the release of 1.54 (which did publish many of the pending bug fixes) and now code security and soon integrating filesystem & MTP stuff.

The other unfortunately situation is we pushed really hard to release Teensy 4.0 in late 2019 and Teensy 4.1 in early 2020. Some important software features were dropped, so the hardware could be released, with the intention that dev time would then focus on the software side after the hardware was shipping. At least that was the plan before the pandemic hit. Only just recently am I managing to get back to features like code security, which were meant to be part of the original Teensy 4.0 release back in 2019.

I know it's frustrating when fixes sit unused. But I need you to understand I've been burned many times by contributions which I didn't carefully test. Your work, and Kurt's, are among the best. I sometimes do merge with little or no testing, depending on the circumstances, mainly whether we're getting close to a stable release versus just beginning a cycle of beta testing. The main reason I haven't merged about a dozen of your pull requests over the last couple weeks is because we're in the run-up to a stable 1.55 release, and it will be under time pressure if Arduino releases IDE 1.8.16 next week (they recently committed a changelog saying it will release on Sept 6). In a time like we're in right now, I am overly conservative.

I wish I could say things are fully returned to normal, but the truth is we're in the middle of a global semiconductor shortage. That is going to drain away some of my dev time. For example, I believe the most recent batch in production is using up the last of the tiny dual schottky diodes. I found a possible replacement which is a quad diode array in a 6 pin package. Our suppliers are saying the normal diode should ship at the end of September. If we don't get them, I'm going to have to redesign the Teensy 4.0 and 4.1 boards to use the 6 pin part. More of this sort of work lies ahead in the coming months. We're hearing predictions that 2022 will be as bad or even worse than 2021 for buying electronic components.

The good news is PJRC is back to full strength, since late July. We're all fully vaccinated. Robin & I bought large floor-model air purifiers, window mounted exhaust fans so we can have separate outside air flow in each person's space, and overheat IR space heaters. The only hazard on the horizon is Oregon's forest fire season, which thankfully hasn't been a problem here so far this year, and the rains usually come strong by October.

I can't promise I will always review every contribution quickly. There's never enough hours for everything, even in the best of times. But I do believe things are improving and the rest of this year and 2022 are going to be a great time of developing new stuff while also catching up to a large backlog of neglected issues.

I really do hope you'll come back and be part of that.
 
As a newcomer who only joined the forum three months ago, but has benefitted from others' help and (I hope) also made modest contributions, I'd like to add my perspective to this thread. (For info, I've been working for a design consultancy doing cross-discipline projects for >30 years, mainly in the medical devices industry, and my part has mainly been from the [usually embedded] software perspective, though of course that means having some understanding of electronic hardware, testing, risk management, UI/UX design, project management etc. We don't manufacture, but we do of course have to design for manufacture. None of this is meant to imply I'm therefore right in everything (or indeed anything) I say, just to give you an idea of where I'm coming from :))

I joined the forum and the Teensy users' community because of an interest in the audio processing capabilities. The forum is a fantastically helpful place to be, and quite astonishingly patient at times with some queries! The fact that Paul is on here pretty regularly, and giving clear and detailed answers, is superb. And of course the Teensy range is mature and appears stable and well thought-through (I only have direct experience of Teensy 4.1, but that's extremely positive).

However, it appears to me that the community and PJRC are at some risk of becoming the victims of their own success, combined with, as Paul notes, external problems caused by the pandemic and chip shortages. There simply isn't enough bandwidth for PJRC, and in particular Paul as an individual, to do everything that's "needed". The question then becomes, what is needed, and who does it? Here's a quote which kind of worried me:
I've been burned many times by contributions which I didn't carefully test
I 100% understand the desire not to release contributions which haven't been carefully tested. But it's a huge bottleneck if everything is going through Paul alone, and that's just one instance. Clearly there are some things, like encrypted firmware and new hardware or library development, that can absolutely not be delegated. Others, maybe they can, at least to a degree: the testing of the encryption clearly is.

It seems to me that at least the preliminary testing of PRs could be delegated, at the first level to those Paul trusts to do a good job, and through them to the wider community. A quick triage through the existing ones to make a short list of those potentially worth merging, deferred until later, and already done / clearly hopeless would presumably be possible and fairly quick. A definition of "careful testing" would be helpful: maybe "a Teensyduino sketch which shows the problem in the unfixed code, the absence of the problem in the fixed code, and graceful behaviour under misuse", or similar. (I'm used to risk analysis, documentation, then unit, integration and coverage testing, but that's a sledgehammer to crack a nut, I think!) If at least basic test code could be, and had to be, contributed with a PR, that would help. A visible effort in this direction would motivate people to contribute good quality PRs which could be more rapidly tested and merged, which benefits everyone.

Cheers

Jonathan
 
@Frank, noted some frustration in recent posts, pondering.. Teensy would not be what it is without your valued input, thank you for your hard work.
 
@Frank B - The Teensy-WavePlayer works great. Don't know how to say this but I have been using it a lot lately for my own personal use with all of he storage devices we have availabe. You have contributed so much to this forum and Teensy:) I see movement on your libaraies still. I have always followed your lead along with all the others. Even if with my simple skills I still learn from your posts. Those that want to show off or argue without fact cannot change the facts PERIOD! Finding and resolving issues takes everybody testing, keeping in sync with testing and not sensationalizing there results. It's not competition just valid RESULTS! I am sorry but that is what I see right now. I am sorry if this is out of line but I thought having a bit of beer and music would remind me of your influence here.

Please reconsider when you are ready:) @All Block me if you NEED!
 
Last edited:
My dearest FrankB,

I know we’re total strangers, but I’ve had the pleasure of learning from you either on my posts or others. I understand your situation and I have similar feelings. Over the last year or so I’ve lost many of my passions and I’m struggling to keep my interests in anything.

Do you think your feelings are driven by COVID lockdowns and the general state of the world? It definitely has affected me and all of the people I know. If you truly want to move on (retirement or pursuit of other interests), I get it, otherwise maybe take some time to catch your breath and let’s get back to inventing.

The next time I’m in Germany, dinner and beer is on me. The next time you are in northern Alabama, dinner and beer is on me.
 
Thank you Frank

I think it's time to say goodbye here.
Maybe forever. Maybe only for a few months.

Edit: rmvd blab blah here

Take care, I wish you all the best.
Take a vacation.


Frank, you don't know me, but I wanted to inform you that I have learned so much from reading your posts over the years. I probably should have spoke up sooner but it just didn't seem like the right thing to do until now. Thank you. Yeah, take a hiatus, but please come back.
 
My dearest FrankB,

I know we’re total strangers, but I’ve had the pleasure of learning from you either on my posts or others. I understand your situation and I have similar feelings. Over the last year or so I’ve lost many of my passions and I’m struggling to keep my interests in anything.


Oh so now you too are languishing. Well, I've learned a lot from your gauge code. Thank you.

The next time you are in northern Alabama, dinner and beer is on me.

Europeans laugh at American beer, but I'm sure he gets your drift. To me, one German beer == one American six pack, but I digress.
 
I think it's time to say goodbye here.
Maybe forever. Maybe only for a few months.

Edit: rmvd blab blah here

Take care, I wish you all the best.
Take a vacation.

Frank

I have not been very active here for years. But you have been one of the huge contributors to the forum and always contributed much, much, more than I could ever hope to. I just looked at the bug you recently discovered and explained. Wow! Finding something like that takes really careful detection and deep knowledge of the system. You will be sorely missed here. I hope you find the joy and intellectual stimulation we all need.
 
Back
Top