Request, new cmds for communication with educational hardware as it is arduino

[compsystems]

Texas instruments has initiated a new era in calculators allow communication with educational hardware as it is arduino
cmds:
•get()
•getStr()
•send()
HP must follow the same steps?

[dbbotkin]

(02-24-2016 01:03 AM)compsystems Wrote:  Texas instruments has initiated a new era in calculators allow communication with educational hardware as it is arduino
cmds:
•get()
•getStr()
•send()
HP must follow the same steps?

The ability to capture data from analog and digital sensors has been available on the Prime via the StreamSmart 410 interface for a year or more. The 410 has a USB cable to the Prime and has its own rechargeable battery built in. Anything that can output 0 to 5 volts DC can be used easily. An Arduino, for example, could use digital HIGH or LOW or AnalogOut (PWM) to send data to the Prime, depending on the application.

There are a variety of digital sensors that work with the 410 directly and use the Prime as a data capture/analysis computer.

That's the good news; now the bad news: if you live in Europe (or don't mind waiting for shipment) Der Rekenwinkle in NL is where I got mine. Shipping via NL Post was reasonable; DHL, not so.

None of this techie stuff comes cheap and the details of the SmartStream interface are not available. The HP strategy in the US market seems to be "sell to schools at a high price" so don't expect Arduino-like pricing or ease of use.

Unless TI has something new beyond the "Lab Cradle", HP is at least even if not ahead in the educational market.

[debrouxl]

The key factor is that the hardware mentioned here is cheap and wide open for DIY purposes.

You don't connect an expensive StreamSmart or Lab Cradle to the Prime / Nspire. Instead, you leverage some of TI's LaunchPad boards with customizable firmware, or other similarly open and cheap boards which can be made to expose a USB CDC interface on top of a USB VID:PID that the calculator recognizes (knowing that OS patching in RAM, through Ndless 4.2, could technically kill the filtering).

I think it's a good move to keep up with the trends in technology and pricing. TI is implementing the same BASIC commands on the 83PCE/84+CE and the Nspire, providing additional more advanced Lua APIs (Asynchronous Serial Interface, Bluetooth Low Energy) on the Nspire, and defining a de-facto standard.
TI's higher-end, USB-only models are thereby gaining functionality provided on older models through the legacy I/O port, in a more standard way: the legacy I/O port used a relatively slow half-duplex protocol on layer 2.

[dbbotkin]

(02-25-2016 06:49 AM)debrouxl Wrote:  The key factor is that the hardware mentioned here is cheap and wide open for DIY purposes.

You don't connect an expensive StreamSmart or Lab Cradle to the Prime / Nspire. Instead, you leverage some of TI's LaunchPad boards with customizable firmware, or other similarly open and cheap boards which can be made to expose a USB CDC interface on top of a USB VID:PID that the calculator recognizes (knowing that OS patching in RAM, through Ndless 4.2, could technically kill the filtering).

I think it's a good move to keep up with the trends in technology and pricing. TI is implementing the same BASIC commands on the 83PCE/84+CE and the Nspire, providing additional more advanced Lua APIs (Asynchronous Serial Interface, Bluetooth Low Energy) on the Nspire, and defining a de-facto standard.
TI's higher-end, USB-only models are thereby gaining functionality provided on older models through the legacy I/O port, in a more standard way: the legacy I/O port used a relatively slow half-duplex protocol on layer 2.

If this is a TI supported feature, that is a very interesting development indeed. Your explanation adds much to the prior post and the LaunchPad boards are a perfect way for TI to take a giant leap forward with their calculators. I totally agree that the "classroom" solution (SmartStream or the LabCradle) adds to the cost while removing functionality.

The key will be the interface between the calculator firmware/USB and the external board; any idea if HP could do the same? There are many very inexpensive analog/digital boards available and once the calculator can talk to one, the door will be open.

If anyone is interested, the interface between a sensor or other device and the SmartStream is very complex compared to SPI or i2c owing to a legacy from the sensor vendors product protection 'features' and the role of their products in serious science.

[debrouxl]

Quote:If this is a TI supported feature, that is a very interesting development indeed.

Yeah. In their most recent OS versions, TI spent some development time adding TI-Basic USB communication functions (TI-eZ80, Nspire) and new Lua APIs (Nspire), and one of the supported boards is a TI Launchpad, so they clearly have something in mind, though we don't know what exactly yet. Their major annual T^3 conference is this week-end, and the recent OS releases with USB serial communication capabilities must be related to that.
Though as far as the Nspire was concerned, a new OS release was also a matter of blocking the 4.0 version of the Ndless infrastructure for arbitrary native code ("jailbreak"). Not that this mattered in practice - Ndless 4.2 came out in a matter of days

Quote:The key will be the interface between the calculator firmware/USB and the external board; any idea if HP could do the same?

Like the TI-eZ80 and Nspire series, the Prime has a host/OTG-capable USB controller (and IIRC, the 39gII has one too ?), so technically, HP could do it, AFAICT.

[dbbotkin]

(02-25-2016 04:02 PM)debrouxl Wrote:  

Quote:If this is a TI supported feature, that is a very interesting development indeed.

Yeah. In their most recent OS versions, TI spent some development time adding TI-Basic USB communication functions (TI-eZ80, Nspire) and new Lua APIs (Nspire), and one of the supported boards is a TI Launchpad, so they clearly have something in mind, though we don't know what exactly yet. Their major annual T^3 conference is this week-end, and the recent OS releases with USB serial communication capabilities must be related to that.
Though as far as the Nspire was concerned, a new OS release was also a matter of blocking the 4.0 version of the Ndless infrastructure for arbitrary native code ("jailbreak"). Not that this mattered in practice - Ndless 4.2 came out in a matter of days :)

Quote:The key will be the interface between the calculator firmware/USB and the external board; any idea if HP could do the same?

Like the TI-eZ80 and Nspire series, the Prime has a host/OTG-capable USB controller (and IIRC, the 39gII has one too ?), so technically, HP could do it, AFAICT.

Unlike HP of today, TI is heavily invested in the technology behind the IOT and has been practically giving away Launchpads to support school kids learning electronics by working hands-on at home and in organized summer programs. HP: knock, knock!

[eried]

With the speed of the Prime and the graphical capabilities of HPPPL, adding serial-usb capabilities would made this calculator a wonderful device for a lot of things, even as a general purpose I/O terminal.

In any case, to complete the experience some special features are missing too, like a way to run something at boot, etc

[debrouxl]

We now have more information about TI's plans for cheap programmable external hardware with I/O capabilities, based on Launchpads:
https://education.ti.com/go/innovator (official website)
https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=18010 (announcement in the TI community, in English)
https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=18015 (demo, in French)

[eried]

(02-27-2016 09:21 AM)debrouxl Wrote:  We now have more information about TI's plans for cheap programmable external hardware with I/O capabilities, based on Launchpads:
https://education.ti.com/go/innovator (official website)
https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=18010 (announcement in the TI community, in English)
https://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=18015 (demo, in French)

pffff... "Innovator"

I thought it was some direct capabilities for the calculator to directly interact with things not a streamsmart wannabe bs box.

[debrouxl]

Quote:some direct capabilities for the calculator to directly interact with things

Well, the calculator interacts with anything which can be made to speak a compatible USB CDC protocol and can be bent into using the appropriate USB VID:PID, seemingly.
And USB HID keyboard on the 83PCE/84+CE, we can all hope the Nspire grows such functionality out of the box.

But for interacting with real-world equipments which produce or consume data and control, all of our calculator models with very poor I/O capabilities (the 83PCE/84+CE, Prime only have an USB port; the Nspire has an additional dock connector with semi-undocumented pin assignment and an uncommon physical pitch, so it has basically nothing) need something that provides digital inputs and outputs, analog inputs, why not PWM output, and other kinds of useful I/O.

[douganc]

A Calculator biased on the Broadcom Chip in the Rasberry Pi 2 would be perfect. Make it open source too , so anyone can make it. Make it as well, so you can plug Adrunio Boards into it too. Call it The Open Source Calculator Project.