Sometimes it takes a very long time to realize a project. Adding the Arduino Ethernet Shield R3 to one of my Freescale FRDM boards is one of it: it took me a year until I have found a few days to work on using the Ethernet Shield with my FRDM-KL25Z.
FRDM-KL25Z with Ethernet Shield
I have not everything in place yet, so I decided to publish things in parts. So this is about part one: using the Micro SD Card on the Shield.
Character based LCD displays are great: they are inexpensive, and it is rather simple to use them compared to graphical displays. Yes, they only can display text and custom symbols, but this is usually what I need. And pretty much all character displays are using the Hitachi HD44780 protocol, so it is a de-facto industry standard.
HD44780 compatible Dual Line Character Display
These displays have one big disadvantage: they need to be compatible with the original Hitachi interface and protocol. First display were mostly one line only, and had only few characters, typically up to 16. The protocol worked either with one or two lines on the display. Today’s display have usually two lines, with 16 characters. But what if I need more?
4-Line LCD (Source: Daniela Solorzano)
I probably would have missed the fact that Freescale has released a new Freedom board, if I would not have visited my local distributor site to order a replacement for one of my first FRDM-KL25Z boards. So surprise, surprise: there is a new Freedom board: the FRDM-KL26Z!
FRDM-KL26Z Board
So instead ordering again a FRDM-KL25Z, I decided to order that new FRDM-KL26Z instead. And it arrived right before Christmas, and now I had time to check it out. Nope, I did *not* use it as a blinking gadget on a Christmas tree, even if that would have been a nice idea ;-).
Tired by the tool chains provided by your silicon vendor? Do you want to use a free and open tool chain? Then you probably followed by “DIY Free Toolchain” series already. In “DIY Free Toolchain for Kinetis: Part 2 – Eclipse IDE” I used the standard GNU Eclipse plugins. As mentioned in above post, there is an even better and more powerful plugin available: the GNU ARM Eclipse plug-ins. There is a dedicated blog site which provides excellent documentation and direct access to new and frequent releases. And these days there is a true a Christmas gift for every Eclipse lover: the version 1.1.7 with the addition of J-Link debugger plugin :-).
GNU ARM Eclipse
Time to write an update about the RNet Wireless Stack. The stack has been successfully used for the Sumo Robots as wireless controller. In the last week, there has been a lot smaller and larger extensions for it. And because the nRF24L01+ modules are so inexpensive, I bunkered more than 50, with 20 still left to be deployed:
nRF24L01+ Transceiver Modules
It was Friday the 13th, and it was Sumo Battle Day :-). After 3 months of tinkering, hacking and creatively improving the Mini Sumo Bots, finally the the course tournament took place.
With using a different room, every team had a chance to warm up and recalibrate the sensors for the new environment.
Getting ready for the battles
The time was used to apply last-minute changes and improvements too, plus to record the last Robo Portraits.
Good news for everyone having Windows 8.1: P&E has released Dec 11th 2013 a new FRDM board firmware which solves the bootloader issue found with Windows 8.1. The new firmware can download from https://www.pemicro.com/opensda/.
New PnE OpenSDA Firmware
If you are familiar with battle games, then typically there is portrait of the machinery you can use. Or if you have every watched ‘competitive’ sports, then every player can have an opportunity to present himself to the audience. So here we go…
Fredy the Commander
Tomorrow will the STD (Sumo Tournament Day)! Here are a few last tips and tricks to be prepared for that Sumo Tournament using the Pololu Zumo Robot chassis:
If two robots crash into each other, there can be quite some force. What I have observed is that it can be strong enough to temporarily disconnects the batteries from their spring contacts. I use pieces of plastic parts to keep the batteries tight and in place.
Battery Enforcement
There is one week left until all the Sumo robots of the Infotronic course at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts will enter a tournament. The robots have to pass a simple tests before they can enter the tournament: to push a ‘dummy’ robot outside the ring. This simple test is used at tournaments to avoid ‘passive’ robots just sitting in the middle of the ring ;-).
Sumo Robot against Dummy Bot
MCU on Eclipse 