ZBasic or Arduino for hobby?

[rich]

I am a newbie to ZBasic and my application are all hobby but i am a professional ASIC/FPGA design engineer so i know something about computer and micro-controller.

I wish to know from the forums experience if you think the ZBasic environment is better suited to hobby application than the Auduino?

I know that is a big question but i am mostly concerned with reliability, mature tools, and product support for some years to come.

When i am doing hobby i do not want flaky hardware or software as my owm time is very limited like most i think.

Thank you for any thought you can give this question.

cheers,
rich

[sparxfly]

I wish to know from the forums experience if you think the ZBasic environment is better suited to hobby application than the Auduino?

Hi Rich-

I have no experience with Arduino, but can comment on ZBasic.
I am an EE and have been doing embedded hardware and software design for (ahem) 30-odd years.
I have found ZBasic to be a very simple, practical and powerful tool for rapid development.
The multitasking executive works well, the tools and libraries are pretty extensive- gives you most of what you need.
And I must admit that coding in Basic is way more user friendly, self documenting, and less error prone than cryptic old C.
I started off using ZBasic for prototype development, intending to rewrite in C for the final embedded end product, but found that sticking with ZBasic and compiling into native mode devices is simpler, easier, and saves the extra work- with no cost disadvantage.
As long as there is an Atmel device that has the hardware resources you need, then ZBasic lets you get on with the job quickly and easily.

My 10c worth,
Stuart.

[GTBecker]

Rich, device support here is unparalleled. Don Kinzer will correct a
revealed firmware bug as soon as he can reproduce it and write and test
the fix - often in hours or one day. The contributing users here are
also widely experienced and unselfishly helpful.

While I have become moderately C-literate due to adopting Linux and
cutting the cord to Redmond, I also appreciate writing in ZBasic which
has become a very powerful and well-structured platform. Still, if you
like to write in C or must mix C and ZBasic, you can. ZBasic can also
work with Arduino sketches. The ZBasic IDE, BTW, also runs fine under
Wine in Linux.

I suspect you'll do well with ZBasic devices.


Tom

[eserdahl]

I wish to know from the forums experience if you think the ZBasic environment is better suited to hobby application than the Auduino?

ZBasic is definitely my choice for professional quick prototyping. All of my hobby projects
are done in ZBasic, fast, reliable and cheap.
 
Programming microprocessors since the Intel 4040A.
 
Eric Serdahl

[sparxfly]

Programming microprocessors since the Intel 4040A.

You beat me Eric - I cut my teeth on the COSMAC and 8080/8085

[GTBecker]

My first micro was an 8008 (did you know the first instruction was
always executed twice?) and, OT, first big box was a 1401.


Tom

[sparxfly]

My first micro was an 8008 (did you know the first instruction was
always executed twice?) and, OT, first big box was a 1401.

And while we reminisce about the good old days when 2K of code was HUGE and coders had hairy chests....a couple of rumoured but unconfirmed factoids

The early Motorola 6502 had a 'halt and catch fire' (aka HCF) opcode- best not to use.

The early ROM-less 8031 micros were reject ROM versions. If you set the /EA high you could run the internal ROM code- rumoured to be something to do with the cruise missile program. Yeah, right!

[rosariote]

Hi,
The only I would recommended you it is compare the instructions command set from ZBASIC and Arduiino and you will immediately will make your mind/decision on Zbasic. There are not comparison between Zbasic and Arduino period. Zbasic it is the only choice that you will do.

[dkinzer]

My first micro was an 8008

Mine, too. We had an Intellec 8 in the EE digital lab at Purdue. A year later it was upgraded to an Intellec 80 with an 8080 CPU.

I recall that we had to key in the instruction C3 00 F8 at address zero using front panel switches and then press the reset button to get it to jump to the monitor, at which point the KSR-33 would clatter to life.

[rich]

Thanks for the feed back.

I think i will get the 29 mhz 44 pin chip and see if i can get it to work.

After blinking and LED i plane to drive a LCD display and read a quadrature encoder knob.

Thanks again.
Rich

[jay]

My first micro was an 8008

I was tad later.. 6052 .. I still have two working KIM-1's (and a KIMSi 1K memory expansion).. but I'd have to dig around a bit to find some old programs on tape..

[twesthoff]

I might still have some Kim-1 programs on tape somewhere. I did a lot with that one back in the day. 

On Dec 6, 2015, at 7:28 AM, ZBasic <zbasic.forum@zbasic.net (zbasic.forum@zbasic.net)> wrote:

GTBecker wrote: My first micro was an 8008

I was tad later.. 6052 .. I still have two working KIM-1's (and a KIMSi 1K memory expansion).. but I'd have to dig around a bit to find some old programs on tape..