We closed this forum 18 June 2010. It has served us well since 2005 as the ALPHA forum did before it from 2002 to 2005. New discussions are ongoing at the new URL http://forum.processing.org. You'll need to sign up and get a new user account. We're sorry about that inconvenience, but we think it's better in the long run. The content on this forum will remain online.
Index › Programming Questions & Help › Integration › Proccessing and the mbed NXP LPC1768 board
‹ Previous Topic | Next Topic ›
Page Index Toggle Pages: 1
Proccessing and the mbed NXP LPC1768 board (Read 2119 times)
Arthur P.
Proccessing and the mbed NXP LPC1768 board
May 11th, 2010, 4:42pm  
I just got an mbed NXP LPC1768 board (see mbed.org/nxp/lpc1768/). It is an absolute gem at a size of 52x26mm, all low profile and with the mini-USB interface fully integrated into the board. The online programming environment looks to be close to as simple as the Arduino environment. But it still lacks a simple environment for user interface building. That user interface will be important as I hope to develop a flight controler for multikopters / multirotor RC craf for aerial photography with this little board, the sparkfun 9DOF board, an SCP1000 air pressure sensor, a GPS receiver, and an Arduino Mini Pro for converting I2C motor commands to high rate PPM control pulses for the electronic speed controlers. I will have to be able to set parameters and read back sensor values over either a serial link (over USB or Bluetooth). So here's the question: Has anybody used Processing to interface with the mbed NXP LPC 1768 board?
Back to top
 
 
Arthur P.
Re: Proccessing and the mbed NXP LPC1768 board
Reply #1 - May 14th, 2010, 4:14pm  
Been fooling around a bit with this board and its online compiler. The compiler has a nice interface and is quite fast, providing the resultant .bin file for download. You then just drag and drop that onto the board which acts as a usb drive. Reset the board and it runs the last program added. It really doesn't get much simpler.

The "language" is C++/C with the mbed libraries simplifying a number of things similar to the way this is done for Arduino.

For Windows you do need a driver to communicate with the board with a serial over usb connection. I believe that is not needed for Linux or OSX. Once the serial connection is set up you can use any terminal program capable of communicating over a serial connection to e.g. reset the board with a Ctrl-Brk, or passing info to or reading info sent from the board.

Did a very quick test whether Processing also works as a possible GUI environment, and for receiving it certainly does. Haven't tested the other way around but if Processing can receive serial info from the board there is no reason it wouldn't work.

Talking about an "Arduino killer" ...

And I-ve also figured out how to use Eclipse and a GNU ARM toolchain for offline programming and compiling but then you don't have all the simplified stuff (but the header files and parts of the libraries are available in a SVN, so it may be possible to even get that up and running offline).

Only two possible criticisms so far:
a) all 4 user controlable LEDs are bright blue. They are spaced so that it is still easy enough to identify them correctly if used for e.g. error signaling, but using different colours (or white LEDs so that the user could create them with coloured filters) would have been nice.
b) of course not all pins are brought out.

Neither of these criticisms is important. For the intended use the 2 separate I2C and other serial buses are more critical than having a huge number of PWM pins and the very small form factor is actually a big advantage which easilly offsets not having all pins available.
Back to top
 
 
Arthur P.
Re: Proccessing and the mbed NXP LPC1768 board
Reply #2 - May 14th, 2010, 4:18pm  
Forgot to mention that the form factor is perfect for using a narrow white jumper-type proto board where you have one row of jumper pin holes availabe along each side of it, in addition to the 4 lengthwise rails for e.g. power and gnd, and most of the board for your sensors and other stuff.

If you need more than a very low amount of power at 5V you will need to supply external power as any significant draw from the USB bus, e.g to run a servo, resets the board. Of course not a problem.
Back to top
 
 
Page Index Toggle Pages: 1
‹ Previous Topic | Next Topic ›