.NET Gadgeteer — Microsoft's Arduino Killer?

mikejuk writes ".NET Gadgeteer is a new open source platform, from Microsoft Research, based on the use of the .NET Micro Framework. It brings with it lots of hardware modules that are backed by object oriented software. You simply buy the modules you need — switches, GPS, WiFi etc — that you need and plug them together. The software, based on C#, is also open source, and comes with classes that let you use the modules without having to go 'low level.' Is this a competitor for the Arduino?"

Comments

Honest question:

[cervesaebraciator]

Can anyone think of any example when a [fill-in-the-blank-popular-or-niche-object-of-consumption] killer has ever killed a [fill-in-the-blank]? Calling something a [fill-in-the-blank] killer seems to admit at the outset that the market belongs to [fill-in-the-blank].

Re:Honest question:

[gman003]

Video killed the radio star.

Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

The type of person who cares about open anything is the same type who will avoid anything with a Microsoft logo. That alone will kill any potential this platform has.

Re:Nope

[hism]

Not the Kinect. Google libfreenect or openni_kinect-- there's plenty of people hacking at it.

Re:Nope

[Xest]

The type of person who is a rabid irrational open source zealot and would cut their nose off to spite their face is the same type who will avoid anything with a Microsoft logo.

FTFY.

There's plenty of people out there who are a bit more rational than that though, and just use what they like, and avoid what they don't. The plethora of open source software available on Windows should make that clear enough- clearly if people are developing FOSS for Windows, then not everyone that cares about open source is avoiding everything with a Microsoft logo, clearly some recognise that FOSS and proprietary can actually work together. Obviously you've never heard of XBMC or the FOSS Kinect projects etc. either.

In fact frankly, most people I come across who have this hate Microsoft for everything, forever attitude, aren't even FOSS developers, they're just FOSS fanboys, groupies, whatever you want to call them. They don't actually help the FOSS community really, they just unfairly make it look like it's full of retards because they're the mouthy gobshites making it look bad, whilst the hard working, talented developers slave away creating a decent product, whatever the underlying platform.

Besides, even if you genuinely believe that a single company can kill FOSS, then there's a lot bigger threats than Microsoft nowadays, MS is pretty much done as a threat to FOSS, I'd be more worried about the growing influence of Apple's extremely more closed and restrictive platform model, or the push by equally many other firms for everything to be run from the cloud, where you can use it, but can't fiddle with it.

Not a chance.

[decriptor]

Simple reason: The base board looks like it needs connectors best I can tell and costs 4x as much as an arduino board. Plus I'm sure the MS board requires windows. I have an arduino because I can interface with it on different platforms and it didn't cost a ton to get into.

Re:little pricey

[PopeRatzo]

little pricey to be a arduino killer

"arduino killer" is not Microsoft's term. They call it a ".NET gadgeteer" or something.

I love that some blogger calls it a "arduino killer" and all of a sudden, "Microsoft's trying to kill the cute little arduino".

Arduino is cool as hell. My daughter and I have been having a blast with a couple of them that we bought just to goof off with.

The .NET Gadgeteer also looks pretty cool, though I don't know much .NET framework. Oh well, I'll let my kid learn that stuff. I'm not that interested, but I don't see any reason why we should find anything negative in this gadgeteer thing from MS.

You know which very rich and successful and famous high-tech company is NOT making an open platform for us to play with?

Seriously, go back ten years, twenty. Now ask yourself which company would come out with something like this Gadgeteer first, Apple or Microsoft. Which company would lock up its handhelds behind a walled garden. Which company would stash profits for a war chest to buy its competitors instead of paying its shareholders a dividend. Sometimes things don't go the way you would suspect.

No. Just no. For more than one reason.

[Opportunist]

First: MS. Hobbyists, especially the microcontroller crowd, are usually aiming for independence, interconnectivity and freedom of choices. Most microtinkerers I know were even shy to touch the Arduino because it came along with its own development tools that smelled like "you need them to do anything with it". Only after reading the specs, seeing the PCB around the chip and noticing that it is pretty much simply a (rather well designed) pimped out devboard, essentially a "standardized breadboard plus programmer", they started to use it. Many I know still refuse to use the compiler that came with it and stick with AVR Studio or GCC. Some even consider that "too far from the metal" and stick with ASM, personally I think one can overdo his zeal for independence and "feeling your controller", but I'm not judging them. Case in point, microdevs hate being locked into something. Despite the perpetual ATMEL vs PIC battle (and the self-chosen lock-in with either platform, since few people I know really want to work with both).

Second: Microcontrollers are still very, very tiny in their specs. The average affordable model measures their clock in the Megahertz and their flash rom (program memory) in the kilobytes. And for that a .net platform? Are you kidding? Now, I might be prejudiced in this matter, but unless they somhow then turn that .net program into very tight assembler, the 72MHz Arm will feel like a 8MHz Atmel. Now, that Arm implementation MS is offering has 4500kB of flash. Pretty much, considering most AVRs still measure their flash ram in the single and double digit kilobytes. But will that .net compiler spit out native code? Or will a good deal of those 4.5MB be taken up by some virtual machine that then tries to run the object code? Essentially the question is, how much "work" can you push into the flash, how many instructions can you possibly put into it before you're running out of space?

And finally: As a extension from the first point, MC developers love to tinker and toy with their gadgets. And they love expanding on them. Having a wide selection of addons is nice, but how easy is it to roll your own? In case I do not want that Ethernet expansion, can I make my own? Are the specs known? What about the legal shit, can I publish what I create without paying MS for it?

I'd be wary to take the information provided at face value. 72MHz look far more than the measly 20-48MHz Arduino offers (depending on the board you choose). And 4.5MB certainly is far more than 128KB of flash rom. The key question is, though, how much of that rom is usable, how do the processors perform in comparison, and how easy is it to roll your own expansions.

It's not meant to compete with Arduino

[artor3]

Look at the specs. Arduino's "beefy" MCU is 16 MHz, 8 bits. This is 72 MHz, 32 bits. Arduino draws a sub-10 uA sleep current. This thing draws a 40 mA (yes, milliamp) sleep current. They're completely different devices targeting completely different markets. Talk of "killing" Arduino is just meant to draw eyeballs and clicks.

Re:The likeliest adopters are commercial users

[aiken_d]

The word "fortune" has several meanings. You're referring to finances, the parent was referring to well-being. The two are related but not the same.

Microsoft may be turning record profit, but it's clearly a company in decline. Their stranglehold on operating systems is loosening as OSX gains market share and web browsers make underlying OS less relevant. Office, their cash cow, has hit the point where nobody really sees a reason to upgrade, and its features are also being commoditized by open source and lower cost software. Xbox / Kinect are the two bright spots for a company otherwise drowning in bureaucracy and searching for relevance and innovation.

So yes, their fortunes are sagging, even as their fortune accumulates. English is funny that way.