FREE CoreChartFR

[Wayne Doenges]

I've been asked to pass this on to the FIRST community. If it doesn't belong here, please move it to the appropriate forum. Thanks.

eLabtronics is sponsoring CoreChartFR for FREE to all students, mentors,
schools, sponsors, etc. involved in FIRST Robotics 2006. There is no time
limits or limits on the number of computers that can be installed.

We will do this by alerting everyone to a sponsorship number so that
everyone can download CoreChartFR and enter the special sponsorship number
to get unlimited access. Can you help get this message to the teams?

Regards,
Miroslav Kostecki
Technical Manager
eLabtronics
51 Byron Place, Adelaide
South Australia, 5000
PH: +61 8 8231 5966
FAX: +61 8 8231 5266

[ChuckDickerson]

Any more information on when/where/how we obtain the special "sponsorship number"? I assume we download the software here.

[Vaillancourt88]

Originally Posted by DeepWater

Any more information on when/where/how we obtain the special "sponsorship number"? I assume we download the software here.

We are very much interested in the CoreChart software. (Especially the FREE part!!) How do we get this sponsorship #?

[Andrew Blair]

Huh, very nice of them. I don't know if this confirms or denies my prediction that CoreChart would be associated with the KOP...

[Eldarion]

My initial "gut feeling" is that this cheapens the programming end some. What do other people think?

[BrianBSL]

Originally Posted by Eldarion

My initial "gut feeling" is that this cheapens the programming end some. What do other people think?

I think that its far more complicated to write assembly than C, so if anything it requires more skill.

[Eldarion]

Originally Posted by BrianBSL

I think that its far more complicated to write assembly than C, so if anything it requires more skill.

But this software is kind of like Mindstorms for the FRC, so how does that require more skill?

[Ian Curtis]

Originally Posted by Eldarion

My initial "gut feeling" is that this cheapens the programming end some. What do other people think?

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...ight=corechart

(Oh and by the way, it is painful to code with Mindstorms. At the very least use RoboLab 2.0 (graphical) or even better, ScriptEd (text-based)!

[Eldarion]

Originally Posted by iCurtis

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...ight=corechart

Sorry, I didn't see that thread.

Originally Posted by iCurtis

(Oh and by the way, it is painful to code with Mindstorms. At the very least use RoboLab 2.0 (graphical) or even better, ScriptEd (text-based)!

I know, that is one reason I don't like it! I've been programming in C++ for a very long time, so I might be biased though...

[BrianBSL]

Originally Posted by Eldarion

But this software is kind of like Mindstorms for the FRC, so how does that require more skill?

Because core chart is a graphical assembler, not a graphical high-level language program. There are no floats - there arn't even any 16-bit variables. Everything is 8 bits, period. You are 100% limited to the PIC 18 instruction set. Want to store a literal (like 0x77) in a variable? You can't just move it right into it, you have to move it into the working register and then into the variable. There are not blocks for everything you want to do like there is in mindstorms, you have to create everything out of assembly instructions.

Take a look at the .lst that c18 makes for you. Every assembly instruction there would be a block in corechart.

I'm not saying I would use it - I'd program in C, and if I had to use assembly I'd do it by hand. I am, however, saying that it requires more skill than writing C code in MPLAB. All it does for you is makes it so you cant screw up the syntax.

[Eldarion]

Originally Posted by BrianBSL

Because core chart is a graphical assembler, not a graphical high-level language program.

Thanks for clearing that up. I was under the impression that it was a graphical high-level language similar to MindStorms.

One has to wonder what the benefit of this software actually is. It seems like an odd mix of high and low level stuff, and C already performs syntax checking.

[Miroslav]

Note that CoreChartFR now runs on the 2005 controller and runs on the 2006 controller too ( this has been tested ). Updates will be available on our web site.

eLabtronics will not put the sponsored key number to unlock the 30 day trial limit on CoreChartFR on the Internet since it is for FIRST Robotics students, mentors, teachers and sponsors only. We have put together a PDF document including the number and how to unlock CoreChartFR. This document can be passed on to other FIRST members but is not to be put onto the Internet for general access.

If anyone who is mentioned as qualifying ( above ) for sponsorship wants a copy of the document please email me at miro@elabtronics.com and I will email it back to you. Anyone is welcome to help pass on this document to other FIRST members.

[Alan Anderson]

Originally Posted by Eldarion

One has to wonder what the benefit of this software actually is. It seems like an odd mix of high and low level stuff, and C already performs syntax checking.

It goes further than syntax checking, making it basically impossible to create syntax errors in the first place. The brief demo I saw convinced me that it's a very friendly programming environment. I'm not sure how much power, if any, is sacrificed for that friendliness. I believe that I'd end up feeling frustrated with how much time it would take to create a program, though it's possible that I'd find the test/debug process to be faster.

The main potential benefit I can see is that some people are good with "programming" but not with "coding". Giving them the ability to express code as a graphical flowchart overcomes the conceptual hurdle of writing programs as textual instructions.

[Danny Diaz]

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

The main potential benefit I can see is that some people are good with "programming" but not with "coding". Giving them the ability to express code as a graphical flowchart overcomes the conceptual hurdle of writing programs as textual instructions.

That's the benefit of pretty much all graphical programming languages, LabVIEW being one of them (and to a lesser extent MatLab and related languages that hide the inner details of how the data is stored). In my experience I have found that people who are comfortable with text based languages will not like programming in a graphical language at first, mainly because graphical programming languages require a different mindset and algorithm base. Even though I am very fluent in LabVIEW now I still prefer to do some things in a textual language because I haven't convinced myself yet that doing it in LabVIEW (or any graphical language) could be as efficient, even though I've had people tell me it is (but they were LabVIEW developers, who can trust them? ).

-Danny

[aaeamdar]

"But this software is kind of like Mindstorms for the FRC, so how does that require more skill?"

If it's anything like Mindstorms (which I've used) our team won't be using it. I've programmed in Java and C and C++ and you can't go back to legos after that.

But could someone please clarify what it is or give a description of what it does? Or link me to their site.

Thanks