Astrobe

Feedback

Here is some of the feedback we have received from Astrobe users. Any unsupported devices mentioned are completely the result of development efforts of those users. If you are interested let us know and we'll contact them to see if they are willing and able to share their work with you.


Programming in this environment is so clear and refreshing compared to other IDEs. I got the Astrobe tools on Friday night and got more done in 1 day with these tools than a month of some other toolsets & tool chains.


Thanks for the responsiveness! It is so good to interact with a PERSON when doing this stuff.


Easy for me to take a F130 lib and just copy to a new folder to use the M0 tools. The M0 compiled code for exactly the same build is significantly shorter. Will soon be testing to see if it's any faster / slower.


It's been interesting to see just what a 40 Mhz EFM32 ARM chip can do. Some of our larger projects do need the 72Mhz EFM32GG11/12 and we are fitting a GG12 in a 64 pin package onto our smaller console controller, partly for the increase in clock speed but also to have more usarts so that each IO port has it's own usart. Smaller systems can get by multiplexing a usart among a few ports but as the system gets larger and more complex, parallel operation of IO ports is required to keep system performance to stated goals.


I'm still really pleased with the Astrobe / Oberon tools and what we've been able to do with them. Recently finished work on a PWM module that manages 256 PWM timers, each with setable period and duty cycle, with a timing resolution down to 500 uSec. Each PWM timer can also generate single pulses of a setable duration.


The QSPI controller can be set up to work with a psram. Currently using it as extra heap space, so is mapped into the data space of the Cortex-M, not the instruction space.

Kind of handy to be able to add larger chunks of ram at relatively low cost ( 8 mbytes for $2.19, APS6404L-3SQR-SN ).


I'm a longtime embedded developer (since the 80's) and I'm increasingly frustrated with general tool bloat. I've been following Oberon (loosely) for a while now and I think now is the time to try it against a simple work project.


We are currently porting software from the LPC (M3) environment to an STM-M4. This works really well with the current compiler. In this setup, our wearable will have an STM-M4 combined with a SemTech SX1276 LoRa transponder. However, there is a more appealing alternative using an STM32WL55xxx processor. This processor combines an M0 host processor with an M4-based LoRa transponder. This setup has two advantages: It is a smaller package AND the chip is still available in the market.


I'm about to use Astrobe to compile some code for a Church pipe organ control system in the UK.


We have solved our Chip-issue by advanced purchasing a bunch of STM Cortex-M7 chips. Your software works flawlessly on the Nucleo test board and we will start with porting the firmware soon.


I have been working on (and simultaneously testing) more Oberon code for the whole day and found no further issues. So it is all good. (with about 300kB image file and many 1000s of lines code, I am pretty sure we exercise the compiler and bin's quite well!)


You added the extension on the Traps module. This is a VERY useful extension and it allowed me to find the bug you just fixed in about 15 minutes. With this, you can start the bug search right around where it happens, instead of starting with your a debug line and work forwards.


 Astrobe's build facility is a stroke of genius. Just Build, fire up Upload, and the relevant files are right there at the top of the list. Combined with the blazingly fast compiler, it's just a joy to work. Anyone without this facility with other tools, or not using it with Astrobe, don't know what they are missing out!


I find myself regularly switching configurations by going to Configuration > Open and browsing back and forth between two or three of them. It would be immensely helpful if the 2? 3? most recent were available as menu options below the edit choice. I realize not many people would benefit from this, but those of us who bounce between a few MCUs would really like this.
 
...Implemented in v8.0
.