micro:bit v2

[espruino-discuss]

Posted at 2020-10-13 by parasquid

Looks like they just announced it: https://microbit.org/new-microbit/

It uses the nRF52833 and can use S140

I wonder if current builds for nRF52840 would work (with some pin adjustments) ?

[espruino-discuss]

Posted at 2020-10-13 by @gfwilliams

Already ahead of you. I'm just about to push it live with the 2v08 release. I'd done a port but was under NDA until the announcement.

The nRF52833 looks like a great chip, but is also a pain. Nordic only support it in SDK17, which has another whole set of pointless file/function renamings which seem designed to make everyone's life difficult.

So for now, to get something out quick, I'm just using the old SDK12 with a one-liner to allow the second GPIO port to be used. It means only 64k is used right now but that's more than enough for most stuff.

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Posted at 2020-10-13 by parasquid

Amazing! :D Can't wait until November when a local distributor rolls it out :)

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Posted at 2020-10-13 by @fanoush

Oh, nice, the first one was old tech even at release day but this one is actually quite usable :-)

I'm just using the old SDK12 with a one-liner to allow the second GPIO port to be used. It means only 64k is used right now but that's more than enough for most stuff.

Interesting, so it runs including bluetooth? With S132 3.0? maybe the extra ram is only about linker script? or possibly enabling it in bootloader if it needs changing some registers

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Posted at 2020-10-14 by @gfwilliams

so it runs including bluetooth? With S132 3.0?

Yes, it's all fine. I haven't found anything that's broken at all.

Yes, just a new linker script would do it I reckon - but long term it would be good to move to a new SDK I guess. I was almost there but there were just a few too many unknowns to get it working ok.

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Posted at 2021-01-24 by tcpipchip

Hi, did you do “make” to nrf52833 ?
And are you created a Js function to detect the ble signal direction ?

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Posted at 2021-01-27 by @gfwilliams

Yes, nRF52833 works, albeit with a few hacks. Until a tweak by @fanoush recently only 64k RAM was used.

created a Js function to detect the ble signal direction ?

I'm not sure I understand. BLE Signal direction finding only works when used with a high-end multi-aerial gateway. I'm not sure they even exist yet

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Posted at 2021-01-27 by tcpipchip

Hi @gfwilliams

Bluetooth 5.1 Direction Finding service. The service can be used for indoor positioning,
wayfinding, and the tracking of assets.

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Posted at 2021-01-27 by @gfwilliams

Bluetooth 5.1 Direction Finding service

That's what I thought. Read into it a bit more - it's as I said above. There is no direction finding capability in the individual devices

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Posted at 2021-01-27 by tcpipchip

Nice!

OFF TOPIC: How is going the Boufallo RISC-V implementation ?

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Posted at 2021-01-27 by AkosLukacs

I'm not sure they even exist yet

Saw a demo somewhere, so they must exist :) But yeah, won't work with two devices with simple PCB antenna. And possibly multiple receivers to achieve the advertised centimeter accuracy...

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Posted at 2021-01-27 by tcpipchip

@AkosLukacs
thank you the info!

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Posted at 2021-01-28 by @gfwilliams

Yeah, as I understand it the direction finding involves:

• The individual device sends a specially formed signal which repeats over and over
• A receiver with multiple aerials can then look at the phase difference between the aerials and can work out the angle.

However you need a special receiver for this. I feel like it was probably possible even before Bluetooth 5.1 if someone had a sufficiently advanced receiver.

How is going the Boufallo RISC-V implementation ?

It's not I'm afraid. I'm just spread too thin to actually start porting to new devices right now.