Power splah'

[johnridley]

I'm running my credit card close to the edge (my definition = barely enough in the checking account to pay it off) but payday is tomorrow, I have several projects to work on, and I've had it with the cheap bench power supply that I have. I went ahead and ordered the Korad programmable bench supply. At least I will be able to set a voltage properly. The USB interface seems interesting. Writing an interface for it might be a cool reason to learn Python or something.

Comments

[marsgov.livejournal.com]

I have this theory that FORTH would be a better interface...

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

Hah, they just had a guest on Embedded.fm that's a Forth aficionado. He ported Forth to the ESP8266 recently.
Python seems like one to learn. Not the best language out there, but it's being used everywhere so getting some experience is probably worthwhile.

[marsgov.livejournal.com]

Our mutual friend ESR recommended Python to me years ago, and it's actually a decent interpreted language; I prefer those because they offer real-time, line-by-line instrument control.

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

There's a ton of work being done in Python in the embedded and scientific data gathering and analysis world. I hear Python more than any other language when I listen to embedded systems podcasts.

A lot of the 3D printing utilities are written in Python. I've heard more than one guest on Embedded.fm say that they think Python would be a good first language to teach people.

I tend to agree with the most recent Embedded guest though - it doesn't matter what language you teach first; anyone who "gets" programming will learn whatever language they need once they get started.

[marsgov.livejournal.com]

Back in the dark ages, when I created my own PDP-11 to Nicolet digital scope interfaces on wirewrap boards, Python didn't exist...

Python would clearly make an excellent and more maintainable interface language.

Having said all that: I have to wonder what the best first language would be. Not Basic, obviously; not Python with its archaic "format by indentation"; I'd have to go with Javascript at the moment as being both highly interactive and easy to use, and very useful.

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

Javascript is certainly a valid choice and is being taught as an introductory language. The advent of node.js has made it a much more valid general purpose language.