Re: [Paparazzi-devel] Lisa/M questions

[Martial Chateauvieux]

Hi Antoine,

Don't take the question personally. I asked this question to the list in Feb 
already. In the mean time I've been invited on the Skype discussion as well. 
It's just a fact that 
the people only reading the list have a limited visibility over the work 
currently done by all the active developpers. The Openness of the project is 
important for many people 
(including myself). So I'll guess you'll have to communicate on this topic 
explicitly often.
In my opinion the thread, how you wrote it, is interesting enough to be placed 
in the wiki. What about a short article on the "autopilots" page decribing the 
developement and 
release process, with a blog like progress report...

...And because it's a wiki I gave it a try. Do you want to review it?

Cheers
Martial


Le mercredi 8 juin 2011 13:25:47 antoine drouin, vous avez écrit :
> Hi Christophe
> 
> Schematics will be released ASAP, CAD files will come later. When ? I
> don't know.... Worst case would be when Joby Robotics releases a new
> version of the board, but I hope it will be sooner than that.
> Now, why do I have the feeling that we get attacked all the time on
> that choice ? The "beginning of closedsource-only APs in paparazzi"
> does not sound very neutral to me. Maybe I'm just overreacting, but
> you seem to be implying that there would be some evil hidden
> motivations behind that choice. For you information, Lisa/L CAD files
> have been released (
> http://svn.savannah.nongnu.org/viewvc/paparazzi-hardware/trunk/lisa/v1.1/?r
> oot=paparazzi ) 3 month ago.
> I had already written a mail to the mailing list to explain the
> motivations behind not releasing CAD file together with new boards
> when all the fuss about about lisa/L happened but renounced to send it
> in order to avoid fueling the flameware.
> I've started this project together with Pascal 8 years ago and since
> then I have dedicated my time to try and make it successful. I'm
> utterly convinced of the benefits of open source, but observing how
> Paparazzi grew over time, I came to the conclusion that hardware is a
> bit different than software... "gcc tiny.brd" is not going to make a
> board magically appear on your desktop. I'll list here some of my
> arguments in favor of releasing CAD files after the board is mature.
> 
> 1- Unlike software, where an unskilled user can type make and get a
> piece of complex software to successfully build, assembling hardware
> requires tools and skills. Providing gerbers and BOM have lured a
> bunch of new users into believing otherwise and has created tons of
> frustration. I've myself fixed a number of badly assembled boards and
> I even recall that while helping debugging a board ( so after
> assembly), discovering that the person had manufactured two layers
> PCBs instead of four layers. As the technology of the autopilot
> increases, this problem becomes more and more important.
> 
> 2- The success of the project depends on the availability of
> affordable hardware. The price of hardware is directly and
> exponentially dependent on the number of manufactured units. If ten
> persons manufacture 10 boards each, the cost will be much higher than
> if one person manufactures 100.
> 
> 3- Last and not least, the quality of assembly also depends very much
> on the number of manufactured units. Good quality can only be achieved
> through the use of automated placing and soldering, and those
> processes can only be used if the number of units reach a certain
> amount.
> 
>  You may think that my arguments are wrong and I'm ready to debate
> them with you, but questioning my ethics hurts. I, as well as all the
> Paparazzi developers, only have one goal in mind, the success of this
> project.
> 
> Best regards
> 
> Poine
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Wed, Jun 8, 2011 at 11:01 AM, Christoph Niemann
> 
> <address@hidden> wrote:
> > Hi,
> > 
> > thank you very much for your replies.
> > 
> > @Eric: The reason why not to use Spektrum is the following:
> > I have 2.4Ghz video-gear, so if I'm using it, I have to use 35Mhz. My
> > 2.4Ghz stuff is JETI-equipment, so I'm using a receiver, that has been
> > modified to output the PPM-Signal.
> > 
> > So the first question is solved, PPM should work. What remains is the
> > question of the license. Will the shematics (perhaps the eagle-files) be
> > available, like at the old APs, or are the Lisa-APs the beginning of
> > closedsource-only APs in paparazzi? Please don't get me wrong, but this
> > is really important to me for making some strategic descisions and might
> > be for some more guys too.
> > 
> > Cheers
> > 
> > Christoph
> > 
> >> Datum: Wed, 8 Jun 2011 07:58:45 +0200
> >> Von: antoine drouin <address@hidden>
> >> An: address@hidden
> >> Betreff: Re: [Paparazzi-devel] Lisa/M questions
> >> 
> >> ppm on lisa/M works, and so does it on lisa/L
> >> 
> >> Regards
> >> 
> >> Poine
> >> 
> >> ps: on lisa/M, PPM is at the moment sharing a line with servo6 (
> >> because it's the way it was wired on lisa/L ). It would be trivial to
> >> adapt the driver to use another line. look at
> >> sw/airborne/arch/stm32/subsystems/radio_control/ppm_arch.c
> > 
> > _______________________________________________
> > Paparazzi-devel mailing list
> > address@hidden
> > https://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/paparazzi-devel
> 
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