IoT - Share the Knowlege

[brad jones]

I'm looking for a regular writer for one of our other sites, Codeguru.com, for the topic of IoT. If you'd like to write a single piece or do become a regular contributor on topics related to IoT, then let me know and I can share the details. You can post a response here, or email me at bjones@QuinStreet.com.

If you email me, please include a brief bio and a tiny bit of info on what you've done with IoT.

Thanks!

Brad!
(This post done with permission of admin, which is me)

[dilettante]

Could be kind of tough, because these are Microsoft-oriented sites.

Microsoft has shot themselves in both feet with regard to IoT: they insist on making it .Net-oriented, which means a fairly bloated device is required. And even then as they commission vendors to make a few they just as quickly deprecate them and pull support. Can you imagine using an IoT device to control something in your home or office when you know it will become unsupported in a year or less?

Of course there is still a role here for Microsoft-oriented developers. Most serious IoT efforts involve some sort of server acting as a "spider in the middle of the web."

Sadly, Microsoft pulled the pistol again and before getting it out of the holster BLAM! they took off a kneecap. They refused to offer MQTT or even an MSMQ-MQTT Bridge product standard in Windows. MQTT is where a lot of the action is currently. Instead they want to drive everyone to Azure, which as we all know is a non-starter for just about everyone. This is very similar to the deathwish they demonstrated to the world when they trashed their popular mobile platform.

The clock is really running out. If Microsoft wants to survive they need to stop picking bizarre proprietary directions and then promoting them to the exclusion of everything else that gave them the market momentum they are sucking the life out of now just to get by.

They could do far worse than outright firing Anders Hejlsberg (preferably out of a cannon).

[brad jones]

There are a lot of people who aren't just Microsoft focused that use these forums too.

Additionally, there are devs that do Microsoft development for web and desktop that are using other technologies for mobile, embedded, and IoT. Devs are adapting, Sadly, (as you stated), I think Microsoft has shown the willingness to pull the trigger too often after begging devs to take a chance with them.

[dilettante]

Well you might still get lucky and find somebody with a broad range of knowledge and experience willing to take on a column or even an article author role.

I haven't done a lot with IoT myself besides minor dabbling. But it seems that forum sites catering to specific platforms tend to get most of the action. The "platform" isn't just the microcontroller or SOC hardware but separate software ecosystems on top of it.

For example Arduino's software-level ecosystem has expanded beyond Atmel chips to other microcontrollers. ARM SOC devices seem to involve some form of Linux, Android, or in very rare cases a stripped-down specialized version of Windows 10.

I'm in the process of writing a simple front-end for NodeMCU devkits based on Espressif's ESP8266 in VB6. It's a nice hardware/software platform for a number of reasons (well, aside from being LUA based). But these present a "serial console" over USB that is easy to plink around with while developing applications. It is sort of like scripting Node.js, just in LUA, with the ability to be a WiFi AP or client (or both) using on-chip hardware at a very low price per unit.

I'm only doing that to edge my way into working with ESP8266s on a Windows machine without installing a ton of stuff I don't care to. For example I don't want to deal with Python, Cygwin, and other fragile technologies "from Planet X."

It turns out that making this "front-end" (more than a "serial terminal" but calling it an "IDE" would be far too grandiose) do what I want it to is very useful. It is driving me to do the research necessary to learn about both the ESP8266 microcontroller and the NodeMCU firmware implementation for that chip.


So it is interesting, but I'm sure in no position to do any write-ups yet.

[dclamp]

10/10 would recommend.

[DavidButterfield]

really good

[sirtrung]

Well.

[brad jones]

If interested in writing, email webmaster@codeguru.com now instead of the bjones@ address. It will work better....

[dclamp]

If interested in writing, email webmaster@codeguru.com now instead of the bjones@ address. It will work better....

Uh... Happy Retirement? Hopefully?