I was curious if anyone has tried installing and running SBBS on an Arduino Board?

JFSAG?

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Re: Arduino
By: Mortifis to All on Mon Mar 02 2020 08:38:04

I was curious if anyone has tried installing and running SBBS on an Arduino
Board?

Far too many roadblocks (no OS, very little memory, etc.) If it were possible at all it would be a pretty big effort.

Arduino and similar are great and they have their place, but if you're looking for something small and low-power to run Synchronet on, a Raspberry Pi would be the way to go.

I have considered making a simple BBS that would run on the ESP8266 or ESP32 microcontroller, just because it would be fun. Doubt if I'll ever get around to it.

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On 02 Mar 2020 at 08:38a, Mortifis pondered and said...

I was curious if anyone has tried installing and running SBBS on an Arduino Board?

An 8-bit AVR with a couple of K of SRAM isn't really packin'
the horses for something like that.

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On 03-02-20 08:38, Mortifis wrote to All <=-

I was curious if anyone has tried installing and running SBBS on an Arduino Board?

I can't see that happening. Arduino isn't designed as a general purpose computer, which is what is required to run Synchronet on. Most of the Arduino line lack the storage and RAM, probably processor speed as well in any case, and there's no OS. Arduinos are designed as microcontrollers to interface with the real (physical) world. They are excellent at what they are designed for - I've used a couple myself.

The Pi (Raspberry, Orange, Banana) is a compact low power platform that can and does run Synchronet. I'm using a Banana Pi myself.

Where an Arduino could be used is in conjunction with a Pi, if you wanted to create BBS menu items that control or monitor things in the real world. For that setup, you'd use a Pi to host the BBS and interface it to an Arduino. But that's a whole other discussion! :)


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On 03-02-20 10:49, echicken wrote to Mortifis <=-

Re: Arduino
By: Mortifis to All on Mon Mar 02 2020 08:38:04

I was curious if anyone has tried installing and running SBBS on an

Arduino

Board?

Far too many roadblocks (no OS, very little memory, etc.) If it were possible at all it would be a pretty big effort.

Yep, not the right tool for the job.

Arduino and similar are great and they have their place, but if you're looking for something small and low-power to run Synchronet on, a Raspberry Pi would be the way to go.

I am using Arduinos for a project of mine, but it's not BBS related. The Arduinos are excellent and easy to program microcontrollers, but not something that can run a general purpose OS like Linux. Horses for courses.

I have considered making a simple BBS that would run on the ESP8266 or ESP32 microcontroller, just because it would be fun. Doubt if I'll ever get around to it.

Interesting concept. If you were to do it, you might want to have a system that focuses on controlling things in the real world, in addition to whatever BBS features you wanted to have.


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Re: Re: Arduino
By: Tony Langdon to echicken on Tue Mar 03 2020 09:55:00

I am using Arduinos for a project of mine, but it's not BBS related. The

Anything fun?

Arduinos are excellent and easy to program microcontrollers, but not something
that can run a general purpose OS like Linux. Horses for courses.

I've used Arduinos and other MCUs in many projects over the past 10+ years, and Raspberry Pi or similar for other projects. Sometimes it's tricky to choose the best tool for the job, but they all have their place.

These days, unless I specifically need something really small, low power, or extremely cheap, I tend to reach for a Raspberry Pi Zero W. Lots of GPIO and just all around easy to develop for.

Interesting concept. If you were to do it, you might want to have a system that focuses on controlling things in the real world, in addition to whatever
BBS features you wanted to have.

Yeah, I'd have to think about what/why/how a BBS might interact with the physical world. My thought process on this so far was that it would be neat to have a mesh of little nodes that made up a BBS, or just a tiny BBS in a tiny box.

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On 03-02-20 23:28, echicken wrote to Tony Langdon <=-

Re: Re: Arduino
By: Tony Langdon to echicken on Tue Mar 03 2020 09:55:00

I am using Arduinos for a project of mine, but it's not BBS related. The

Anything fun?

Yeah a photo finish timing system. Uses an iPhone with an app to do the photo finish. Uses 2 Arduinos, a 433 MHz wireless transmitter and 2 receivers to manage the starting signal.

I've used Arduinos and other MCUs in many projects over the past 10+ years, and Raspberry Pi or similar for other projects. Sometimes it's tricky to choose the best tool for the job, but they all have their
place.

Indeed. Arduino is for those control jobs that have to be 100% reliable. That sort of code can be made very deerministic and with a low bug count. And you're not having to deal with a whole OS. :)

These days, unless I specifically need something really small, low
power, or extremely cheap, I tend to reach for a Raspberry Pi Zero W.
Lots of GPIO and just all around easy to develop for.

The Pi is a good general purpose system, and one of my gotos as well. :)

Interesting concept. If you were to do it, you might want to have a system that focuses on controlling things in the real world, in addition to

whatever

BBS features you wanted to have.

Yeah, I'd have to think about what/why/how a BBS might interact with
the physical world. My thought process on this so far was that it would
be neat to have a mesh of little nodes that made up a BBS, or just a
tiny BBS in a tiny box.

Maybe have it flash a LED when you have new mail? ;)


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Dan Cross wrote to Mortifis <=-

An 8-bit AVR with a couple of K of SRAM isn't really packin'
the horses for something like that.

The old Fido sources in C are floating around somewhere... :)


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