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Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : Raspberry Pi

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Teo1
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Joined: 06/05/2023
Location: Romania
Posts: 30
Posted: 08:19pm 28 Jan 2025
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Hello everyone!
Thanks to the authors for Picobasic. It's wonderful!
Do you think you can implement this Basic in the Raspberry Pi 4 or 5 as well?
It would be extraordinary!!!
Thanks in advance,
Teo
 
JohnS
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Joined: 18/11/2011
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 4037
Posted: 09:29pm 28 Jan 2025
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Used to be available - search for Picromite.

John
 
homa

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Joined: 05/11/2021
Location: Germany
Posts: 465
Posted: 09:30pm 28 Jan 2025
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Hi Teo,

https://github.com/thwill1000/mmb4l

It's from Tom ... https://sockpuppetstudios.com/

For 32-bit Linux Debian/Raspbian 11 "bullseye" running on ARM, e.g. Raspberry Pi Zero, 1, 2 & 3, use the 'armv6l' build.

   Note that graphics and audio performance on the original Raspberry Pi Zero is very poor, I have not tested on a 1 or 2.


Matthias
 
lizby
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Joined: 17/05/2016
Location: United States
Posts: 3358
Posted: 09:35pm 28 Jan 2025
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MMB4L will run on any Raspberry Pi with current Raspbian:
https://www.thebackshed.com/forum/ViewTopic.php?FID=16&TID=17635

Note that this implementation does not include pin I/O control.

The Picromite implementation does not run on current Raspbian--the under-the-hood I/O API was changed by the Raspberry Pi folks.
PicoMite, Armmite F4, SensorKits, MMBasic Hardware, Games, etc. on fruitoftheshed
 
Teo1
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Joined: 06/05/2023
Location: Romania
Posts: 30
Posted: 09:54pm 28 Jan 2025
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Thanks for the answers!
I would like to make an analogue and digital data acquisition system.
To use something similar to the GUI from picom, but on a large display.
Do you think it's possible?
Teo
 
JohnS
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Joined: 18/11/2011
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 4037
Posted: 10:08pm 28 Jan 2025
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Maybe one of the STM32 systems. Lots of I/O, fast displays.

F4 is great, H7 even more powerful.

John
 
Teo1
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Joined: 06/05/2023
Location: Romania
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Posted: 10:11pm 28 Jan 2025
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Is it faster than the Raspberry Pi 5?
 
JohnS
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Joined: 18/11/2011
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 4037
Posted: 10:47pm 28 Jan 2025
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  Teo1 said  Is it faster than the Raspberry Pi 5?

Maybe, maybe not. Why do you need speed?

For most of the things they're all fast enough.

One thing is with the RPi you've got Linux.  Good if you want it, bad if not.

Also with the RPi you have very little I/O, with poor things the I/O can do, and pretty poor access to it.

John
 
phil99

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Joined: 11/02/2018
Location: Australia
Posts: 2605
Posted: 10:53pm 28 Jan 2025
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As there is no OS to get in the way MMBasic is very fast on the H7.

From what I have read Peter stopped work on the Picromite as Raspbian kept changing, requiring large changes to MMBasic. And I/O was a problem.
 
JohnS
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Posted: 10:54pm 28 Jan 2025
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Oh, and there's cost - the RPi 5 costs much more than anything else with MMBasic.

John
 
Teo1
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Joined: 06/05/2023
Location: Romania
Posts: 30
Posted: 11:05pm 28 Jan 2025
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I would like to use something similar to: https://thebyteworks.com Easy Control and Rack Designer but with Rpi not with Windows PC.
 
lizby
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Joined: 17/05/2016
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Posted: 11:51pm 28 Jan 2025
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Rack Designer:



If you like the PicoMite graphics, what is there about the Raspberry Pi that you think would make it a better platform?

If you want fast, the CMM2 MMBasic platform could provide everything you want. As others have said, the Armmite F4 might well suit your needs.

If you want an OS, there is MMB4L, which does run on the Pi. I don't know exactly what the state of GUI-type graphics is on MMB4L, but the release from a week or two was specifically aimed at providing game-type graphics.
PicoMite, Armmite F4, SensorKits, MMBasic Hardware, Games, etc. on fruitoftheshed
 
PhenixRising
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Joined: 07/11/2023
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 1360
Posted: 12:12am 29 Jan 2025
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The only reason I'd consider the Pi over the CMM2 is the availability of a capacitive touch screen.

As part of my dog and pony show, to my customers, I literally take a screwdriver and attack the sensor to demonstrate the resilience  

I do have options where I have a serial interface to the touch screen but ideally, I'd like to stick with components that are easily sourced by end-users.
 
lizby
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Joined: 17/05/2016
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Posted: 12:49am 29 Jan 2025
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As Phenix has entered the discussion, you might consider his robust industrial-grade solution--build the interface on android, and use bluetooth to talk to sensors, which might be hosted on PicoMites.
PicoMite, Armmite F4, SensorKits, MMBasic Hardware, Games, etc. on fruitoftheshed
 
Mixtel90

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Joined: 05/10/2019
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 7856
Posted: 07:45am 29 Jan 2025
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There are many ways to skin a cat. :)  First you have to define the problem, making special notes for each section. e.g. user interfaces don't need speed but they may need to be flexible in programming, Loop controls with feedback from sensors need to be fast but will never do anything else, they may need something like a RS-485 interface though, where commands will be buffered until the processor has time to handle them. Don't attempt to do everything on one board unless it's a full industrial PC - and be prepared to pay the (monetary) price.

If your use interface would be ok on a 5in or 7in resistive touch screen then the PicoMite could handle that well, it supports commands for it.

You may choose to interface that to other modules, possibly using I2C or SPI or even bluetooth, each carrying out it's own task or set of tasks.

The main thing is that there will be a way to do it and speed isn't *always* as important as you may think. If, for example, there is one short sequence that has to operate *extremely* fast then you may be able to do everything on one PicoMite, using a PIO for that one fast bit. A GUI will always be as slow as a human, but commands from it are on interrupts so you don't need to be sitting around waiting for input.
Mick

Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini
Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs
 
thwill

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Joined: 16/09/2019
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 4301
Posted: 11:25am 29 Jan 2025
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  lizby said  I don't know exactly what the state of GUI-type graphics is on MMB4L, but the release from a week or two was specifically aimed at providing game-type graphics.


Other than GUI BITMAP (required by @Martin H's Pico-Vaders game) the MMBasic GUI commands are currently unimplemented in MMB4L. I might be persuaded to do it in the future if there is a "real" project but unfortunately I don't have time to implement it "on spec". Of course someone else could do it, probably a "relatively" simple copy & paste from Peter/Geoff's PicoMite code .

Best wishes,

Tom
MMBasic for Linux, Game*Mite, CMM2 Welcome Tape, Creaky old text adventures
 
lizby
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Joined: 17/05/2016
Location: United States
Posts: 3358
Posted: 02:51pm 29 Jan 2025
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  thwill said  Other than GUI BITMAP (required by @Martin H's Pico-Vaders game) the MMBasic GUI commands are currently unimplemented in MMB4L ... Of course someone else could do it, probably a "relatively" simple copy & paste from Peter/Geoff's PicoMite code .


From the MMB4L thread:

  LeoNicolas said  I will take a look at the source code and how the unit tests are structured. It will be a pleasure to contribute to the MMB4L project.


Now there's a place to dip your toe in, @LeoNicolas, if you're interested.
PicoMite, Armmite F4, SensorKits, MMBasic Hardware, Games, etc. on fruitoftheshed
 
matherp
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Joined: 11/12/2012
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 10229
Posted: 03:10pm 29 Jan 2025
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Implementing GUI controls for MMB4L is non trivial. They are originally designed to work with a touch screen. To make them work on a monitor required modifications MMB4W does this with an unpleasant hack (my standard programming approach) as does CMM2 - both are hardware specific to a greater or lesser extent.
One of the other ports has a version that supports both mouse and touch (MMX?).
Probably starting with the MMB4W version is the best approach.
To implement GUI controls there are changes needed to multiple source files (7 in the PicoMite)
 
bfwolf
Regular Member

Joined: 03/01/2025
Location: Germany
Posts: 75
Posted: 03:44pm 29 Jan 2025
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Maybe interesting for others?
Not a project of mine, but know it since several years..

http://www.comvisu.de/descreenshots.htm

Sample screenshot:



GUI language may be switched from German to English but manual only available in German language!

Available for Windows, Linux and Raspberry Linux..
Communication with microcontroller boards possible via RS232 or TCP/IP..

bfwolf
 
thwill

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Joined: 16/09/2019
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 4301
Posted: 03:52pm 29 Jan 2025
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  matherp said  Implementing GUI controls for MMB4L is non trivial.


Yes, I should probably roll back on that, I assumed that with the graphics primitives in place that would be a substantial amount of the work done, but there is more to it than that.

Getting MOUSE input working first would be a more manageable entertainment.

  matherp said  ... there are changes needed to multiple source files (7 in the PicoMite)


And no doubt more in MMB4L because I have started breaking up some of the more monolithic files.

In general, and even ignoring GPIO and the fact that MMBasic is a moving target, MMB4L is still significantly far from feature parity with the PicoMite family and that's not a target I can even realistically aiming for. It's a plaything that I'm working on for my own edutainment, if a couple of people get some "real" use out of it or some things might feed back into the mainline then that's great, but only a side-effect.

Best wishes,

Tom
MMBasic for Linux, Game*Mite, CMM2 Welcome Tape, Creaky old text adventures
 
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