[Simon]

ScratchCrumble 0.4 can now control the sparkles 🙂

http://simplesi.net/scratchcrumble/

[Simon]

If you can’t wait for native support – 4Tronix have produced a Servo Crumb
http://4tronix.co.uk/store/index.php?rt=product/product&path=82_84&product_id=503

Simon

[Simon]

Ye -same problem with Proximity Crumb when I tried last term. I think 4Tronix wer egoign to make them a bit less sensitive for future batches. All IR sensors have the same problem but since these are normally sitting up on a desk – they are subject to a lot of ambient light.

An old trick with these sort of sensors is to get a small black rubber tube and place over sensor so that they become much more directional but I’ve not tried that yet with these ones but that technique has proved effective on robots with IR sensors.

Re PIR sensors – ALL PIR seem to behave randomly (due to the rate of change of signal principle that they work on)

They are designed to work at a distance so you have to program them on trust – mount them in position – move well away – then approach and see what happens. They detect lateral movement much more than to and from

simon

[Simon]

Hi
What the situation is that the Crumble is obviously a commercial piece of kit and the software that it runs isn’t opensource.

Joseph has let me incorporate some python libs into my project so I can talk to the Crumble and at the moment I’m “hiding” these by only distributing an .exe.

I believe/think/hope that eventually these libs will be opened up but that’s a matter for Joseph

Simon

[Simon]

Yep – the Crumble outputs can drive plain LEDs

[Simon]

Version 0.3 – changed inputs to CrumbleA/B/C/D (outputs still just A/B/C/D) prob going to play around further

Simon

[Simon]

🙂
Thanks very much for all your efforts and feedback

I think I’ll have a play around with sensor naming to minimise possible confusion
Simon

[Simon]

em – I’m very confused by your description of sensor values

Using latest test script

my screen looks like this

4 sensor values A,B,C and D that respond to each leg

Simon

[Simon]

Just tried it out back at the school where is was failing and its run for an hour with no events so hopefully its fixed but I need confirmation from others 🙂

Simon

[Simon]

Well overnight – no crashes or dropouts on my dev machine running the exe 🙂

[Simon]

Ok – I had a thought that it might be clashing between threads so I’ve added some locks to the I/O routines and it lasted up to 4700 on my setup here without any errors (but of course I may have just been lucky)

Anyway – its back to the old packaging system for V0.2.1

Try it and see what happens please

Simon

[Simon]

OK this is now test script to record events
http://snag.gy/7dsRf.jpg

and export of record list which shows about 4/5 events

2039.567
2039.592
2039.616
2039.648
2039.669
2039.694
2039.722
2039.754
2039.773
2039.798
2039.825
2039.867
2039.88
2039.905
2039.93
2039.962
2039.981
2040.006
2040.032
2112.123
2322.772
2322.816
2322.823
2322.85
2322.876
2322.917
2322.925
2322.953
2322.975
2323.009
2323.025
2323.05
2323.075
2323.107
2323.126
2323.153
2323.176
2323.215
2323.227
2323.252
2537.984
2538.01
2538.043
2538.06
2538.087
2538.112
2538.15
2538.162
2538.188
2538.214
2538.248
2538.264
2538.289
2538.314
2538.349
2538.364
2538.389
2538.414
2538.445
2927.353
2927.36
2927.384
2927.41
2927.451
2927.462
2927.487
2927.515
2927.547
2927.562
2927.586
2927.611
2927.641
2927.662
2927.688
2927.716
2927.745
2927.766
2927.791
2927.816
2941.36
2941.373
2941.398
2941.424
2941.468
2941.475
2941.499
2941.529
2941.56
2941.575
2941.6
2941.624
2941.654
2941.674
2941.699
2941.726
2941.754
2941.774
2941.799
2941.825
3424.308
3424.333

[Simon]

OK ran same Scratch routine but running ScratchCrumble.py direct from my Pycharm IDE and it lasted till 1500 secs before exceeding the 100 count.

I’m thinking that could just be an accumulation of 100 blips rather than a fail at 1500 sec – I’ll need to write a better Scratch logger to see if that’s true

[Simon]

Nah – just leaving it alone and it goes off-piste!
Lets try using this as test routine – out of 4 runs – maximum time it lasted was 80 secs

[Simon]

mm – just tried it on one of my schools on the w2k8 server (as thats the machine I sit at) and it did perculier things

Starts off ok with D connected to A -leave it a few minutes – fine
But very shortly after connecting B to D as well, it starts thinking A is LO and then just stops responding

I think I’ve have to do some native Python tests (without Scratch) just to make sure the basics are working

Simon

[Author]

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