[OpenTRV-interest] Thinking aloud re what to integrate on the MCU board

[Damon Hart-Davis]

> On 30 Apr 2015, at 13:45, Damon Hart-Davis <dhd at exnet.com> wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> Our IoT Launchpad pitch shows the power, radio and microcontroller (and sensor) boards as separate and stackable, and they certainly should be available in that form.
> 
> But there also advantages (eg space and cost) to integrating common combinations onto merged boards (ie that cover 2 or 3 levels of the stack) such as we have with OpenTRV.
> 
> It strikes me that having the radio module and its support code integrated makes particular sense where possible, eg because the crypto support code may be very different for different radios and so only having the right set taking Flash space could be helpful.
> 
> Equally, hosting a TMP112 temperature sensor by default and some simple power conditioning seems sensible.
> 
> Anyone have any thoughts on what merged board elements might be be useful optimisations alongside the simple separated function boards?
> 
> Also, what depth vertically should we allow for by default for the stacked boards, esp sensors?  Enough to take a socketed DIL plastic chip or more or less?
> 
> Rgds
> 
> Damon

I had a helpful followup on chat, keep ‘em coming:


Afternoon, just read your email re integrating stuff on the MCU board
Probably a really silly question but would it not make sense to use the same configuration as an Arduino
There are even boards off the shelf that are almost exactly what you describe; http://shop.ciseco.co.uk/xinorf-100-arduino-uno-r3-based-dev-board-with-radio-transciever/
J
 • 


Hi
No, not a silly question at all.
The primary problems are size and that we carry very different I/O and power for example.
But more ideas on that lines very welcome, thanks!

Your idea [is] fundamentally good and I'd like to do it, but I think it would cause too much developer surprise, plus the other things…


Rgds

Damon