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Is Arduino killing the electronic hobby?
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james_s:

--- Quote from: Bradlez on June 29, 2021, 01:19:33 pm ---Imagine in an alternate timeline where PIC18F based Arduino boards reigned supreme instead of ATMEGA boards. I wonder if the world would be much different.

--- End quote ---

Why would it be? There are already loads of different Arduino boards that are not Atmega based, from the user perspective they are not much different to develop for.
SiliconWizard:

--- Quote from: james_s on June 29, 2021, 04:59:25 pm ---
--- Quote from: Bradlez on June 29, 2021, 01:19:33 pm ---Imagine in an alternate timeline where PIC18F based Arduino boards reigned supreme instead of ATMEGA boards. I wonder if the world would be much different.

--- End quote ---

Why would it be? There are already loads of different Arduino boards that are not Atmega based, from the user perspective they are not much different to develop for.

--- End quote ---

Yes, indeed!

The question is still "interesting" though, come to think of it, but maybe not in the way it was expressed.

There clearly were like two crowds at the time (probably still the case a little bit, but a lot less obvious ever since ARM-based MCUs became very popular): the PIC users and the AVR users. Each often pretty opiniated about their preferred MCU line, and with a slightly different mindset as far as I can tell.

So a maybe interesting, related, but different question could be: "Could Arduino have been imagined and designed with 8-bit PIC MCUs to begin with, instead of AVR ones?"
It's of course not possible to answer this question, but we can still have an opinion. I for one am not 100% sure this could have happened, again mainly because most PIC users tended to exhibit a different mindset. And even the respective vendors had a different approach, explaining this partly too.
james_s:
Of course it could have, although I think it would have required an open source C compiler existing for the PICs, is there such a thing? I got started with AVRs and stuck with them because I know them. I don't think the PIC is any worse but I used the AVR because there was an easy and free BASIC compiler that I was able to get started with now over 20 years ago and PIC at the time meant learning assembly. It all comes down to the software, I don't really care what's going on inside the chip.
rstofer:

--- Quote from: SiliconWizard on June 29, 2021, 06:37:10 pm ---
--- Quote from: james_s on June 29, 2021, 04:59:25 pm ---
--- Quote from: Bradlez on June 29, 2021, 01:19:33 pm ---Imagine in an alternate timeline where PIC18F based Arduino boards reigned supreme instead of ATMEGA boards. I wonder if the world would be much different.

--- End quote ---

Why would it be? There are already loads of different Arduino boards that are not Atmega based, from the user perspective they are not much different to develop for.

--- End quote ---

--- End quote ---
Well, there was the OOPIC based on the 16F877A.  This added an objected oriented approach to PIC programming and was quite powerful and totally unique.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OOPic

It was pretty popular 20 years ago.

https://www.amazon.com/Programming-Customizing-OOPic-Microcontroller-Official/dp/0071420843
Nominal Animal:

--- Quote from: Siwastaja on June 29, 2021, 07:19:08 am ---frequently seen overconfident Arduino hobbyists

--- End quote ---
I was so ready to respond, and then you go and say

--- Quote from: Siwastaja on June 29, 2021, 07:19:08 am ---So I really do see Arduino as an important stepping stone which does mostly good, but like always with any technology, there are traps and you can fall into them.

--- End quote ---
which leaves me with nothing to do but *nod in agreement*.

The variants of the stated question, for example "If Arduino is killing the electronic hobby, how is it causing that?" and "If Arduino is killing the electronic hobby, should we stop Arduino? How? Is that even possible, or just Quixotic You-Kids-Need-to-Grow-A-Lawn-To-Become-Men-So-You-Too-Can-Shout-At-Kids stuff?" and "If something about or in Arduino is killing the electronic hobby, what could we replace it with that is similarly useful, but would not kill the electronic hobby?" and "Is electronics hobby something we should try to keep as is, or should we let it go as it may and see what comes out after a decade or two, like we do with basically all hobbies outside of organized sports and religion?", plus all reasonable ideas about making Arduino better, or replacing it with something similar but in a some clearly defined way "better", is fun shop talk.  Not idle chat, though, because there is information and experience lurking here; but more fun that way, too.
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