embeddedgurus.com: "An open letter to the developers of the MPLAB IDE"

[andersm]

upgrading to xc32 v1.32, the good old 'return 2' xclm trick no longer works... just an FYI.

It seems they're now verifying the SHA256 checksum of the license manager executable. The hardcoded checksum string is present in the cc1, cc1plus and lto1 binaries.

[BloodyCactus]

yep. whats worse, every platform has a different sha256, so someone had to build xclm, sha256 it, paste it into the build and then build gcc/binutils/etc.  then you see its plain ascii embedded into the files. lol. ohwell.

worse to me, all the plib stuff has been deprecated and your supposed to use harmony, which does not come with the compiler, and so far, each release totally breaks everything from the last release. aargh. so were supposed to migrate to some shit that they have not even finished OR TESTED, damn, their own forum is full of bugs and things not implemented.

I like using pic32 but damn they should get the replacement lib working fully before trying to force us over, why the hell is the harmony lib 170mb download WITHOUT HELP FILES? oh thats another 24mb..

[dannyf]

the good old 'return 2' xclm trick no longer works.

It seems to me that if someone makes a product that you like, the right thing to do is to reward them, or at least not punish them.

The fact that Microchip got bad marks because they made their products less easy to hack speaks volume about some users than Microchip.

[nctnico]

The thing is that with most software it is easier to use the hacked version than the version you buy from the manufacturer. I'm running hacked versions exclusively even though I have all the original disks. It is just too much hassle to deal with online activation schemes, dongles, moving node locked licenses to a new PC, entering endless sequences of keys, etc, etc.

[BloodyCactus]

so I should pay 1000$ usd to to turn on 'optimisations' that are built into gcc? microchip didnt fund those gcc optimisations, but I really should pay for them right?  since its open source, they can charge whatever they want, but since it is open source, I can recompile then as I see fit. Thats power of open source.

[Rufus]

the good old 'return 2' xclm trick no longer works.

It seems to me that if someone makes a product that you like, the right thing to do is to reward them, or at least not punish them.

Seems to me that if someone rewards you for your product the right thing to do is not punish them with obnoxious licensing and activation schemes and slower compile times.....

And I don't really like their product anyway, XC8 in particular has been riddled with bugs and product support is abysmal.

[Mechatrommer]

so I should pay 1000$ usd to to turn on 'optimisations' that are built into gcc? ... Thats power of open source.

yes thats the power of free dish. implemetation of a OS code in a product doesnt necesarily means the product should be free as well. you want free go for command line or find someone that can spoonfeed you well. even fun, becomes a daddy or a professional programmer.

[true]

so I should pay 1000$ usd to to turn on 'optimisations' that are built into gcc? ... Thats power of open source.

yes thats the power of free dish. implemetation of a OS code in a product doesnt necesarily means the product should be free as well. you want free go for command line or find someone that can spoonfeed you well. even fun, becomes a daddy or a professional programmer.

This is a compiler. A GPL licensed compiler. The product, by definition, IS free, in the RMS / "free software" / "as in speech" meaning of the word. The product can still be sold, but the license grants recipients the right to modify and redistribute, so Microchip does not hold absolute control. IANAL go consult your own

Besides, in context of this discussion, your "command line" remark doesn't make any sense. I simply don't get the "spoonfeed" remark. Even fun, even.

I wrote a patch for this new thing before I noticed someone else did. But I am curious; what is in the "Top" patch collection? Sounds more involved than it needs to be. His old xclm was less encompassing than mine. I am curious to see wtf this xclm of his that wants the old xclm is...

[dannyf]

so I should pay 1000$ usd to to turn on 'optimisations' that are built into gcc?

It is up to you if you should or shouldn't do it.

But you punish people for producing things that you want, sooner or later, no one will be producing things that you want.

[nctnico]

But you punish people for producing things that you want, sooner or later, no one will be producing things that you want.

There is tons of open source software which prove this statement is absolutely wrong.

[andersm]

You have it backwards, as usual. GCC was developed by the community.

If you look at the development history of GCC, the overwhelmingly largest amount of work has been commercial. It's also incorrect to say that Microchip have done "nothing". They've added extra support for their chips, extended ISR support, added features to the linker and so on. And for many, just providing precompiled binaries is a service worth paying for.

With all the hand-wringing about open source you'd expect someone would have actually done something by now.

[WarSim]

Which platform specifically?  Here is my reason for asking. 
When I consider a new product I search their site for a question to ask.  I ask this question three times ever 2 weeks for 6 weeks.  For every month waiting for a reply, I am less likely to use any of their products.  After a year they are never considered again, unless I hear of many great experiences. 


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[nctnico]

You have it backwards, as usual. GCC was developed by the community.

If you look at the development history of GCC, the overwhelmingly largest amount of work has been commercial. It's also incorrect to say that Microchip have done "nothing". They've added extra support for their chips, extended ISR support, added features to the linker and so on. And for many, just providing precompiled binaries is a service worth paying for.

With all the hand-wringing about open source you'd expect someone would have actually done something by now.

I find it hard to believe Microchip added features to GCC which improved MIPS support in general. Even though MIPS is not a general purpose core (only a few big companies use MIPS) GCC's MIPS support is pretty decent. I think Microchip added features to make it easier to port existing PIC source code to PIC32.

[Mechatrommer]

But you punish people for producing things that you want, sooner or later, no one will be producing things that you want.

There is tons of open source software which prove this statement is absolutely wrong.

and there are tons of open source software which prove this statement is absolutely wrong. if you are accustomed to quality softwares, you know its not with most of this so called FOSS. one good example is the "famous and mentioned everywhere" KiCAD. time needed to improve it, is exponential of the complexity (or quality) of the software to the power of 10, aka it will take eternity to get really usable just as the paid EDA version of today. you may argue its the thing that does what "you want", but well.... after installing most FOSS around, i wish there is a paid version, if its too expensive, i wish i can do it myself. most FOSS is a "crippled" (or crawling) version of an otherwise another famous jargon "portable code" running in M$ Wind***. so... my english can be broken.

[Mechatrommer]

well to be fair, it is true some FOSS are usable and good, but some.... ehhhh.

[nctnico]

But you punish people for producing things that you want, sooner or later, no one will be producing things that you want.

There is tons of open source software which prove this statement is absolutely wrong.

and there are tons of open source software which prove this statement is absolutely wrong. if you are accustomed to quality softwares, you know its not with most of this so called FOSS. one good example is the "famous and mentioned everywhere" KiCAD. time needed to improve it, is exponential of the complexity (or quality) of the software to the power of 10, aka it will take eternity to get really usable just as the paid EDA

It is always possible to name one example where something doesn't turn out well. Open source electronics software has been lagging behind in general. It just takes a party with enough interest to pick up the pace. CERN has big plans for Kicad.
Then again there are many open source software packages which work really well. Linux in general, GCC, Gimp, Apache, PHP, Firefox, Eclipse, Wireshark to name a few.

In general there is more crappy software than good software whether it is free or you pay for it.

[andersm]

I find it hard to believe Microchip added features to GCC which improved MIPS support in general. Even though MIPS is not a general purpose core (only a few big companies use MIPS) GCC's MIPS support is pretty decent. I think Microchip added features to make it easier to port existing PIC source code to PIC32.

Partly that, partly chip support, and partly chip-specific features like configuration bits. I don't know if the ISR handlers for the external interrupt controller is completely Microchip's work (their toolchain is based on CodeSourcery's/Mentor's tree), but they have definitely extended it.

[neslekkim]

You have it backwards, as usual. GCC was developed by the community.

If you look at the development history of GCC, the overwhelmingly largest amount of work has been commercial. It's also incorrect to say that Microchip have done "nothing". They've added extra support for their chips, extended ISR support, added features to the linker and so on. And for many, just providing precompiled binaries is a service worth paying for.

With all the hand-wringing about open source you'd expect someone would have actually done something by now.

Is the sources for xc16 and xc32 complete?, so if you compile it yourself, you get the pro compilers, is that is?

[miguelvp]

Not sure if complete but here is the page where to get the sources (search for "Source Archives" within this page)

http://www.microchip.com/pagehandler/en-us/devtools/dev-tools-parts.html

[BloodyCactus]

Is the sources for xc16 and xc32 complete?, so if you compile it yourself, you get the pro compilers, is that is?

dont know about x16, but it is for x32. the compiler is 'complete' the 'pro' is just a switch that enables existing parts of gcc. the cpp compiler is exactly that too, a switch.

[miguelvp]

If you have the source you can tell to use that switch regardless of what the IDE passes.

[Mechatrommer]

Then again there are many open source software packages which work really well... Eclipse

i hate to mention it since that is another famous name here. good? usable and it can do the job? yes! but usable with comfort? i dont think so. imho, if they have to, the developers should learn from MSVisualStudioExpress (i guess, since its the next thing to the MSVisual6 i'm currently using) i know one can bash on nonportable MSVS, but its not about portability or not, its about comfort and one big help file as reference without going online looking the earth. and importantly without finding another chunk of binaries to make it work.

In general there is more crappy software than good software whether it is free or you pay for it.

agreed, the problem is not whether its free or not, its the finger behind the scene. does anyone really serious, motivated or commited spending thousands of hours for a "quality" FOSS? let alone making a effort to make it work at the first install in any type of OS targetted at. frankly i havent seen one, like KiCAD it will be like, bye bye my dear (i have enough) hope someone can take care of you soon, gladly CERN took it. as for the paid version, they are commited, they are even commited pushing their product to the edge, edge of what? you define it.

[nctnico]

There is very little to argue with opinion  Eclipse has been developed by big companies like IBM to create a very good IDE. I have been using it exclusively for all my software development for about 10 years now. It does take some getting used to in the beginning but I'm pretty productive with it especially since I can use it for C, C++, PHP and VHDL. I really don't want to go back to MSVS 

[dannyf]

I have been using it exclusively for all my software development for about 10 years now.

For such an "expert" on Eclipse, you seem to have more than your fair share of troubles getting CoIDE (=Eclipse) to work.

[BloodyCactus]

eclipse is great if you stay away from plugins.

Im a netbeans guy over eclipse, so I really like that Microchip picked it for MPLABX.