I’m still working on building a really nice development environment for the Arduino. The Arduino IDE works (and is easily installed on Fedora, with sudo yum install arduino) but it’s very, very primitive compared to the Java IDEs with which I’m more familiar.
So now I’m on the hunt for a good C++ IDE that works well with Arduino. Ideally, I’d like to be able to import an Arduino sketch (the “project” for Arduino) verbatim into this mythical C++ IDE, compile, and deploy.
It can’t be that hard, can it?
So the first thing I’ve tried is the Eclipse CDT, as documented in “Adventures in Arduino.”
Eclipse’ CDT worked, as long as I didn’t try something silly, like the extension libraries for driving the LCD screen. This is a very limiting definition of “works,” because those extension libraries are very, very handy. I’m aware that this is my limitation, but:
I couldn’t quite figure out what the “proper” settings were. I found settings that should have worked, but didn’t. On bringing this up to others who used Eclipse CDT and the Arduino plugin, they suggested I follow the directions “to the letter“… which I mostly did, except I’m not installing a 32-bit Eclipse.
Letter, consider thyself not followed.
Eclipse CDT, consider thyself marked as mostly harmless, but not good enough yet. I’ll revisit you if I need to.
That said, though, in terms of raw C++, Eclipse CDT was actually pretty usable. I was able to use it for a native C++ program or three (just noodling around, warming up the C++ muscles), mostly to end up with this thought line:
Why did I ever leave C++ in the first place?
Oh yeah, because it kinda sucks.
In all fairness, other languages suck too – generally as much as C++. It’s just that they just suck in ways that make the overall experience more positive for me.
The next thing up on deck is Code::Blocks.
It’s installable on Fedora, after installing the Fedora Repository as mentioned. Install the repository, then sudo yum install codeblocks. It even discovers the AVR compiler out of the box, which is nice…
But the AVR project configuration is still a little murky for me. It uses a custom build process (like Eclipse does), so modification of the environment to fit the Arduino sketch requirement (remember, I want to be able to take an Arduino sketch’s source, then compile, deploy, and run) isn’t quite all there yet.
I may yet figure out the sketch configuration such that I can get both Eclipse and Code::Blocks working to my satisfaction.
But I’m not there yet. I’m looking into a manual project configuration process, to see if that takes care of the issues I’m running into.
… And before we go too far, yes, I’m aware that none of these issues are actually serious blockers. My goal is to make a streamlined process, remember, not just bull my way through every issue.
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I left Arduino because of C ++ it has no multithreading multitasking or Parallel programing built in. State machines don’t work on large projects, and the commercial programs to make it easier are impossible to figure out.
RTOS wont work on Arduino, its not easy either. Unless you go with something like Duin OS and that’s in Alfa with no support. I could care less about the IDE I want a programing language that works. That’s not C or any flavor, patched up knock offs that they are using today. I went Netduino, it has its limitations too, but it runs C# or even Visual basic. With built in multitasking that works, and It has way more power, better made, and cheaper. This is also one of its limitations as it would be expensive, and a little hard to copy into a production model, although not impossible.