Hi. I’m just getting started with development for the Smoothieboard, and was wondering what IDE is recommended for editing code. I’m happy with the command line build and deploment to the board, but was wondering what made it easiest to actually work on the code.
I’ve seen the guide to using eclipse and I’ve got this sort of working. The code builds from the command line but appears full of errors in Eclipse. However seeing the warning at the top saying it’s not officially supported makes me wonder what IDE is. Surely it’s more than just a text editor? I’m new to LPC development and there’s a few to chose from (mbed, LPCXpresso IDE).
In a similar vein - what development hardware is recommended for development? I’ve currently taken my Smoothieboard out of my laser and I’m testing it using a logic analyzer to see what output it’s giving (PWM, etc). If I could easily develop on a LPC1768 mbed board or an LPCXpresso1769, then I’d be happy to do the bulk of the work on this and leave my Smoothieboard in place for final testing. The guides I found for these seem a bit out of date.
I’m not after a substitute for a working board. I probably won’t ever attach a stepper driver or MOSFET to it. I just want something to make the initial develop / build / test cycle easier and quicker.
Most smoothie devs use either basic text editor ( gedit/kate etc ), or code editors ( emacs, vim, sublime, etc ).
What exactly are you looking for in an IDE like eclipse that you wouldn’t get with one of these ?
For dev platform, most of us just use Smoothieboard nowadays, but you should be able to work with a LPCXpresso ( or any other LPC1769 dev board really ).
Thanks for the quick reply. I find that an IDE makes it easier to navigate around the code, prompts you with the available methods on a class you’re using, gives you early hints of any errors. It’s just a nicer experience all round compared with waiting for “make all” to tell you that your typing sucks. I’m also used to breakpoints and JTAG debugging, when working with CCS for the MSP430 for instance, but can live without this…
I’ll stick with Eclipse then. I went a bit off-piste from the guide as I decided to use the latest version rather than the one from when the guide was written.
Developing on the Smoothieboard is also working fine. I’ll probably grab a LPCXpresso1769 when they’re back in stock though.