5 ms·

Well, this isn't a particularly insightful comment, but my feelings about this are "fark :[". The AVR definitely has something Nordic about it. I first learned

Well, this isn't a particularly insightful comment, but my feelings about this are "fark :[". The AVR definitely has something Nordic about it. I first learned C when programming an AVR Butterfly eval board to take photos like [0] using [1]. I've found the AVR architecture to be much cleaner than 8 or 16 bit PICs. Atmel, for the most part, embraced GPL and GCC. Microchip has tried to squirrel GCC optimization features away from being truly FOSS. [0]: https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/53/115619170_4445c593cd_o.jpg https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/53/115619170_4445c593cd_o.jpg [1]: https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/56/112758047_dc5b4bdc3b_o.jpg https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/56/112758047_dc5b4bdc3b_o.jpg

i_have_to_speak 11y ago
Dude, be careful what you post. These are the days when 10-year-olds can't afford to make spelling mistakes [1]. [1] http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-35354061 http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-35354061
colanderman 11y ago
IIRC Microchip's 8-bit PIC line had poor/nonexistent GCC support because their terrible instruction set provided no way to maintain a data stack. Their own compiler just allocated everything statically. Granted, it's (thankfully) been over a decade since I had to use a Microchip microcontroller, and they've presumably improved since. But Atmel got it right from the start. GCC-AVR produced beautiful assembly and their ISA was a joy to use. RIP Atmel.
- tptacek 11y ago
  Calling AVR a "joy to use" is pushing it a little far. There are things to like about AVR chips as a package, but the AVR instruction set is pretty janky. I don't understand why they're so popular compared to the MSP430.
  - saaadhu 11y ago
    Care to elaborate?
    - wglb 11y ago
      See if https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10946870 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10946870 answers.
  - blackguardx 11y ago
    I found the AVR instruction set pretty straight forward. Granted, it was my first forray into assembly and I learned it around 17 years ago at age 14. Maybe everything seems easy in hindsight at that age. I've never programmed MSP430s in assembly, but I have for PICs and found their instruction set to be more funky than AVR.
    - tptacek 11y ago
      So first a couple caveats: (1) I'm sure AVR is a hell of a let better than PIC, (2) I come at this from a really weird place (exclusively emulators and compilers), and (3) I'm not talking about the AVR parts themselves, which might be more cost-effective for a given project. That said: * Harvard architecture (split I & D memory) * 8 bit registers * Not at all orthogonal, and particularly painful for pointer addressing * The stack pointer is annoying to work with * Address wrap at physical memory bounds, rather than the bounds of address space I could pick a bunch more nits that would only really be relevant to someone writing an emulator (complicated instruction decode, IO addressing, &c) but those are my big complaints. I find MSP430 much more pleasant to work in.
      - colanderman 11y ago
        Those are all true (though that an 8-bit microcontroller has 8-bit registers is… unsurprising). However I am referring to the instructions themselves, which were well-engineered to match the needs of a compiler. The result is very compact assembly for most C programs that you would write on an 8-bit microcontroller (including things like 16-bit arithmetic).
  - ild 11y ago
    1MIPS @ 1MHZ made it popular.
- ild 11y ago
  PICs used to be less power hungry though and had ROM versions.
  - jason_s 11y ago
    ??? Sounds like FUD to me.
    - ild 11y ago
      FUD?? Why? The did have ROM version, and, being made from slower silicon had lower leakage.
brandmeyer 11y ago
I don't know that I would say Atmel has embraced GCC. Consider the case of the AVR32: Atmel's port is in a fork of GCC, and has not been merged upstream. Considering how long they've been maintaining their fork, I'm not sure it ever will be merged.
- krkoch 11y ago
  I think AVR32 is dead (also UC3, AP7 died years ago). I've not seen any development the last years. I guess they don't want to compete with their own ARM's.
  - phyllostachys 11y ago
    In a few meet and greets, the Atmel app engineers mentioned that they always steer people to ARM parts unless they have a requirement that absolutely doesn't fit it, then they push AVR32 parts (and seemingly hesitantly).
- throwaway7767 11y ago
  I believe they were working on upstreaming their changes at the time, but as the sister comment said, AVR32 never really took off and is now basically dead. I still have a couple of AVR32 NGW100 dev boards, they were really nice to work with.
hjalle 11y ago
Out of curiosity, what does "something Nordic" refer to?
- smcl 11y ago
  Total guess - maybe Nordic Semiconductor were also kicking the tyres deciding if they wanted to buy Atmel?
- the-dude 11y ago
  Iirc, Atmel is from Norway
- ballooney 11y ago
  I interpreted it as: Elegant, clean design (certainly compared to the old 8-bit PICs). Good taste. FOSS-friendly. Microchip might be a Texan oilman in this comparison. Just keep pumping them PICs out don't listen to those commies with their 'GCC' and their 'lee-nux' - sounds foreign and suspicious. This is obviously a tongue-in-cheek characterisation but I think that's what the OP was getting at.
- woadwarrior01 11y ago
  The AVR architecture was designed in Norway[1]. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmel_AVR#Brief_history https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmel_AVR#Brief_history

i_have_to_speak 11y ago

Dude, be careful what you post. These are the days when 10-year-olds can't afford to make spelling mistakes [1]. [1] http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-35354061 http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-35354061

colanderman 11y ago

IIRC Microchip's 8-bit PIC line had poor/nonexistent GCC support because their terrible instruction set provided no way to maintain a data stack. Their own compiler just allocated everything statically. Granted, it's (thankfully) been over a decade since I had to use a Microchip microcontroller, and they've presumably improved since. But Atmel got it right from the start. GCC-AVR produced beautiful assembly and their ISA was a joy to use. RIP Atmel.

tptacek 11y ago
Calling AVR a "joy to use" is pushing it a little far. There are things to like about AVR chips as a package, but the AVR instruction set is pretty janky. I don't understand why they're so popular compared to the MSP430.
- saaadhu 11y ago
  Care to elaborate?
  - wglb 11y ago
    See if https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10946870 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10946870 answers.
- blackguardx 11y ago
  I found the AVR instruction set pretty straight forward. Granted, it was my first forray into assembly and I learned it around 17 years ago at age 14. Maybe everything seems easy in hindsight at that age. I've never programmed MSP430s in assembly, but I have for PICs and found their instruction set to be more funky than AVR.
  - tptacek 11y ago
    So first a couple caveats: (1) I'm sure AVR is a hell of a let better than PIC, (2) I come at this from a really weird place (exclusively emulators and compilers), and (3) I'm not talking about the AVR parts themselves, which might be more cost-effective for a given project. That said: * Harvard architecture (split I & D memory) * 8 bit registers * Not at all orthogonal, and particularly painful for pointer addressing * The stack pointer is annoying to work with * Address wrap at physical memory bounds, rather than the bounds of address space I could pick a bunch more nits that would only really be relevant to someone writing an emulator (complicated instruction decode, IO addressing, &c) but those are my big complaints. I find MSP430 much more pleasant to work in.
    - colanderman 11y ago
      Those are all true (though that an 8-bit microcontroller has 8-bit registers is… unsurprising). However I am referring to the instructions themselves, which were well-engineered to match the needs of a compiler. The result is very compact assembly for most C programs that you would write on an 8-bit microcontroller (including things like 16-bit arithmetic).
- ild 11y ago
  1MIPS @ 1MHZ made it popular.
ild 11y ago
PICs used to be less power hungry though and had ROM versions.
- jason_s 11y ago
  ??? Sounds like FUD to me.
  - ild 11y ago
    FUD?? Why? The did have ROM version, and, being made from slower silicon had lower leakage.

brandmeyer 11y ago

I don't know that I would say Atmel has embraced GCC. Consider the case of the AVR32: Atmel's port is in a fork of GCC, and has not been merged upstream. Considering how long they've been maintaining their fork, I'm not sure it ever will be merged.

krkoch 11y ago
I think AVR32 is dead (also UC3, AP7 died years ago). I've not seen any development the last years. I guess they don't want to compete with their own ARM's.
- phyllostachys 11y ago
  In a few meet and greets, the Atmel app engineers mentioned that they always steer people to ARM parts unless they have a requirement that absolutely doesn't fit it, then they push AVR32 parts (and seemingly hesitantly).
throwaway7767 11y ago
I believe they were working on upstreaming their changes at the time, but as the sister comment said, AVR32 never really took off and is now basically dead. I still have a couple of AVR32 NGW100 dev boards, they were really nice to work with.

hjalle 11y ago

Out of curiosity, what does "something Nordic" refer to?

smcl 11y ago
Total guess - maybe Nordic Semiconductor were also kicking the tyres deciding if they wanted to buy Atmel?
the-dude 11y ago
Iirc, Atmel is from Norway
ballooney 11y ago
I interpreted it as: Elegant, clean design (certainly compared to the old 8-bit PICs). Good taste. FOSS-friendly. Microchip might be a Texan oilman in this comparison. Just keep pumping them PICs out don't listen to those commies with their 'GCC' and their 'lee-nux' - sounds foreign and suspicious. This is obviously a tongue-in-cheek characterisation but I think that's what the OP was getting at.
woadwarrior01 11y ago
The AVR architecture was designed in Norway[1]. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmel_AVR#Brief_history https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmel_AVR#Brief_history