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I'm a little surprised Microsoft isn't using their Azure Sphere for this IoT experience. Some of the quick start guides for Sphere are quite simple, and the fr

by mycall 5y ago

I'm a little surprised Microsoft isn't using their Azure Sphere for this IoT experience. Some of the quick start guides for Sphere are quite simple, and the free Azure accounts for going a few steps further is also not that hard.

pjmlp 5y ago
Thankfully, at least Arduino does C++, CircuitPython, whereas Azure Sphere team doubles down on C while trying to sell it as a secure device.
- qbasic_forever 5y ago
  Azure sphere is embedded linux so C is almost mandatory since you'll typically be writing linux driver and kernel-level code for any non-trivial device. There's nothing stopping you from embedding python or any higher level language, other than the resource cost (memory, flash usage, etc).
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    There is, the lack of support on the official SDK. GCC is only packaged as C compiler for Azure Sphere, additional languages would require going to the effort to actually implement Azure Sphere support. Then there is the whole issue that security center talks about memory corruption and the amount of money that CVE cost to Microsot per year, by making use of C and C++, while Azure Sphere tries to sell a security story based on C?!? Sorry Azure Sphere team, better talk to the Microsoft Security Response Center people before trying to sell security.
    - qbasic_forever 5y ago
      ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I'm an embedded linux person and view sphere as a curiosity. Presumably if you have root access to the device you can load anything you want (as long as you can build a cross compilation toolchain somewhere). But yeah... scanning their docs a bit, it looks like they're trying to build on top and abstract away the linux system as much as possible. It's probably easier to work with the grain instead of against it--if their tooling isn't up to what you need, look at buildroot, yocto/openembedded, etc.
      - jimbobbennett 5y ago
        Total disclosure- I’m the main author of this curriculum. Sphere was just a bit too hard for beginner content. We will be adding an intermediate version in some form or other later this year and will include Sphere.

by mycall 5y ago

pjmlp 5y ago

Thankfully, at least Arduino does C++, CircuitPython, whereas Azure Sphere team doubles down on C while trying to sell it as a secure device.

qbasic_forever 5y ago
Azure sphere is embedded linux so C is almost mandatory since you'll typically be writing linux driver and kernel-level code for any non-trivial device. There's nothing stopping you from embedding python or any higher level language, other than the resource cost (memory, flash usage, etc).
- pjmlp 5y ago
  There is, the lack of support on the official SDK. GCC is only packaged as C compiler for Azure Sphere, additional languages would require going to the effort to actually implement Azure Sphere support. Then there is the whole issue that security center talks about memory corruption and the amount of money that CVE cost to Microsot per year, by making use of C and C++, while Azure Sphere tries to sell a security story based on C?!? Sorry Azure Sphere team, better talk to the Microsoft Security Response Center people before trying to sell security.
  - qbasic_forever 5y ago
    ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I'm an embedded linux person and view sphere as a curiosity. Presumably if you have root access to the device you can load anything you want (as long as you can build a cross compilation toolchain somewhere). But yeah... scanning their docs a bit, it looks like they're trying to build on top and abstract away the linux system as much as possible. It's probably easier to work with the grain instead of against it--if their tooling isn't up to what you need, look at buildroot, yocto/openembedded, etc.
    - jimbobbennett 5y ago
      Total disclosure- I’m the main author of this curriculum. Sphere was just a bit too hard for beginner content. We will be adding an intermediate version in some form or other later this year and will include Sphere.