4 ms·

I don't think it takes "0" more knowledge. Maybe 2-5% more knowledge? (In some made-up subjective scale). If you buy a feather and a wing you know they'll work

I don't think it takes "0" more knowledge. Maybe 2-5% more knowledge? (In some made-up subjective scale). If you buy a feather and a wing you know they'll work together (I haven't looked up every feather-wing combination, but the only exception I've seen is large OLEDs which technically work with low-powered feathers, but not very well - and they spell this out clearly in the product description). Not necessarily the case for a random MCU and breakout board, and figuring out needs at least a little bit of knowledge. Same for connecting the boards. There's pretty much one way to connect a feather and a wing so you don't have to think about 5V/3V, SPI pins, RX/TX, etc. Or weird small connectors. Again, not super hard to figure out with arbitrary breakouts, but requires more than 0 knowledge.

BoorishBears 5y ago
Their form factor places literally no role in their compatibility. If with a Feather/Wing combo you don't need to worry about 5v/3v, if there wasn't an enforced shape that would not change in the slightest. > All Feathers and Featherwings use 3.3V logic - so do not make anything that requires 5.0V logic. You must accept and emit 3.3V logic on any Feather/Wing (except for Analog inputs) Like, the literal shape of the PCB has nothing to do with their compatibility, rules like do. Same with SPI pins, RX/TX, etc: > Bus Pins > To make it easy to create add-ons, we have fixed inter-chip bus pins: - The main change vs female headers is now you're forcing beginners to choose something that locks up their hardware. This isn't a new thing, beginners since Arduino days have been overwhelmed by how shields take over all their pins and often run into clashes. It's less of a burden if anything to have proper connectors or simply well marked female headers, which newbies can then easily follow between boards. I mean if even if you're experienced with electronics just try following which pins a board is actually using. You'll need to look up a PCB schematic. That's infinitely less beginner friendly than simple color coding and fixed connectors.

BoorishBears 5y ago

Their form factor places literally no role in their compatibility. If with a Feather/Wing combo you don't need to worry about 5v/3v, if there wasn't an enforced shape that would not change in the slightest. > All Feathers and Featherwings use 3.3V logic - so do not make anything that requires 5.0V logic. You must accept and emit 3.3V logic on any Feather/Wing (except for Analog inputs) Like, the literal shape of the PCB has nothing to do with their compatibility, rules like do. Same with SPI pins, RX/TX, etc: > Bus Pins > To make it easy to create add-ons, we have fixed inter-chip bus pins: - The main change vs female headers is now you're forcing beginners to choose something that locks up their hardware. This isn't a new thing, beginners since Arduino days have been overwhelmed by how shields take over all their pins and often run into clashes. It's less of a burden if anything to have proper connectors or simply well marked female headers, which newbies can then easily follow between boards. I mean if even if you're experienced with electronics just try following which pins a board is actually using. You'll need to look up a PCB schematic. That's infinitely less beginner friendly than simple color coding and fixed connectors.