RFID Reader v2 Starts

2018-06-07 23:14 - Making

The first working prototype of the next version of my RFID reader project.

I've used Arduinos for some time now, for electronics projects. They're very easy to get started with, but a little bit limited. As I called out in the VFD clock project I did a few years ago, STM32 is a nice next step up. Pictured is a Maple Mini clone I still had from that project, easily available for around $5. Even better is the (as it's colloquially known) "Blue Pill board with almost the same functionality at around $2, and it's close cousin the "Black Pill". More speed and RAM and Flash, more peripherals. More exciting!

I designed a multi-headed RFID reader project, on top of an Arduino core. After some delays it's finally seen real usage, and revealed several opportunities for improvement. Mostly around the hardware, but if I'm going to redesign, I want to take the opportunity to revisit the software as well.

On my clock project, I found the SDK very detail-heavy and hard to work with. ST Microelectronics, which makes the STM32 chips, also makes a package called STM32CubeMX, a code generator that makes the SDK easier to consume. But it wants to output projects that specifically work with a small handful of professional (read: $$$) IDE packages. I recently discovered that Atollic TrueSTUDIO, which is in that list, is available for free download! I've spent a fair deal of free time, in small chunks, recently getting these all set up and working, and especially understood.

The plan is to take advantage of FreeRTOS, which the Cube tool can include with just a click, to handle scheduling and some other things to make this next version both faster and more stable. For now at least, I've got a proof of concept, working end-to-end, able to read cards and developed with a capable IDE with breakpoints and value inspection built right in.

Comments:

But USB?
2018-07-10 14:17 - arantius

I can't get USB CDC to work, which is a requirement for this project. So I've re-re-started it on an Atmega32U4. But I found Sloeber which is a pretty good integration of the Arduino build/library system into Eclipse, which gives me much better editing, especially across files, and IDE style completion and navigation.

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