How to present the documentation project.

MIDIbox Documentation Project
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Personally, I’m envisioning the following. This forum section gets used to brainstorm, argue, ask questions, share tips, etc. The resulting docs get put on the wiki, and once they are at a beta stage they can be linked from other relevant sections of the midibox sites. On the wiki page it will be easy for others to add comments about the articles in case something is not clear.

Some questions for others to argue over in the meantime:

How should schematics be presented, and what file formats are preferable? What about explanations of the various PCBs available? I thought it would be good to be able to clearly correlate the PCBs from say Smash and Mike with the schematics.

Code, should we make the simple examples code compatible for 16F877 and 18F452, or do examples for each? I personally tend towards examples for each, mainly because so much other online and book documentation for PICs focusses on 16Fs that I think it would be good for people to be able to read that code as well.

Protoboards:

I myself use Smash’s fine boards, being in Canada. I think what I will do for the projects is rig up a core module with cables running from the ain ports and display ports and button input ports into a breadboard, putting the auxillary hardware, ( leds, buttons, encoder, pot ) on the breadboard. I have a digital camera so this should be fairly easy to demonstrate. I suppose using the ICSP feature would make life easier too, though I have not yet tested that using PikDev on linux.  

Splitting up the work with any who want to help:

I like writting code, so I’m happy to do all that, and I am a good technical writer, so I’m happy to make/edit the final write ups. I’d love help in electronics, and testing. I’m also totally lame at graphics, so if anyone else wants to help make the schematics for the tutorials that would be cool too.

Thanks

iain

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The resulting docs get put on the wiki

The WIKI seems hard to find. I only find one inconspicuous link on Thorsten’s page. Whoever administers the forum needs to add a prominent link with explanation.

How should schematics be presented, and what file formats are preferable?

I say let them be presented in whatever way the name can. Graphics and complex documents need to be hosted somewhere and pointed to from the WIKI. A common repository would be good as things have a way of disappearing when they are scattered around the web. How can we create a depository for files related to the MIDIbox?

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I don’t know what Thorsten’s deal on space is, but I will have quite a lot of server access coming up soon after a buddy of mine builds his new server. As long as the bandwith isn’t outrageous I think I should be able to host it all if need be.

iain

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I bumped my hosting account up a level a few months ago (in space and bandwidth) for more room for MIDIbox stuff.  That’s where the portal and Wiki are.

The gallery script that is already there allows for the addition of new file types, so we could use that without much extra effort and keep security decent (the easiest way to hack any CMS is through uploads).  This is also the easy way for an uploader to make something immediately available for download via a link from the forum, Wiki, etc…

On file formats for schematics and PCB artwork PDF is king.  Print to pdf type drivers are available free for every platform.  But I agree with Jim, any format is fine, if needed we can convert stuff.  ;)

Best!

Smash

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I’m sure I can mirror the docs on my own site too, which is never a bad plan. Nothing sucks more than discovering that something’s down right when your confused and debugging and pulling your hair out! Ha ha.

iain