News, Gossip and Rumour

Last updated 3 March 2008

Cartoon of the day Copyright © J.D. "Illiad" Frazer.
A Forth-related one Copyright © J.D. "Illiad" Frazer.
Cartoon of every other day.

Back in the days when we used to send printed catalogues all over the world, there was a section in the catalogue with this title. This page is the electronic edition of that section. Please send contributions.

VFX Forth for Linux

I've been promising VFX Forth for Linux in time for Christmas for several years. Well, we delivered for Christmas 2007. Now it's March, and we're moving from the Alpha to the Beta release phase now that components such as the serial and socket generic I/O devices are done and PowerNet has been ported.

We have been very gratified by everyone's reaction to this product, not to mention the number of downloads! A console version with minimal technical support is free of charge. A download is available from the VFX Forth for Linux page. Three paid for versions are also available, varying in functionality, source code and technical support level.

With the release of the Forth 7 cross compilers, we have taken the opportunity of making the cross compilers available under Linux as well as Windows.

The Linux console

Pearls perhaps

Taken from the Tao of Programming".
A master was explaining the nature of Tao of to one of his novices. "The Tao is embodied in all software - regardless of how insignificant," said the master.
"Is the Tao in a hand-held calculator?" asked the novice.
"It is," came the reply.
"Is the Tao in a video game?" continued the novice.
"It is even in a video game," said the master.
"And is the Tao in the DOS for a personal computer?"
The master coughed and shifted his position slightly. "The lesson is over for today," he said.

Competition

Some of our customers don't like sending their credit card details by email. Stefan Schmiedl circumvented this problem by separating the four four-digit groups and including them as Forth expressions.

  aaaa bbbb cccc dddd

  7 8 * 100 + 2/ 1099 + .

• First - VFX Forth for Windows Standard
• Second and third - Forth Starter Kit

The closing date has passed. Results by the end of February 2008

Low-cost embedded PCs

Along with the rise of low cost domestic PCs using Linux, there's a revolution happening in indistrial and networking PCs. We bought ourselves a couple of Ebox 2300SX PCs for Christmas. See the manual. What a fabulous piece of kit! Plug in a CompactFlash card with Xlinux (console mode) or Puppy (with a full GUI if you want it), and you have a very capable machine for the money. You can also run DOS on these.

We're so impressed with these, that we're selling them!

Ebox2300 front

Ebox2300 back

Specifications:

• CPU - Vortex86SX, 300MHz
• RAM - 128Mb
• BIOS - AMI
• Video - up to 1280x1024 with 32 Mb RAM
• I/O - 10/100 Ethernet, 3 x USB host, 2 x RS232, keyboard/mouse, CompactFlash slot (type I/II)
• 24 bit GPIO
• Internal - IDE 44, Mini-PCI
• Size 115 x 115 x 35 mm, weight 505g
• Boxed and with wall-wart PSU with UK plug

• Bare bones systems GBP 99.
• As above with WiFi GBP 145.
• Puppy Linux for Ebox2300SX and VFX Forth on a 1Gb card, GBP 49.
• Ask for volume pricing, non UK plugs and so on.

Recent applications for Forth

These applications are recent uses of Forth, and the list is somewhat constrained by the tendency of clients to want us to sign non-disclosure agreements.

Pollution monitoring

The embedded software for the Total Sulfur Analyzers in the Pilot Project shown in this link was developed on a 68332 platform using MPE's 68xxx cross compiler by Alberto Pasquale at Thermo Fisher Scientific.

Vending machines

It is now possible for vending machines to brew tea and coffee with fresh milk, and to produce a cup of tea acceptable to professional tea tasters. The first trick is to prevent milk seeping into pipes and then going off overnight after the machine has been switched off. The next trick is prevent sedimentation in the boiler/heater mechanisms - it ruins the taste of tea! The final trick is to control the flow of water/steam through the coffee grounds or tea leaves, as these need a "wetting period" during which they swell before releasing flavour to the liquid. All controlled by an MPE system. Buckets were much in evidence during development.

Inside a vending machine

A different project aims to protect vending machines from fraud by the route-men who stock the machines and empty the cash bags. Industry estimates are that each vending machine loses £2 per machine per week. There are 1.5 million machines in the UK alone, so that's about GBP 150M per year. Safer Systems, a vending machine security specialist asked us to help out. The system involves intercepting the local vending machine bus, logging the cash data, and transferring it to an RFID tag on the Custodian cash bag. When the cash bag is read, the cash value can be compared by the reader with what was actually in the bag. Reports are created and transmitted to a remote web site (designed and implemented by our sister company Remote Management Systems). Management can retrieve reports and live data directly from the web site. All the embedded systems involve Forth on ARM CPUs, and the readers use the PowerNet TCP/IP stack to access the remote web site. Sites are scalable to over 25,000 machines.

Seismic data logging

Guralp CMG-5TD

Guralp Systems (see web site make low-noise broadband seismometers, digitizers and networking equipment for science and engineering. Their new CMG-5TD is a complete seismic station in a sensor case, combining the well-regarded CMG-5T accelerometer with a full-featured CMG-DM24 to form a low-noise strong motion instrument with output over RS232 serial links, modem or (optionally) direct to local area networks over Ethernet.

Stack machine news

There's something of a resurgence of stack machines at the moment. The ones described here are just the ones we (may) know something about.

IntellaSys

Of the two-stack silicon machines that are available or close to market, the devices from Intellasys are the fastest and most radical. The funding appears to have come by exploiting previous work by Charles Moore, so enabling ongoing development.

IntellaSys SEAforth24 prototype evaluation board with USB
Production boards will be much smaller

Chips are real, and Stephen presented for IntellaSys at EuroForth 2007.

From a press release: "Since January 2006, HP, Casio, Fujitsu, Sony, Nikon, Seiko Epson, Pentax, Olympus, Kenwood, Agilent, Lexmark, Schneider Electric, NEC Corporation, Funai Electric, SanDisk Sharp Corporation and Nokia have all purchased MMP Portfolio Licenses. The two earliest MMP Licensees were marquee chip makers Intel and AMD."

York UFO

UFO Spartan-3 development board

A team lead by Chris Bailey at York University are finalising a stack machine for use in FPGAs under the title UFO - Ubiquitous Forth Object. The project was run with MPE collaboration and sponsorship. We hope to have systems available 1Q2008 with both Forth and C compilers available.

"Illegitimis non carborundum"

The origins of this phrase much used by engineers about both customers and management are discussed here

Tech support responses ...

"Open win.ini in notepad and enter the following line exactly as I tell you: USER=1D10T. This will help our hotline technicians to diagnose your future problems."
See also this cartoon.

Email signatures

Seen somewhere:
"Photoshop - the simple solution to all your dieting needs".
"You can play with your friends' privates, but you can't play with your friends' childrens' privates. (C++ coding rule)"