Real Newbie needs some help and advice

Clive S wrote:

The Feral Engineer wrote: Check out my Linuxcnc videos. If you need me, email TheFeralEngineer@gmail.com. I'll give you a hand

youtube.com/channel/UC5Agp5Z6F1JiWihdO-QKkbQ

I have looked at your vids and I personally think you are doing a great job. The vid's are clear and concise with good camera work.

There aren't enough thank yous for your feedback. I'm really glad people are enjoying the content.

I second that, you youtube videos are great (presently working my way through them).

Can I suggest maybe breaking up your playlists a bit
maybe classicladder, HAL, etc. as some are part of a series and it will make it easier just to pick up on the sequence (IMO).

I was working my way through HAL and then you referenced something you did in classicladder, so I stopped and decided to start with classic ladder and then work my way forward.

maybe if you gave the playlists a prifix number, then you know which way to follow / work your way through the sequence and not having to step back.

Thanks for taking the time through at putting them together.

robertspark wrote: I second that, you youtube videos are great (presently working my way through them).

Can I suggest maybe breaking up your playlists a bit
maybe classicladder, HAL, etc. as some are part of a series and it will make it easier just to pick up on the sequence (IMO).

I was working my way through HAL and then you referenced something you did in classicladder, so I stopped and decided to start with classic ladder and then work my way forward.

maybe if you gave the playlists a prifix number, then you know which way to follow / work your way through the sequence and not having to step back.

Thanks for taking the time through at putting them together.

Yeah, i guess i need to do some housekeeping on that stuff. Didn't really expect it to blow up the way it did. I've been so busy with things, I haven't even had time to sit down and do more tutorials. I'll try and implement your suggestions soon. Thank you

robertspark wrote: I was working my way through HAL and then you referenced something you did in classicladder, so I stopped and decided to start with classic ladder and then work my way forward.

I have never used classic ladder. When I started, it was acknowledged it was not really necessary but was still included for historical reasons. I'm sure it only ever makes sense to people who have come from a PLC environment.

HAL is much more efficient in my view. I don't think classic ladder should be included in any Linuxcnc tutorials other than in a stand alone context. Why add another layer of complexity to your config?

My content is labeled Hal tutorial and classicladder tutorial. I made content about both for those that want to use it. It just happened to be that my classicladder tutorial on and, or and xor circuits kinda bled into me doing a comparison between CL and and2, or2 and xor2 gates and I never split the video up

I have watched some of your content but not seen that one. I liked your SX3 videos because I have one myself that is not CNC'ed. I can't help felling the poor little mill is struggling under the weight of the massive control box though!

Syil who started off with a CNC machine based on the SX3 (a mate has one) was able to keep it inside the rear cover plus a small enclosure attached to the back of it. www.syil.com/

I understand ladder from an earlier life.

it's just another tool in a box, and sometimes something graphic / visual is easier to follow than something textual.

it seems you still need to interface with inputs and outputs in HAL

I haven't finished the video clips (I try to do them in small chunks as I need to go off and play with the bits mentioned so I can find the stuff discussed)

I am also trying to not run before I can walk too

Knothead wrote: I am in Amherst, OH USA.

I'm in Dalton,OH (maybe 45min south of you.) We have 5 cnc routers running Linuxcnc, Two using Mesa hardware and 3 running off of parallel ports.

Hi Rodw
I tent to disagree with your judgements of hal versus cl.
For one hal is not a usual language, it's way of working is not intuitive.
It has no clear structured semantic ( talking of those not in use -> "habits" ).
There is nothing like a crossreference.
You have to read a lot of lines and it's not easy to see what sticks together.
It is very easy to write unreadable spaghetti in hal.

At least for pure logic CL is more straight forward. And it is visual. More compact. Easier to read. As long as you stay in digital or "simple numbers"

And just remember how often beginners have problems to write hal. The thinking in nets with name, one "sender" and multiple "receivers"... You have to get used to.
That remembers me to the old hw related wire wrapping.

Mike

P. S.
Me talking positiv about cl; also I do not like ladder, I think it is my most unliked plc language ;-()

Mike_Eitel wrote: And just remember how often beginners have problems to write hal. The thinking in nets with name, one "sender" and multiple "receivers"... You have to get used to.
That remembers me to the old hw related wire wrapping.

Mike

P. S.
Me talking positiv about cl; also I do not like ladder, I think it is my most unliked plc language ;-()

Interesting your last comment

I always make it a habit to create the signal on one line and connect it to each pin on separate one or more lines. Then the <= and => make sense to the reader.

I found that where code has the signal created and connected to the pin on one line are much harder to maintain if you wish to connect the signal to another pin. Its easy to write incomprehensible code in any "language" so we develop our own coding styles to make code easy to read. . I guess thats my HAL coding style