NativeCAM Looks Great! Should Be Included in LinuxCNC 2.8

Hi,

From what I have seen of LinuxCNC, I think it should be included in the standard LinucCNC distro.

BTW, I've been mocking up a user interface, and of course I put a NativeCAM tab.
forum.linuxcnc.org/41-guis/34572-a-wides...nder-style-interface

I am sorry that the screenshot is so big.

Hi Brenda,

Your design is very impressive and professionnal looking.

I still have some testing to do before publishing an update to NativeCAM. I have done many changes to make it simpler to use and I am a little short of extra time to work on it now but it is still alive.

Regards
Fern

Once again, I really think NativeCAM should be a standard part of LinuxCNC, and included in the distribution disk/.ISO.

It would be cool if the user could also press one button to send the produced gcode to whatever runs it, such as Axis, Gmoccapy, or the "Code Runner" tab in interface I am trying to make from all of the others. I would like to see the other interfaces do their part to help you with integration.

When I started mocking up interfaces, I wanted something at a manual mill person would be comfortable with, like a hardware DRO, and NativeCAM is pretty close to that, and much more. It was recommended to me for that reason.

If you hadn't already lived through having your creation and effort renamed once, I would have asked for it be named DRO+ or DROPlus.

Thanks for making NativeCAM : )

BrendaEM wrote:

Once again, I really think NativeCAM should be a standard part of LinuxCNC, and included in the distribution disk/.ISO.

It will

It would be cool if the user could also press one button to send the produced gcode to whatever runs it, such as Axis, Gmoccapy,

It already does on every change the user make, 'gscreen' included.

I would like to see the other interfaces do their part to help you with integration.

It integrates simply with a line command

If you hadn't already lived through having your creation and effort renamed once, I would have asked for it be named DRO+ or DROPlus.

Nick Drobchenko started the project in 2012 and it was then named LinuxCNC-features. I used his base code, added much refinement and options and try to make it as much user friendly as possible.

The real advantage of NativeCAM is when used with the wizard view and you see the result of every change you do. Some interfaces do not have a preview.

Fern

To point out the obvious, solving installation issues for individuals uses a lot of your time.

If the LinuxCNC OS system maintainer steps up, then you would only have one configuration to support : )
Though, I hear, that whomever is rolling the LinuxCNC installtion distros is not responsive to the users.

BrendaEM wrote:

To point out the obvious, solving installation issues for individuals uses a lot of your time.

If the LinuxCNC OS system maintainer steps up, then you would only have one configuration to support : )
Though, I hear, that whomever is rolling the LinuxCNC installtion distros is not responsive to the users.

You are starting to look like a spoiled child, suggestions are great but don't expect them to happen over night or at all.

In actual fact the distro convenience to get people up and running.

No, you don't get it at all.

NativeCam is great, and I don't want FernV getting burned out by having to answer the same installation questions over an over again.

Instead I want the downloadable image maintainers to take the heat off of him, by stepping up and updating the downloadable image. That way, that way, if he wants to continue working on NativeCam, he will have more time to do that.

Looking at things pragmatically, he may be the only one working on NativeCam, so his skills are a unique as well as valuable.

I got NativeCAM installed today. I had problems with the installation, but I wasn't going to post anything about it because I didn't want FernV taking time to help me with my sniveling questions. I eventually got it going. It's great!

~

The LinuxCNC specific things should be updated in the install disk image, as well.

To be pedantic and bratty, I would add a calculator application for doing math, and forgo Librieoffice on a CNC distro, because of space considerations.

Does one not think that posting an issue you have installing nativecam may help someone else in the future ? How is old mate going to know what to fix ?

Yeah Librieoffice may not be essential.......but then again some maybe keeping a materials or job database or any other such thing that helps them in their workshop may like it there. I often thought about cups as well, is it needed, but then there might be a few out there that will print something off in the work shop.

Galculator has been included in the stretch-uspace image.
Personally I always install midnight commander (my preferred file manger and the editor is quite good), gftp (great for transfer files via ssh to the ftp server) and geany, as this is my preferred editor. gvfs-fuse would be handy for those connecting to samba servers and such and wanting a definite mount point.
On the standard stretch iso the dependencies to build a git version of linuxcnc aren't there, is that an issue ?

On the whole the iso seems to be generated to get people going, whilst keeping the size down, who knows about the inclusion of Libieoffice, that could be a debian thing....one of their many dependencies, that sometimes appear to be a little left of field unless you really know the whole story.
Take for instance when I was trying to setup a build environment for 2.8, when installing the required packages apt also wanted to include apache and up to about 1GB of extras, now on the face of it that would seem strange ?
After a bit of digging I was able to sort that out.
If someone is doing their cam on another machine they may not feel the need for native cam (I'm not dissing it in any way).
If you want to build your own image the tools are available.....just saying.
I never thought Linuxcnc to be distro orientated, it's a suite of programs for controlling machines....the fact that it has been released on a modified debian base is a great thing....but I would hazzard a guess it wasn't never meant to be a complete distro........They could have gone the route Libreelec did with Kodi, just enough to run it, which would give you even less.

I believe that if someone offers a unique skill or effort, let them do that. I don't have a good metaphor for this, but... Let the lion tamers tame the lions; let the chartered accountants keep the books.

At least we seem to agree that a calculator would be a worthy addition to the distro.

I love Libreoffice. I use it every day, though some people might find it non-essential on a CNC Machine.

Perhaps the person or people who maintain the distro don't know what a valuable tool the distro is.

Firstly, because the real-time kernel is used, people would otherwise have to compile a kernel from scratch, and make sure the boot order is right, and clean up everything after, and rest : )

[There is other Linux software, such as music recording software that requires a real-time configured kernel as well. Perhaps, someday redundant efforts could be reduced and a common real-time distro could be released.]

I've read that some people have multiple machines, which may or may not be connected to internet. It would seem easier to walk around with a little flash drive installing it on machines, rather than disconnecting them and hauling elsewhere for installation.

Personally, I have a little trepidation about putting a computer on the internet, that make spinning brittle pointy things spin at 20,000 RPM, anyway.

Like I said on the stretch uspace distro Glaculator is included...I'm typing away at that install right now.

I have a way of installing that starts off with using a virtual machine, getting it setup just the way I want, then migrating that to real hardware.

Least I can agree with the connecting to the Internet thing........but it will be needed to do an update......but the best security in that respect is removing shutting down the network interface.
Luckily I no longer have any rugrats that like to push buttons........tho one does wonder about Butters the beagle (yes his namesake is from South Park)