[Gta04-owner] [Tinkerphones] Status GTA04A5

[H. Nikolaus Schaller]

Hi,

> Am 21.08.2016 um 09:39 schrieb Butrus Damaskus <butrus.butrus at gmail.com>:
> 
> On Tue, Aug 16, 2016 at 7:51 PM, H. Nikolaus Schaller <hns at goldelico.com <mailto:hns at goldelico.com>> wrote:
> 
> > Am 16.08.2016 um 19:45 schrieb Xavi Drudis Ferran <xdrudis at tinet.cat <mailto:xdrudis at tinet.cat>>:
> >
> > El Tue, Aug 16, 2016 at 03:26:51PM +0200, Dr. H. Nikolaus Schaller deia:
> >> Hi,
> >> here a brief status update:
> >>
> >> * components have all arrived, except one
> >> * the one is a new one which IMHO compensates for waiting some more days!
> >>
> >> Thanks to generous support by Bosch Sensortec we got an option to buy the
> >> BNO055 intelligent 9-axis Absolute Orientation Sensor, which includes sensors
> >> and sensor fusion in a single package. It combines an accelerometer (position),
> >> gyroscope (rotation speed) and compass (absolute position) and a microcontroller
> >> in a single package. All data can be read through I2C.
> >>
> >
> > And is the software that microcontroller runs free ?
> > Is it replaceable ?
> 
> not replaceable. It is fixed in the chip and described in the data sheet what it does.
> It does not more than providing integrated coordinate data in registers
> that the CPU an ask for over I2C. So it can't do anything unexpected.
> 
> Are you really sure? I just noticed that there is something about "boot loader" in the Datashit...

Yes of course there is a microcontroller inside which boots from some ROM/Flash on the chip.
There seems to be a variant which could be reprogrammed. But ours is the fixed one
(which RMS considers as "hardware" because we have no mechanism to change the firmware).

BTW: many sensors or other chips have such a built-in controller but you rarely know about
it. Sometimes a data sheet says something about a required delay time between ending the
reset and starting the first command. This is for some hidden microcontroller to boot and be
able to respond to commands sent from the host.

BR,
Nikolaus

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