Would like menu option for AVR-based programming

I've read the instructions here:

and I'm very grateful that I have the option to directly program the MCU with my AVR-ISP. However, as I also program my regular arduino boards quite frequently, it would be nice to have a menu option to switch between these different options rather than have to drill down and edit the preferences.txt file each time. I would suggest adding a "Program Via" option in the Tools menu that would contain these options:

Bootloader (default)
AVR ISP
AVRISP mkII
USBtinyISP
Parallel Programmer

Just a thought.

Wayne

I support this feature to 100%.... it's really anoying to edit the preferences file each time...

IIRC, version 12 will allow direct programming in the boards.txt file, so you could do a one-time edit of that file and have an entries like "ATmega8 via AVRISPmkII" or "ATMEGA168 via USBtiny"

-j

IIRC, version 12 will allow direct programming in the boards.txt file, so you could do a one-time edit of that file and have an entries like "ATmega8 via AVRISPmkII" or "ATMEGA168 via USBtiny"

That will be a big step in the right direction, but what is the reason to not simply have it work that way out of the box (or at least some kind of preference setting for easy vs advanced mode)?

I don't like the idea of having to make edits to config files, especially when it's more complex than changing what's commented out. It reminds me of all the drawbacks of linux on the desktop (back in the 90's when I stopped using it), it was just so tedious trying to set anything up and I was spending more time maintaining my computer than using it. (Arduino may clearly not be like that, but it's the connotation this concept gives me).

Because coding preference dialogs is annoying as hell :slight_smile: :slight_smile: :slight_smile:

But anybody who wants to do it is welcome to contribute it to the code

massimo

Also, we want to keep things simple for beginners. They won't have a programmer, and probably won't even know what one is.

IIRC, version 12 will allow direct programming in the boards.txt file, so you could do a one-time edit of that file and have an entries like "ATmega8 via AVRISPmkII" or "ATMEGA168 via USBtiny"

-j

That seem like a workable solution. Thanks.

Wayne

Because coding preference dialogs is annoying as hell :slight_smile: :slight_smile: :slight_smile:

But anybody who wants to do it is welcome to contribute it to the code

massimo

I'd love to contribute (time permitting.) I'm the lead architect on a large, Java-based project, so I have some skills. What's the best way to help out?

Wayne

While not exactly the same as this issue, we'd like to add an "Add board..." menu item to the Tools > Board menu. This should prompt you for a .zip file containing a boards.txt file to be merged into the global one and potentially a directory to be added to the hardware/cores/ directory. You could try to put together a more detailed plan for how this could be implemented, and send it to the developers mailing list.

I downloaded and built the latest 0012 version to try this out and can report that it does work. However, it did take a minute to puzzle out how to add the needed annotations to the boards.txt file. What I did was copy the Diecimila definition and made a new "direct168" entry. I then added this:

direct168.upload.using=avrispmkii

to enable this entry to upload via the AVR ISP. However, I did find that I needed to add this entry:

pro.upload.using= bootloader

to the other entries in boards.txt to switch them back to the normal bootloader upload. Without making these changes, the upload didn' seem to switch back after I selected the direct168 option.

Wayne