For a while now, I've been thinking that it could be interesting to use the small Raspberry Pi Pico processors, particularly the RP2350 version.
While searching online for information about the available tools for programming this type of component, I was initially quite disappointed, and this was confirmed later on.
Basically, aside from perhaps manually creating the entire toolchain from scratch, there are only three options left:
- The Arduino IDE
- PlatformIO
- Visual Studio Code with the Raspberry Pi Pico extension
And right here, without even trying anything, I face two problems. It is absolutely out of the question not to have real-time debugging. Immediately, the Arduino IDE is out! I spent a lot of time years ago developing for Atmel processors with that IDE and debugging via the serial port. For a complex project, there's no way I'm going to mess around with that again —no, thank you!
That leaves the two other options. Unfortunately, both are based on microsoft's editor. I knew that attempting anything with 'crosoft' would lead me into a minefield. I was not disappointed.
I tried everything. I also noticed that the documentation online isn't recent, but oh well. Impossible to get my RP2040 probe recognized by the OpenOCD provided with the Raspberry Pi Pico extension for Visual Code. Worse, I tried manually modifying some configuration files, which led me to a complete dead end.
Not to mention the visual interface, which is awful. Redundant information everywhere—a real, chaotically festive Christmas tree, just as you could wish for!
And the worst part is that when it screws up, they just open the configuration file directly in the editor. Good luck figuring it out!
You might tell me, "Oh, but when you're used to it..." Well, that's just it—I've never been able to get used to the 'Crossoft' ergonomics. Spending more time disorienting the user than producing something decent, all while amassing fortunes, really irritates me. As a result, I'm not rich. Microsoft's shareholders, however, are!
It was the exact opposite philosophy that guided the IBM teams behind Eclipse.
The beginnings of Eclipse were somewhat chaotic, but for quite over a decade now, it has been a stable project offered by a number of solution providers similar to Raspberry Pi. That is to say, providers who do not have, or who have no interest in maintaining a significant software team to develop a graphical IDE for Windows. I understand them!
So, I decided it was time to uninstall everything and do a fresh install.
That's what I did. Well, I managed to uninstall Visual Studio Code and all its extensions just fine.
However, when I tried to download Visual Code again from the microsoft website:
Hmm, we can't seem to find that site.
As usual with 'Crossoft', I'm tempted to say!
A sign for me that, after spending several hours trying to use this environment, it was high time to stop insisting. I also tried PlatformIO, with no better results.
I'm surely not the ultimate geek capable of getting absolutely everything to work on any platform, but what interests me is what I can do with the tools. Building or eternally rebuilding my tools just to possibly be able to work with them doesn't interest me in the slightest.
Using Visual Studio Code instead of Eclipse represents, to me, a total lack of professionalism. The goal isn't just to create interesting components—it would be interesting to be able to develop them while focusing only on the essentials!
There's nothing to be done, microsoft will always be 'micro'. And its fortune won't change much about the situation!
