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@stefanix stefanix released this 19 May 10:19
· 1 commit to alpha since this release
v18.05
63e45e7

This is a general update of the DriveboardApp recommended for all users. It is currently marked as a pre-release until we hear back from people using it successfully in a production environment.

Most changes are incremental improvements but some changes to the firmware and API have been made to make DriveboardApp fully ready for 3-axis applications. This update is also required for machines that run stepper drivers which need a delay after direction changes (DM542). This prevents loosing steps with these drivers.

For a standard Lasersaur (Driveboard v14.03, Driveboard Element) everything should work out of the box. Simply download the binary for your platform and double-click it. On Linux you may need to make it executable first. NOTE: You will also have to run "Flash Firmware" from the UI.

For development, troubleshooting, non-standard machines you should run the app from sources. For this you need python 2.7 with the pillow package installed (raster engraving will fail without pillow). There are two levels on which to change configuration: firmware config files, and app config files. Firmware config files work as always. App config files can now be specified on the command line when starting the app. This makes it very comfortable to play with many custom settings.

Changes

  • Windows (driveboardapp.exe), OSX (DriveboardApp.dmg), Linux (driveboardapp)
  • improved serial connection handling
    • auto connects on usb plugin
    • asks to upload firmware on vanilla arduino (CLI)
  • revamped configuration files
    • loads by default config.json
    • has now --config option to load other configurations (CLI)
    • has --list-configs to show available configs and config dir (CLI)
  • flashing on Linux without having arduino-core installed
  • many small optimizations
  • revamped homing cycle, faster, better
  • smaller, compressed job files (support for larger files on small computers), thx to @adammhaile
  • firmware/API changes
    • homing cycle improved
    • homing works when machine is in limit stop mode
    • homing can be configured towards any side
      • see: CONFIG_INVERT_X_HOMING, CONFIG_INVERT_Y_HOMING, CONFIG_INVERT_Z_HOMING
    • AIR, AUX1, AUX2 changed to AIR, AUX
    • TABLEOFF, CUSTOMOFF is now just OFFSET (table offset is hardcoded in firmaware config file)
    • more sophisticated ways to deal with offsets (for mapping G54 stuff), running proper retracts while offsets are defined, storing/restoring relative/absolute motion, etc
      • see web.py low level API
        • /retract
        • /jog
        • /move
        • /supermove
        • /offset
        • /absoffset
  • milling mode with fusion 360 support (experimental)
    • completely separate frontend (frontend_mill)
    • to enable add a ""mill_mode": true" to your configuration file
    • also a new parameter for rpms: "mill_max_rpm": 18000"
    • fusion 360 post processing file in backend/jobimport/driveboard.cps
    • eventually we can also make this work for laser work
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