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by inframouse 3670 days ago
Right now this seems mostly to consist of javascript wrappers around existing platform libraries? E.g. to let me read a gpio pin or blink a led? Not that it's a bad thing but it seems a little skinny as a thing right now, and the pitch seems to be that more and more platform stuff arrives. Smells more like a replay for firefox os less innovating on the platform? Any insights?
2 comments

I just took at look at the linked repo and thought the same. I've tried the node on embedded devices recently and most likely would not go that route again. I would at least recommend to do it in Typescript. However I still think that a big bunch of JS with the usual amount of external dependencies can turn quite fast into an unmaintainable mess if you are not super careful.

Another thing that has to be considered is that that if an OEM then uses this SDK to build his own device his software will be open too (in the sense of extractable in code form, not by license). In my experience most device manufacturers won't be happy with that. But I don't know who Silklabs is dealing with and what their expectations are - so things might be different here.

Well you gotta start your platform somewhere!

I really hope this gets off the ground. I really like the direction Mozilla (and ex-Mozilla teams) takes on a lot of projects - this, Firefox OS, etc. They just seem to have trouble moving from the initial concept stage into a 'production' mindset for much of their work.