[freefriedrice]

You're very good at inventing creative scenarios. Well done.

I don't really know where to start, you clearly want to defend your comfort zone. So I will be supportive: go work on projects that require Linux. It will be much more rewarding to you than working on constrained edge devices that are more challenging due to resource constraints.

You're also free to pretend that you can just swap in platform that requires watts of power in a scenario that requires an edge device to last a year on a battery.

[ohazi]

Look, if you really need to get a coin cell onto the internet, then go for it. But I don't think your comments on this thread represent good advice for most engineers building typical devices. Insinuating that anyone who doesn't agree with your view is technically challenged is also kind of pathetic.

Expectations around what an internet connected device should look like and be capable of changed permanently with the launch of the iPhone in 2007. There will always be special cases like yours, but they are increasingly (sadly?) relegated to smaller corners of the internet.

I did it your way for years. Every company I've ever worked for that started off with a microcontroller based networking solution eventually migrated to an application processor because users and non-technical management kept demanding iPhone-like behavior that was either too difficult or too time consuming to deliver any other way. People expect a lot more functionality than just TCP sockets and web interfaces nowadays.

[nitrogen]

I'll add that it's not just capabilities that matter, but also the open Internet gets more and more hostile over time. In the absence of proof otherwise, eventually someone is going to transmit something that makes your device misbehave.

[nine_k]

There are devices where both BOM and size constraints matter. Do you want to run Linux on every smart power socket, smart light switch, smart light bulb in your house? A light bulb in particular has tight volumetric and thermal budgets.

This is where stuff like ESP8266, and the controller from the post, makes sense.

[ohazi]

I don't own any smart bulbs, but yeah -- this is a good example of a case where using a microcontroller is probably reasonable. I can't imagine people enjoy paying >$25 per bulb, and there's evidence that users are willing to put up with some truly appalling UX to get those things connected [1].

Amusingly, the most reliable smart outlet I own runs Linux on that MediaTek SoC I linked above (~500 MHz MIPS, 32MB RAM). I mean, power is definitely not a constraint when you're an inch away from the prongs, right? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[1] https://www.belkin.com/us/support-article?articleNum=116178