NETLabTK Update!

Posted on: 12/17/2014

Watch the new NETLabTK in action. As we prepare to release an Alpha version, we wanted to update you on how it’s coming along. More details below.

It’s been a long time coming, but we’re about to move the toolkit forward to a completely new architecture. Flash Pro has been good to us, but now is the time to adopt modern technologies like HTML5 and Nodejs. In addition, the new NTK version is designed to run on a range of systems, including Linux based microcontrollers like the Arduino Tre and Intel Galileo and Edison.

We plan to make an alpha release of NTK in January, along with a completely new website. Here are some more details on the toolkit.

NTKlogogreen

Features

  • Browser based authoring – all authoring happens in a web browser – no Flash required
  • NodeJS server – the new server is built in NodeJS so it can run on multiple platforms – pc, cloud, and embedded
  • Runs headless – The system is designed so that once the authoring is completed, the user can close the browser and the project will continue to run on the server. Reconnect with a browser, and you’ll see the project running in progress.
  • Projects are text files – When you make a project, you save it as a text file in JSON format. This makes it easy to save and share projects.
  • Fully mobile – Since the authoring is done in a browser, you can use a mobile device for this. Imagine just using and Intel Galileo and a table for an entire project – never touch a PC!
  • Improved widgets – We’re undertaking a complete redesign of the widgets to make them easier to user, visually modern, and mobile friendly. The widget designs you see in the video above are just the first step in this process.
  • Create your own widgets – The system was designed to be easily extended, so that you can add your own widgets. Templates are provided, and you write a combination of Javascript and HTML to create a widget.

2015 Timeline

  • January – Alpha release with 14 or more widgets, new website
  • January to April – UX and Visual design phase for entire system, bug fixes, feature completion
  • June – Beta release with full suite of redesigned widgets. double-clickable application, and drop-in disk images for popular embedded systems
  • August – 1.0 release

Source Code

As an open source project, our current development repository is on Github. You can pull from here:

https://github.com/netlabtoolkit/ntk