Wowzers! (Patreon)

Hey RepRappers, Thinkyhead here with another Marlin Firmware project update!

"Let's push this puppy out!"

So wow, what can I say? When I jumped in to help push through the 1.1.0 release I guess I didn't know what I was getting into! The number of new patches added since 1.1.0-RC3 (way back in December) numbers in the hundreds. The latest round spanning from RC4 through the upcoming RC6 has been almost as heavy.

I suppose we all knew RC4 wasn't going to pan out as the final release, but it made sense to put it out anyway. Since RC3, Marlin contributors had patched up dozens of issues and the time was ripe to get those fixes out to the community. The response was mostly positive, and I personally had no problems at all with my basic Cartesian printer.

But of course as more users with a variety of configurations came aboard, we got a slew of new issue reports. The community really came through in a big way. I was amazed by how many of you came along to test Marlin, give us feedback, and help troubleshoot.

There were enough show-stoppers in RC4 that I decided to release RC5 with the most obvious bugs patched up just a few days later. I had to make some last-minute changes to the LCD menu manager to improve Manual Bed Leveling just before RC5 came out, so users saw some minor LCD issues.

Weird Stuff with Arduino 1.0.x

We had some strange issues in defiance of all logic and reason. "How familiar!" we cried. Marlin has been hit by this before because older versions of the Arduino compiler are known to produce bad code, resulting in all kinds of very ugly and bad things. The worst of the lot is Arduino 1.0.6, so now when we see crashing we always ask first "Are you using Arduino 1.0.6?" rather than try to chase compiler bugs. We finally opted to throw a warning if you try to compile with any version of Arduino before 1.6.0.

Time for RC6… and 1.1.0 Final

It's hard to believe it's been 3 weeks since RC5, especially as I wanted to speed up the release cycle with another quick patch up job, and I figured that was all we would need. But you know you're getting really close to release when all the sneaky and subtle bugs start to appear. It means all the obvious and ugly bugs are finally dead, and users are gaining more confidence and trying more stuff.

The next release candidate will be RC6, slated for release in the next day or two, and I feel really good about this one. I finished support for CoreXY / CoreXZ and made lots of improvements to Mesh Bed Leveling and the LCD menus. Marlin 1.1.0 is shaping up to be a really strong release.

Taking Marlin to the People

In case you were worried, I want you to know I haven't just been locked in a tiny room for every moment just working on Marlin patches. In fact, on March 30th I found the time to give a presentation on Marlin Firmware for the Portland 3D Printing Lab Meetup group. I talked about how Marlin works, how to configure it, and the roadmap for the future. There was an enthusiastic group in attendance with many questions.

I plan to do more talks and labs around Marlin in the future. I'd love to help user group members to configure and update their machines to the latest and greatest Marlin code. I may also have the opportunity to test Marlin on more hardware and make some custom features for a local startup.

Graphical Displays and other Donations

I'd like to thank my fellow Github collaborators "emartinez," "AnHardt," and "esanapaj" for their generous donations this past month. It would have been a much harder time without you. Your modest capital injections may not seem like a lot, but they helped me to buy food, coffee, petrol, and bus fare so I was able to work on Marlin at the cafés which provide me the vital wifi.

As I write, a graphical display in transit all the way from Perth, Australia. I've received a few promises from well-intentioned donors in the past for equipment that never panned out, so I was pessimistic about this one. But "emartinez" assures me it's on the way, and has the shipping receipt to prove it!

I'm just excited to finally have a graphical display in hand. That Marlin UI is okay, but I know it can be made better!