When using an Eclipse based IDE to debug an embedded system, undoubtedly the reader has come across the reset and restart buttons in the debug perspective. From a high-level view, these two options may seem the same but there are important differences on when a developer should use restart over reset. Let’s look at how … Continue reading Embedded Basics – The Difference between Restart and Reset
Bootloaders are included in nearly every embedded system and provide a great way to update application code in the field without having to access a programming port. As important as bootloaders are, developers often get tripped up trying to jump from the bootloader into their application code. The jump needs to be clean but there … Continue reading Tips and Tricks – Jumping from the Bootloader to the Application Code Cleanly
Finally! I have a J-Trace in hand and I am ready to wreak havoc on those pesky software bugs that always toy with me! A little more than a year ago I decided that I couldn’t stand using low-cost, one-off debuggers any longer and needed to invest in a real debugging tool that I could … Continue reading Tools – A First Encounter with the SEGGER J-Trace
Developers who want to reuse software have several challenges to overcome in order to be successful. These challenges include but are not limited to: Endianness Processor architecture Bus width Ambiguous standards Development time and budget Modularity Code coupling Getting started can be overwhelming and lead to more stress and confusion than simply writing very functional … Continue reading Getting Started Writing Portable Firmware
Callback functions are an essential and often critical concept that developers need to create drivers or custom libraries. A callback function is a reference to executable code that is passed as an argument to other code that allows a lower-level software layer to call a function defined in a higher-level layer(10). A callback allows a … Continue reading Embedded Basics – Callback Functions
One of the top complaints about electronic devices in our modern, mobile society is that their batteries don’t last as long as expected. Human beings have to some degree become addicted to our ability to always be connected and streaming data of one form or another. The increased use of mobile devices has resulted in … Continue reading 7 Tricks for Estimating Battery Life
Software engineers are everywhere! Software engineers develop the low-level firmware that drives our gadgets, the application code that allows us to interact with our devices, the software that manages the internet, satellites, medical devices, automobiles and the list goes on and on. Despite the abundant and ever growing software developer ranks, there seems to be … Continue reading The Case of the Missing Professional Software Engineers
Hardware In-Loop (HIL) testing runs the test case code on the target microcontroller rather than using a mocked software layer to act as the hardware. HIL testing can be extremely useful for verifying that hardware accesses from a HAL are working as expected and even test that all outputs from the system work as expected. … Continue reading Hardware In-Loop Testing
Course Overview: The IoT edge devices have embedded written all over them. Sensor nodes that acquire data and transmit them to the cloud is quickly becoming common place. In this series, Jacob Beningo will walk attendees through the steps and processes necessary to create a sensor node using an ESP8266 which is an integrated microcontroller … Continue reading CEC – Designing IoT Sensor Nodes using the ESP8266
Best practices and industry standards develop and evolve over time but they represent a snap shot of guiding wisdom. Best practices can be slow to evolve and often become entrenched despite technological advances that void the previously known best practice. The use of C language features within the embedded systems space has suffered the same … Continue reading 5 Forbidden C Features that just might not be
