Need to move big amounts of dirt? You could use a tea spoon or something designed for the job, like a dump truck, or a really big dump truck.
In our programs, occasionally, we have to move large blocks of data. We can move it item by item, or bring out the data moving dump truck of computing, DMA.
This week, Andrei presents two examples of using DMA (with code included).
Read MoreConfused by the C keyword volatile? Keep forgetting what it means and why you'd use it?
Read MoreDo you need to shoot out a block of data to your SD card and polling is getting you down? Is your system getting crushed by UART interrupts? Direct Memory Access (DMA) is the answer.
DMA is really useful, but it's treated like computer voodoo by many. This week Andrei introduces us to the concepts behind DMA and gives a few examples.
Read MoreIn this installment in my continuing series about the tricky parts of embedded systems, I discuss some important areas that are often overlooked or undervalued.
Read MoreThis is an overview post for the whole tricky series. It will get updated with new posts as they are published.
Read MoreIf we learn so much from failure, why don’t we embrace it a little more fervently?
Read MoreWonder what you missed on this blog in 2016? I can help you with that.
Read MoreAndrei is back from his Christmas hiatus and brings us a post introducing getting input from a UART.
Previously he had covered output using printf, a helper function called _write, and the HAL routine to send data out of the UART. This time we use the other half of the UART, a different HAL routine, _read, and getchar.
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Lars wrote in and asked if we've ever done an episode of the podcast discussing impostor syndrome and overcoming self doubt.
Yes... yes we have.
Read MoreWhat good is a UART? Why is it the second thing I get set up? (The first being the ubiquitous blinking light.)
Read More"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of clocks -- and lights -- and MSP430 timers."
This week Andrei explains how to get a UART working using Cube. How to get printf working. And introduces the newlib standard library.
This is Andrei's final blog post of 2016, and it'll be useful for your Christmas break project where you learn about ARM processors using CubeMX and ST's Discovery board.
Read MoreThis a blog post is part of a series based on the Embedded Systems: The Tricky Parts talk that Elecia gave to the Silicon Valley IEEE Computer Society. A video of the talk is available on YouTube.
Read MoreUsing the UART on our Discovery board requires a little extra hardware before we can use it for debugging.
This week, Andrei reviews some of the ways to hook the Discovery board to your PC.
Read MoreLast time I explained the basics of what a microcontroller timer is and gave an overview of how timers are configured.
This time I’ll walk you through how to configure an MSP430 timer. We’ll use it to blink a light! (By now you’ve probably realized that most embedded system demos involve blinking a light. I’m pretty sure the singularity will look a lot like a rave.)
Read MoreThis week, Andrei introduces the UART. A useful data communications peripheral with a long history.
Follow along as Andrei gives the low down on bits and bauds, hardware handshakes, and inverting buffers.
Read MoreListener Spetty asks what our favorite podcasts are, both engineering and non-engineering.
Read MoreA conversation about careers led me to realize I'm not sure what I want to be when I grow up. I started thinking about it from a different perspective.
Read MoreThis week, Andrei discusses how our button can be used to generate an interrupt. Other examples include engine management computers. What things should you look out for when using interrupts.
Don't miss the photo at the bottom of the post for a useful hack.
Read MoreThis time, Andrei looks into switches, their bouncy nature, Schmitt triggers, hardware, and software debounce techniques. Join us for a look into the resistors and capacitors leading to port PA0. See oscilloscope traces in black AND white! All of this and more in this embedded.fm blog post!
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