FPGA Central

Embedded Technology Journal Update


a techfocus media publication :: June 16, 2009 :: volume XV, no. 11









FROM THE EDITOR



A creative artist, a crafts person, or an engineer: when you start to write code, how do you see yourself, and how does this fit with the quality of the final product? In looking for answers, Dick Selwood finds experts calling for cultural changes.

Thanks for reading! If there's anything we can do to make our publications more useful to you, please let us know at: comments (AT) embeddedtechjournal (DOT) com. If you'd rather sound off in public, please post your comments or questions in our new Journal Forums.

Jim Turley – Editor
Embedded Technology Journal









EVENTS AND ANNOUNCEMENTS











Building a complete Linux SDK for a MIPS platform using LinuxLink 3.0. Learn the process for designing and assembling a complete Software Development Kit for a hardware platform running a MIPS-based processor.

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Android Beyond Mobile MIPS Technologies is bringing the power of Android to the MIPS development community across the world. Android offers a whole new internet-connected user experience for devices such as DTVs, MIDs and set-top boxes.

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LATEST NEWS



June 16, 2009



WD® Begins Shipping New SATA/PATA SSDs Featuring Higher Speeds And Capacities For Embedded Systems and Data Streaming Applications



IDT Announces World's First DisplayPort-Based Solution Enabling Multi-Monitor Functionality



Wind River Adds Virtualization to Industry’s Most Comprehensive Multicore Software Solution



Ramtron Expands F-RAM Serial Memory Line with 32-Kilobit Device



Digi-Key Corporation and IAR Systems Announce Global Distribution Deal



Silicon Turnkey Express Selects Timesys' LinuxLink as Default Linux Environment for ADS512102 Platform



June 15, 2009



eASIC and IPextreme® Announce Freescale ColdFire® Processors For Nextreme New ASICs



Freescale Speeds Embedded Multicore Adoption with New VortiQa Software Products and an Expanded Ecosystem



DATEL Quad Sampling A/D converter combines low noise and excellent dynamic performance for a wide range of image processing applications



MontaVista Continues Strong Support for Freescale Multicore Processors and New VortiQa Software Products



Starter Kit From Microchip Technology Enables Easy Development of Human-Machine Interface and Intelligent Sensor Processing Designs



CoWare Reduces Design Cost for Complex ARM AMBA Platform Optimization



June 12, 2009



XMOS simplifies Ethernet AVB Implementation



June 11, 2009



Teleca Partners with SVOX - Enabling Faster Adoption of Speech Technologies in Automotive and Consumer Electronics



New 750 watt, 1U User Configurable Power Supplies from Excelsys



FuturePlus Systems Introduces New DDR 3 Memory Bus Interposer



June 10, 2009



Easy-to-use, cost-efficient energy management with Virtual Extension wireless mesh networks and TI technology



Dual-Channel uModule Receiver Subsystem Combines High-Speed ADCs & Drivers in Compact Package



Infinite Power Solutions Launches Its THINERGY™ Micro-Energy Cell Product Family



Matrox Supersight e2 eliminates bottlenecks in high-throughput image processing applications



Operating Systems Used in Embedded Systems - Volume 6: End-User Data on Operating Systems and Multi-Core Components & Tools



Melfas Chooses ARM Cortex-M0 Processor for Capacitive Touch Screen Controllers



Operating Systems Used in Embedded Systems - Voume 5: Mobile Software Stack



CURRENT FEATURE ARTICLES



Engineering or Craft
Developing Safety Critical Software and Systems
(Dick Selwood)
What the Hell Were They Thinking?!
(Jim Turley)
Atmel SAM3U Boasts Screaming USB
(Jim Turley)
Dhrystone Is Dead; Long Live CoreMark!
(Jim Turley)
Powering Up
Mocana Lights up a Freescale Encryption Accelerator
(Bryon Moyer)
So You Want to Be an Entrepreneur
Part 2
(Jim Turley)
So You Want to Be an Entrepreneur
Part 1
(Jim Turley)





JOURNAL WEBCASTS



CHALK TALK Improving Software Development Productivity With Virtual Platforms. Are your SoC and embedded design projects increasingly dominated by software development schedules? Join Amelia Dalton as she talks with Frank Schirrmeister of Synopsys about ways to improve software development productivity using virtual platforms. (Synopsys)

CHALK TALK From Desktop to Target: What You Need From A Development Suite. Is embedded software development and debug a challenge for your team? Join Amelia Dalton as she chats with Jit Sivalogan of Mentor Graphics about setting up a productive environment for embedded development. (Mentor Graphics)

CHALK TALK Simplified Verification of DSP Algorithms in Hardware. Moving algorithms from MATLAB to FPGAs? Join Amelia Dalton as she explores options for verifying DSP designs implemented in FPGAs with Tim Vanevenhoven from Xilinx. (Xilinx)

CHALK TALK Using Embedded Hypervisors in Mobile Devices. Join Amelia Dalton as she explores the use of embedded hypervisors to create safe and secure software for mobile devices with Rob McCammon of Open Kernel Labs. (Open Kernel Labs)



[click here for more webcasts]












Engineering or Craft
Developing Safety Critical Software and Systems
(Dick Selwood)

This article has been in production for some time. It was going to be so simple: chat to two of the leading pundits on system safety and pull together a quick piece of “compare and contrast.” Just to add to the timeliness, there has been a very genteel firefight over the role of the IEC 61508 standard on the leading system safety newsgroup (click here to read), and, sadly, Air France flight 447 has disappeared, leading to intense speculation as to whether the cause was related to the fly-by-wire systems that the Airbus 330’s (and other Airbus models) use extensively.

However, the conversation with the experts and the subsequent reading had me reaching for my “I think you will find it’s a bit more complicated than that” t-shirt.  In fact, in the words of the old joke, “If you want to get to there, I wouldn’t start from here.”

Let’s start with bridges – no electronic content, but a well-understood technology for building bridges that stay up and carry traffic. Tens of thousands of them around the world, and most of them just sit there and do the job. Just occasionally a new bridge goes wrong in some way, and then there is an investigation. The investigation is not looking to assign blame and is not carried out behind closed doors; instead, the investigating team will include a range of professionals, possibly including competitors of the original development team, and the results are quickly put into the public domain so that all future bridge designers learn from this.

Is this what happens when an electronics system goes wrong?

Martyn Thomas, who has been trying to get us to build safe software for several decades, draws a clear distinction between software development and engineering. In his view, while engineering learns from its mistakes, software developers are still making the same mistakes that were being made twenty or more years ago.

Engineering disciplines normally start as a craft. As the tasks they undertake become more complex, then they begin to use mathematics and science to understand what is happening and to provide an underpinning of theory to the craft skills. Software development, except in some restricted areas, has not yet reached this phase. Instead, we have systems developed according to procedural rules (such as IEC 61508), and, providing the rules are followed and the software passes testing, then the system is certified as “safe.”

Thomas feels strongly that merely following the process and then testing does not produce good software. In fact, he claims, there is evidence that there is no relationship between following development processes and software quality. And testing doesn’t guarantee software quality: studies show that, for example, MCDC (Modified Condition/Decision Coverage) testing, mandated for DO-178B, the most rigorous of the defence software standards, “does not significantly increase the probability of detecting any serious defects that remain in the software.” [more]














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