I have been looking into wireless sensor networks for some time, and I definitely need to jump into the wagon and order some development kits to play/experiment and build some prototypes. 802.15.4 is the radio layer used by Zigbee. I am not constrained to using specifically Zigbee and I prefer open-source stacks, but I would … Read more
Lately I keep hearing a lot about software companies moving into agile development processes. Irrespectively of the hype surrounding these news, I think some agile practices are really worth implementing in an embedded software environment: I have had great success e.g. with fast development cycles and continuous integration. However, we need to be cautious with … Read more
Although I agree that proprietary software should have their own space within the embedded systems industry, there are some open source tools I consider essential when developing embedded software. Cenatic is the Spanish national reference center on open source technologies. They have published an interesting report on the usage of open source software on the … Read more
I will be mentoring a SANS Security 401 class in Madrid, starting the 6th of October. This class gives an overview of many security topics, and provides a great foundation on which to build your security career. I passed the GSEC certification test last year and preparing for it was quite challenging and interesting, with … Read more
NanoBSD is a great set of scripts that facilitate the compilation and installation of a custom full FreeBSD system on embedded devices. It is particularly suited for booting from CF cards, as it creates a read-only root file system, with the read-write partitions mounted on RAM (md) so as to reduce wear on the card. … Read more
The technical workshop on the Spanish electronic ID card, DNIe, that took place in Valladolid the 1st of June, provided a good introduction into a subject I have just started to look into. The DNIe support website offers loads of resources useful for development of applications built around the usage of a DNIe smartcard. I … Read more
Embedded World 2010 in Nuremberg was a great exhibition and conference. The trendy topics this year seemed to be Android and energy-efficient computing, with a myriad of vendors selling low-power embedded solutions. There were as well plenty of ARM related tools and chip vendors, with ARM getting bigger all the time. Also, an example of … Read more
