Embedded

Andrei Chichak spoke with us about MISRA-C and ethics.  Linker post:  It's dangerous to go alone! Take MISRA-C Embedded.fm listener survey (please!) Andrei's has  personal website  (we failed to talk about his kite aerial photography , it is really neat though) and his company is  CBF Systems . Plum Hall C Compiler Validation PC Lint JPL Coding Standards for C (and the mentioned  video discussing...

Chris and Elecia talk about memetics , learning, and processors.  Elecia was coy about the Pasadena party May 9th and 10th, but Hackaday announced it so you can invite yourself . She will also be speaking at the Solid conference  in June in SF (email for a coupon!). She'll also be at ESC-Silicon Valley in July .  Star Wars Teaser #2  and SpaceX almost-landing BLE fun: T I's CC2640  and Nordic nRF5...

Professor Paul Fishwick joined us to talk about CS and STEM education, excellent analogies, and the crossover of art and technology.  The Linker post related to this episode managed to be reasonably topical for a change. Paul's work: UT Dallas homepage Creative Automata blog  and Modeling For Everyone blog TEDx talk Aesthetic Computing , one of his books on art and CS. Online chapter .  Creative A...

Carrie Sundra ( @AlpenglowYarn ) spoke with us about doing a Kickstarter on her own… and nearly failing. The SkeinMinder is an automation tool for small yarn businesses (and enthusiastic amateurs). When the successful Kickstarter nearly fell short, Carrie candidly wrote about it (includes a great description of the economies of scale). Carrie's yarn company is Alpenglow Yarn . You can use the cont...

This week we discuss lasers, internet of things, and static electricity. Our extremely opinionated guest has a lot to say, including some scatological humor. The associated Linker post went up early for this one, please check it out. Scary robot litter box  

The linker post for this episode is Be Excellent to Each Other . Dennis Jackson spoke with us about drones (and Airware ), simple code, and learning.  Hobbyist drones and UAVs on Amazon: tiny and cheap ,   medium (Christopher's gift), and please-I'm-drooling-right-now . Only the last one may be an Airware  platform (Dennis could neither confirm nor deny). Airware's breakdown of proposed FAA rules...

The Linker post for this episode is  RTOSs and Brownies . Joel Sherrill ( @JoelSherrill ) spoke with us about real time operating systems, free and open source software, interns, and space. RTEMS home page and wiki Google Summer of Code (the FAQ is the best part!) and ESA Summer of code (awesome tagline: In space no one can hear you code). The LEON is the ESA Sparc core with open source VHDL and e...

The Linker post for this episode: Make Anything James @Laen Neal from OSHPark spoke with us about starting a business, helping open source hardware, and throwing wild parties.  OSHPark  got its start from DorkbotPDX . If you are in Portland, Oregon, check out their meetup (started out on Mondays, now first Tuesday of the month, look at the CymaSpace meetup calendar for the Maker Meetup). Open Sour...

The Linker post for this episode: How to Win the Hackaday Prize (and Other Design Challenges) Sophi Kravitz, electrical engineer and Hackaday Mythical Creature, came on to leak the new Hackaday Prize details!  On twitter, she's @SophiKravitz  and often has the reins of @HackadayPrize . Sophi mentioned Matt Berggren's PCB workshop  (oh! and a Solid talk too !). All three of us have been trying to m...

The Linker post for this Episode: Solving a Different Problem  ThingM's Tod Kurt ( @todbot ) joined us to talk about the most important part of every embedded system: blinking lights. ThingM has been making I2C lights ( BlinkM , MinM and MaxM ) since 2006.  The newer, more productized USB light is the Blink(1)  (there is a coupon near the end of the show). Blink(1) had two successful kickstarters...

Chris Savage ( @SavageCircuits ) talks about building a community and about stopping projects when life intrudes. His site is Savage Circuits . He has a YouTube channel . He has Savage Circuit TV which are the longer, more in depth videos and Short Circuit for the shorter ones. Also see his forums . Chris works for Parallax and had some kit suggestions: BOE-BOT (board of education bot), its succes...

Same day PCBs?!?  Danielle Applestone ( @dapplestone ) chatted with Chris and Elecia about desktop CNC milling using  @OtherMachine 's OtherMill.  OtherMill links: features tools and materials (neat!) store (kits!) instructables (chocolate spaceships!) kickstarter page miniature mocha pot brass, err.. aluminum turbine  (also: what Elecia heard ) stories of people using OtherMill Synthetos TinyG co...

Chip Gracey spoke with us about founding @ParallaxInc , chip design, and the Propeller with its many cores. Parallax Some notes on open sourcing the Propeller Propeller One Verilog forum Propeller products Elecia has a very old Propeller Starter kit but is tempted to get the  PropStick USB . Many years ago, Chris got a Basic Stamp 2 module (like this one ) to control a camera in his RC airplane:

86: MADEUPICAL WORD Erin McKean ( @emckean ) is a lexicographer, programmer, and start-up founder.  We spoke to her about Wordnik (the online uber dictionary), Reverb (smarter recommendations), and her many books. Wordnik : Adopt-a-word Developer Erin's favorite list Reverb Erin has written many books , some about words, one about dresses ( The Hundred Dresses ), and one fiction novel about  The S...

Scott Miller built a hula hoop with Bluetooth, an inertial measurement unit, a 32-bit processor, an 8-bit processor, and a slew of individually addressable LEDs. It makes wild patterns when you move. Scott's "normal" company, with all of its ham radio equipment, is Argent Data Systems . The hula hoops are Hyperion Hoops .  You can buy a hoop . They are also on Facebook or you can watch the mesmeri...

The founders of Bluestamp Engineering spoke with us about running a hands-on summer engineering program for high school students (while keeping their day jobs). Bluestamp  website , Twitter ( @BlueStampEng ),  YouTube channel  full of student projects and  Facebook page .  Dave Young ( @daveyoungEE ) is also the principal engineer at Young Circuit Design . Robin Mansukhani is also CEO of Alzeca . ...

Raman Pi creator Mark Johnson ( @flatCat_ ) spoke with us about spectrometers, 3D printing, and competing in the Hackaday Prize.  Raman Pi project on Hackaday.io Hackaday prize semi-finalist video Mike Szczys' Fl@c@ bio on Hackaday.com Open Source Fusor Research Consortium Wikipedia:  spectrometer ,  Raman spectroscopy , fusors , and optical coherence tomography Weird Stuff is a Bay area electroni...

Jen, Chris, and Elecia talk about the movies that influenced them to go into engineering. Real Genius ( imdb , Amazon ) Star Wars ( imdb , Amazon ) Choose Your Own Adventure books ( Amazon , wiki ) Wargames ( imdb , Amazon ) Ghostbusters ( imdb , Amazon ) Star Trek: The Next Generation ( imdb , Amazon ) 321 Contact, show and magazine ( imdb (tv)) The Muppets Show ( imdb , Amazon ) Sneakers ( imdb...

Chris and Elecia babble up a show about gifts, conferences, and makers. Embedded Systems Conference  is put on by UBM. The conference is in Boston May 6-7, 2015, Santa Clara July 20-22, and Minneapolis November 4-5. The Santa Clara proposal deadline is January 9th. O'Reilly's Solid Conference  is June 22-25 in San Francisco. Proposals are due January 12th. Fitbit Surge  ( Amazon ) Kerbal Space Pro...

Bill Winterberg ( @BillWinterberg ) chatted with Elecia about leaving embedded engineering to become a financial planner then to being a technology adviser to other financial planners.  Bill's company is FPPad . You can subscribe to his newsletter  and watch Bits and Bytes , his video blog (or read it). Bill and Elecia met at LeapFrog . Bill was instrumental in making the original LeapPad Learning...

Vicky Tuite ( @vixter55 ) came on the show to chat with Chris and Elecia about EVAOS , a company that upgrades Ford trucks into plug-in hybrids. Feminist Hacker Barbie She's Geeky Bay piggies (BayPIGgies)

Chris Svec ( @christophersvec ) has an idea about adding empathy to software development. It is a good idea. His blog is Said Svec . He works for iRobot and they are hiring. (Chris' email is given toward the end of the show but if you hit the contact link here, we'll pass along info to him.)  Obligatory cat video Embedded has an episode devoted to  impostor syndrome .  O'Reilly's Head First book s...

Sophi Kravitz ( @SophiKravitz , G+ ) joined us to talk about working on neat things: Wobble World , Oculus Rift , Unity , goldfish training, and BlueStamp Engineering . Sophi's company is Mix Engineering Leap Motion vs.  Microsoft Kinect Goldfish driving (vid) Quit Your Day Job on Element14 , previously on Super Green Dot Advertising in SkyMall Thermoelectric Firestarter

Ron Sparks ( @ txNgineer , AG5RS) spoke with us about the convergence of makers and ham radio enthusiasts. The alternative internet: AMPRNet  ( wiki ) aka 44 net South Texas Balloon Launch Team Pecan Pico AmSAT SatNOGS (their site , their hackaday entry ,  and the video Elecia liked) Weak Signal Propagation Reporter Network ("whisper"). Also on wiki .

Glenn Scott and Nacho Solis spoke with Elecia about content-centric networking , being research scientists, and working at PARC . [Note: Elecia was the recording engineer and her inexperience showed by not hitting that other little button on the software. Nacho's mic ended up bad but Chris mostly fixed it... the sound gets better after the first five minutes.] Twitter: Nacho ( @isolis ), CCN ( @pr...