Embedded

Tags: ARM, Embedded, Programming

In the past I have written on the advantages of minimal development environments (read: Makefiles and GCC, no IDE, minimal abstraction layers) for ARM processors. One of the advantages of working this way is easy integration with existing processes such as build systems, production line, testing, etc. Using this in a virtualized environment also allows one to make sure every developer uses the same tools, and that the tools are tested and qualified for the intended project with a ready made virtual image available for each developer. They can then add their favorite editor and user interface, but the underlying build environment is fixed for everyone and archived as such on a per-project basis. This means that if a customer comes back a year or two later and wants to make a change, all the tools are there as we left them ready to make the change. In this blog post I'll write down a possible scenario for a typical STM32 project, in this case using a NUCLEO-L152RE board as a target. It should be easy to adapt to other STM32 boards/chips, and in general other ARM microcontrollers as well.

Tags: Cryptography, Embedded, Programming, Security

Security in the Internet of Things (IoT) leaves much to be desired. Some of the recent DDoS attacks such as those through Mirai on DNS provider Dyn or on popular security site KrebsonSecurity have been possible due to weak security measures in things like network connected cameras. There are many reasons why the situation is what it is today, but that will not be the topic of this entry. While we have seen some initiatives, notably the security guidelines (PDF) by NIST and some comments made by Bruce Schneier, I feel that this leaves a lot of people wondering what practical measures to take to secure their devices. Many companies in the IoT are start-ups lacking a proper understanding of what security in the embedded field entails, and might lack (or didn't plan for) the budget to hire dedicated security people. The goal of this blog entry are to (hopefully) lift the veil on some of the methodologies that should be employed to create more secure IoT systems from a very practical point of view.

Tags: Cloud, Electronics, Embedded, GPS, Network, Security, Wireless

The problem with the Internet of Things is that few people truly understand what it is really about. A large percentage of people in the group that does understand it tend to discard it as yet another marketing hype such as “the cloud” with very little real substance. Due to all kinds of news reports on security issues, vendor lock-ins and lack of open standards, cost overruns, etc. these people tend to see their opinions confirmed. We at WRD Systems also tend to agree with this group – to a point. The reason we do is that we see the same mistakes being made as countless numbers of times before, including the critical security issues that WRD Systems has highlighted for years. However, we also see the great potential of internet connected devices. Probably not the refrigerators and such, but closer to the origins of the Internet of Things: Machine to Machine, also known as M2M.

Tags: Electronics, Embedded, GPS, Hardware

As some of you may know, we at WRD Systems have been working on our new, next gen, GPS tracker. The goal of this one is to be as small as possible, yet pack as many features as possible out of the box while keeping the cost low. We often get requests asking how small our tracker is. We tried communicating scale in millimeter, or took a picture of the board next to a coin, but they did not seem to convey how small our tracker can really be. To try to improve on this, we present the Matchbox Tracker:

Tags: Computer, Embedded, Programming, School

Well, maybe not that new - but definitely something that is getting more and more important. 

The embedded development toolbox is rapidly expanding, and it is becoming harder and harder to find people skilled in these tools. Starting from the university, 'embedded' is considered hard and not as 'cool' as traditional software development. Why spend hours hacking away and reading datasheet to get to blink a LED and send 'hello world' over a UART when you could build rich graphical programs with web technologies or mobile? The fact that embedded development requires a wide skill set going from electronics, process control, signal processing to software, to Matlab means that substantial time is required to form a good base on which to build the required specialized skill sets. Not many people are willing to do that.