Embedded Development: The Interview Part 2

Embedded Development

This is the second in a series of interviews between Ray Keefe of Successful Endeavours and Lance Harvie of People 4 Embedded. Lance is a LinkedIn connection of mine has wanted to do a series of interviews with Embedded Developers to go over issues, tips and career advice from those of us who have been in the industry for a while. We touch on topics such as:

 

  • Operating Systems
  • Software Testing
  • Design Methodologies
  • Hardware versus Software and trade-offs.

 

The first Interview is at Embedded Development.

 

Successful Endeavours specialise in Electronics Design and Embedded Software Development. Ray Keefe has developed market leading electronics products in Australia for nearly 30 years. This post is Copyright © 2013 Successful Endeavours Pty Ltd.

Embedded Development: The Interview Part 1

Embedded Development

Embedded Development is the process of creating a computing system that is encapsulated within a self contained object. This object may or may not be part of a larger system. In it’s own right it is an Embedded System. So how do you go about creating an Embedded System?

 

Lance Harvie of People 4 Embedded and a LinkedIn connection of mine has wanted do do a series of interviews with Embedded Developers to go over issues, tips and career advice from those of us who have been in the industry for a while. For our first attempt we decided to try a Skype video call and record it. But Skype was not working well. So then we thought we would try out a Google Hangout and video record the interview.

 

First tip: never try a process that isn’t fully debugged when it has to work first time.

 

Second tip: have a backup plan.

 

From that you might be able to tell that both the Skype and Google Hangout processes didn’t go to plan.

 

Third tip: don’t rely on debugging during a live demo.

 

Those who don’t regularly read this blog won’t know that I got into electronics because I was the electric lead guitarist that thought it would be cool to be able to design and build my own amplifiers, racks and effects. I have a post covering my background in Music Electronics.

 

So I had an audio recorder with me and recorded the audio from the speakers of my laptop. I know there are other ways to do this but I hadn’t expected this to end up being the only thing that worked on the night and I had to make it work right then and there. So the audio you hear is Lance from my speakers sounding a little thin and far away and me in the room. This is also why the video is static but it does have our contact details on it.

 

Fourth tip: have a fall-back position you know will work.

 

There will be a transcript soon but you can check out the conversation above. If you want to get a copy of the transcript then either subscribe to the blog or leave a comment.

 

Successful Endeavours specialise in Electronics Design and Embedded Software Development. Ray Keefe has developed market leading electronics products in Australia for nearly 30 years. This post is Copyright © 2013 Successful Endeavours Pty Ltd.