New debug forum held later

Software debug tool company Lauterbach has announced that it will be holding an Automotive Forum at its head office in Munich. This free, one-day embedded computers event is open to all English speaking developers and interested embedded computers parties. The day will include a number of interesting topics presented by a Lauterbach specialist or a guest speaker.

“Developing reliable software for safety critical automotive applications can be very challenging,” said Barry Lock. “We have recently developed several important new techniques, such as ‘long-term trace’. It is this kind of innovation that is enabling faster and more effective code development. I think engineers will greatly benefit from this Forum.”

For more information and to register please visit www.lauterbach.com/1809

refer to: http://embedded-computing.com/news/lauterbach-software-debugging-workshops/

New feature for power management

Qseven supports power management features embedded computer and requires only a 5 V power supply, making it well suited for battery-run applications. Recent embedded computer updates to the specification also introduced a reduced form factor module and extended support for mobile processors, increasing the specification’s viability for low-power, portable applications.

“If it is a mobile application with low to medium computing performance requirements, then Qseven is the right choice,” says Christian Eder, Marketing Manager at congatec AG headquartered in Deggendorf, Germany (www.congatec.com). “Medical systems typically require special functionalities such as ultrasonic control or high levels of isolation in order to protect patients in case of a malfunction. Standard SBCs typically do not feature that. The embedded computer logical consequence is to create a custom carrier board that takes all specific functionalities and complete it with a standard COM. Once this combination is certified, it is quite easy to upgrade or scale to other CPUs while the certification remains or just needs to be updated. This provides a lot of freedom to choose the best-fitting CPU and graphics for a given application.”

refer to: http://smallformfactors.com/articles/qseven-coms-healthcare-mobile/

I/O connectivity in embedded industry

FMC technology is gaining ground as preferred I/O embedded computers. FPGAs have long been used to implement I/O customization, since the required mix of I/O interfaces can be easily implemented in a programmable device from existing IP blocks. The electrical drivers and connectors also need adaptation; however, in a modular embedded system this is not an issue, because the I/O connectivity and electrical protections are customized to the application. It is not difficult to include the electrical drivers in this system-level customization.

On the other hand, for laboratory and test embedded system equipment, it is more convenient to have the electrical drivers directly onboard, because there is no need for sophisticated protection devices, and standard front-panel connectivity is convenient. The FMC form factor allows the customization of the electrical drivers and connectors on a low-cost mezzanine, while the FPGA board itself and the backplane connectivity remain unchanged.

refer to: http://vita-technologies.com/articles/technically-trends-mass-customization-fpgas/

Software add up for the embedded system

Embedded computer software vendors also supply software performance analysis tools to help developers profile and visualize the real-time activity in software. Many of these analysis tools are optional and will add to the overall tool cost. Green Hills Software offers the MULTI Integrated Development Environment (IDE) to support a variety of OSs. The IDE software tools include several C compiler options, editor, configuration manager, code browser, and debugger in a single package. MULTI also features DoubleCheck, an integrated static analyzer that isolates bugs caused by complex interactions between code segments that might not be in the same source file.

refer to: http://embedded-computing.com/articles/choose-right-embedded-operating-system/