Embedded Computing: July 2004 Archives
What I experienced in a supermarket in Gothenburg 4 years ago has finally came to Ireland.
Siliconrepublic reports on the fact that Irish card payment processing company EuroConex claims to have made history by processing the very first non-test chip and PIN transaction in Ireland at the Nas Na Riogh Bookshop in Naas.
The transaction is understood to have been made on a EuroConex-owned Hypercom terminal on 28 June. Following that, the first concentrated roll-out of chip and PIN technology in Ireland took place last Tuesday (13 July) in the towns of Naas and Newbridge.
I came across this website while reading an article on silicon strategies. This site is devoted to the hardware and silicon engineers. It is not light reading as the title suggest you are in deep chip now ...
ITpapers has an article that presents a system architecture that allows users to interact with embedded systems located in their proximity using Smart Phones. These phones have the unique feature of incorporating short-range wireless connectivity (e.g., Bluetooth) and Internet connectivity (e.g., GPRS) in the same personal mobile device. This feature together with significant processing power and memory can turn a Smart Phone into the only mobile device that people will carry wherever they go.
According to In-Stat/MDR (http://www.instat.com), Intel, the world's leading semiconductor manufacturing company, is in the midst of many changes in its microprocessor product portfolio and manufacturing strategy. In 2004, Intel is ramping production of new desktop and mobile microprocessors in Prescott and Dothan, respectively. In addition, Intel has announced the introduction of dual-core processors beginning in the second-half of 2005 to overcome the growing problems of leakage current and power consumption associated with smaller manufacturing process technology and increasing operating frequencies. This will be accompanied by a shift in marketing from microprocessor speed grades to other feature and performance characteristics.
Intel is also ramping production on a 90nm process using 300mm wafers in 2004. The new process increases the number of potential units four times over the older 0.13µm process using 200mm wafers. Intel's fab expansion strategy is also changing to favor the retooling of older fabs over building new megafabs.
It looks like that I will have to start thinking of reasons as to why I will need the next generation of the Sony Playstation. I already own the PSone and PSTwo. My reasoning the last time was that I did not have a DVD player...
The next-generation PlayStation will be unveiled as early as the end of the year by designer Sony Computer Entertainment Inc., which plans to demonstrate a prototype of its next game console during the Electronic Entertainment Expo 2005 next May.
Jack Ganssle at embedded.com reports on the change of strategies of microsof and Windriver with regards to embedded licensing.
With Microsofs and Windrivers change if heart to GPL it now means that developers may now use and modify some 2.5 million lines of CE without releasing their revised code back to Microsoft
Also windriver are now embracing linux with the release of an IDE that supports Linux and VxWorks. Their licensing model for VxWorks has also changed so that it no longer requires royalties.
The Register have a tongue in cheek article on preventing security breaches and compromise of your data
They have formulated a five-point plan which guarantees the absolute integrity of your data.
One of their recommendations is to:
"Restrict staff access to computers, preferably completely. Ideally, remove your company's entire IT infrastucture and seal the servers in concrete-filled oildrums and dump them into the Atlantic. "
At ISSC 04 in Queens University Belfast, Celoxica had a stand promoting their Univeristy alliance programme.
This company uses a derivative of C called Handel C which offers pure parralelism. There are some implementation issues as some of my research colleagues in the University of Limerick pointed out to me, but have since been resolved with later versions.
Clive Maxfield provides a review on embedded.com of the latest products and annoucements from Celoxica.
Clive has also written a book titled "The design warriors guide to FPGA's" I shall be purchasing this book as it seems to cover topics that are of interest to me.
SANTA CLARA, Calif. July 7, 2004 - Tensilica, Inc. announced that it has achieved a major design automation breakthrough the automated design of optimized configurable processors from standard C code using the company's new XPRES (Xtensa PRocessor Extension Synthesis) Compiler.
This tool enables the rapid development of optimized system-on-chip (SOC) devices without requiring designers to hand code their hardware using design languages like VHDL and Verilog.
Instead, designers input the original algorithm that they're trying to optimize, written in standard ANSI C/C , and the XPRES Compiler, coupled with Tensilica's automated processor generation technology, automatically generate an RTL (register transfer level) hardware description and associated software tool chain. In less than an hour, the resulting hardware block is delivered in the form of a pre-verified Xtensa LX processor core.
Additionally, the generated RTL fully rivals the performance and efficiency of hand-coded RTL blocks with many concurrent operations, efficient data types, and optimized multiple wide deep pipe
XPRES Compiler Automates Processor and RTL Design from Standard C Code
