In a routine on
Saturday Night Live
back before it went
completely downhill, Mike Myers played the proprietor of a shop that
sold Scottish goods exclusively. He greeted customers with “Welcome
to All Things Scottish.
If it’s not Scottish, it’s [expletive
deleted].”
Likewise,
Embedded Systems Programming
might be described as
covering All Things Embedded, although be assured that unlike Mike
Myers, we don’t disparage everything else. One of the difficulties
in covering All Things Embedded is that this particular shop keeps
expanding its merchandise. In 1988, “embedded” represented a
niche in the electronics business. Processors were small and code space
was limited. The market for
embedded products was largely industrial and
mil/aero. Today telecommunications and networking markets dominate. The
automotive segment has grown, as has the consumer product sector. Most
of the design starts are on 16- and 32-bit processors, C++ is a major
factor, and Java is even encroaching.
The software content of
embedded systems continues to spiral upward. New areas of relevance are
popping up everywhere. Thirty-two-bit processors, Internet connectivity,
and system-on-a-chip design all influence the
editorial content of the
magazine. However, even though we’re covering topics we would not
have considered just a few years ago, that doesn’t mean we’re
abandoning the traditional areas at all.
Embedded Systems
Programming
is still about developing ROMable code. It’s still
about real-time. It’s still about working close to the metal on
systems with small memory footprints. Wherever development challenges
arise, there is potential for coverage in the magazine.
Although
technology continues to advance, the charter has not changed. To help
enforce the charter, we’ve brought on a new technical editor. Now,
good technical editors are hard to find because they must possess the
skills of an engineer while at the same time maintaining a fairly broad
perspective on the industry so that they can recognize trends and sort
out what’s important. They must also be able to write like demons.
Needless to say, such talented folk don’t grow on trees.
But
after an extensive,
nationwide search, we found one.
Michael Barr, who
has been a speaker at the Embedded Systems Conference and has written
articles for
Embedded Systems Programming
, has agreed to take on
the challenging role of technical editor for the magazine. Michael has a
BSEE and MSEE from the University of Maryland. Until a couple of weeks
ago, he was an embedded software developer who had worked for both large
and small companies. He is intimately acquainted with languages ranging
from C to VHDL, network
protocols ranging from TCP/IP to CEBus, and
multiple architectures and commercial RTOSes. As if it weren’t
enough to be working as an embedded developer, developing articles for
ESP
, and speaking at conferences, he also wrote a book, which was
published this past January.
Programming Embedded Systems in C and
C++
(O’Reilly & Associates) is a tutorial to help give
beginning embedded developers a leg up.
Michael is an important asset
in our determination to cover all things embedded.
They say that
SNL
isn’t relevant anymore. We’ll try to avoid that in
ESP
.
Lindsey Vereen
lvereen@cmp.com
