Customer Reviews

An Embedded Software Primer

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I started working on an embedded platform 1 year ago. Although now I have a good understanding of a lot of the aspects of the system, I never get the big picture.

This book provides exactly what I needed.

If you are a working software engineer and have spent years doing high level programming, the first few chapters will give you a good review of low-level-close-to-the-machine things that you need to know, which is also very useful for students as these are very important concepts that they need to understand to have a solid foundation to conquer higher level, more abstract CS subjects.

In embedded system, bugs in task code can bring down the device. Author has done a very good job explaining how to protect shared data using mechanism provided by a RTOS. The communication between interrupt/task and among tasks are also discussed thoroughly.

Unlike the other reviewer, I found the use of the C!! language in this book a very clever way to abstract away the hardware dependent code from the point being discussed. Consider it pseudo comment if you will.

BTW, the excellent typesetting and use of fonts also makes it a very pleasant experience reading this book.

Looking forward to see a more advanced text on embedded system from this author in the future.

This is a great book for begineers. The author touches upon just about all aspects of software development for embedded systems. This information is usually learned the hard way - on the job. This book will give begineers a head start with the numerous examples of how to do things. And how NOT to do things. I have made it required reading for my software engineers - new and experienced.

In addition, the book is easy reading. The author keeps things somewhat brief and to the point.

I shouldn't need to say more; If you're interested in learning about writing software for embedded systems, this book will take you by the hand and get you there without a lot of fuss or difficulty in trying to figure out advanced topics from a 50,000ft perspective. It drills into each discussion using simplified but not simpleton characteristics of this writer's excellent skill. I recommend this book to every software engineer starting on the path to developing embedded systems. The use of uCOS-II is a decent idea, especially for everyone interested in doing a little embedded systems development using PC hardware...however, I believe that it is a less-than perfect choice because of the rather limited compiler choices for uCOS-II, which should at least include GNU's gcc, but doesn't last time I checked.

Particularly useful for those just starting out in embedded software or for students at the bachelors level. Contains many real world-type examples and illustrates some common errors that we will all tend to make. Also, I know that electrical engineering students often don't get exposure to operating system concepts and computer science students lack exposure to hardware issues. This book helps to smooth over what you may be missing in your education. For the practicing engineer, I recommend it, not so much for reference, but for re-enforcement and clarification of essential concepts. Also it will add quality to your code.

The book provides very useful information for anyone that wishes to learn embedded software from the ground up. Great for entry level engineers, or professionals wishing to make a lateral move into embedded systems. The book has two clearly written chapters dedicated to hardware fundamentals; describing I/O .vs. memory mapping, how interrupts function, memory types including PROM's, and microprocessor basics. A chapter is dedicated to one of the single most inportant issues in embedded systems SHARED DATA and how to prevent corrupting it. Chapter 5 discusses four basic software methods to servicing interrupts. Chapters 6,7, and 8 clearly introduce the concept of an RTOS (Real Time Operating System). Chapter 9 is a must read for those new to embedded systems. It discusses development tools and the steps required to get your final code onto the target system. It explains what a cross-compiler is and why they are used in embedded systems. This is a very good book for engineers with C skills!

For someone starting up into embedded systems this book is excellent. For an experienced developer this book makes for a nice bedtime read. The hardware overview is something that all software developers should understand but many don't take the time. Who needs an RTOS ? In todays fragmented embedded world, where we have 8051's at one end, and StrongArms or Power PC's at the other end of the spectrum, David Simon does a good job of presenting the available options. Table 5-1, "Characteristics of Various Software Architectures" is worth the price of the book. My only real complaint is that on the cover of the book the word 'kernel' has been spelled as 'kernal'.

The book is well organized, clearly written and full of real code examples. It addresses the common and not-so-common pitfalls, and you can tell it has been written by a "seasoned" engineer. The coverage on RTOS's is excellent.

I've been working with embedded systems for 10 years, and found lots of info, I hadn't seen or read before. The chapters on hardware is good info, and the review of RTOS architectures and core functions was a nice refresher. If you're new to embedded system design, then I'd highly recommend this book to nail down the basics.

This book is a GREAT introductory book into the embedded world. Even if you are an experienced embedded engineer, you'll find this book useful to remember basic concepts you might have forgotten with time, but maybe you'll find it TOO BASIC for you.

I must say that this was one of the best programming books I've read in a long time. The author's explanations are clear and concise, yet thorough enough to accomplish the book's purpose. I also appreciated the examples he gives, which were very appropriate and helpful; while some people complained about his use of the imaginary "C!" language (basically, C with a certain amount of "magic"), I found this helpful because it allowed him to omit certain things that were irrelevant to the overall example (for example, do we really care about the specifics of how to read data from an obscure device from the 90's that we'll never actually use?).

This book presents a great overview of the basic techniques, problems, and tools of embedded software. If you are just getting started in the field, this book will speed up your learning curve dramatically and help you avoid a lot of headaches and mistakes.

With that said, this book does assume that you have a certain knowledge base. For example, while this book does review the basics of digital logic design, this chapter is intended as a review, so if you don't have any background in the field you may have trouble following it. It also assumes that you know the C programming language (again, if you don't know this, you may have a very hard time following this book).

Some people also complained that this book is "too basic," but I disagree. While this book certainly won't make you an expert on the topic overnight or cover some of the more advanced or specialized topics in the field, it's not really intended to - that's why it's called a "primer." This book is good for people who are making the transition from desktop programming to embedded software development or are otherwise just starting out in the field, but it's not intended for people who have been in the field for the last 20 years (unless they want to review the basics again, which isn't a bad thing to do).

My one complaint (and this isn't really the author's fault) is that this book is a little out of date at points, since it was published in the late 90's. For example, the author's treatment of ROM seems to assume that it's still commonly used (it's not, and I'm not sure exactly why you'd still want to use it for most applications). I'd like to see them come out with a second edition to update it.

Definitely highly recommended.