The Embedded Buddy System

*James' cheat codes for low/mid volume + rapid embedded development* James shares why you might want to design embedded systems as a network of devices, instead of trying to cram everything into a single chip Visit https://sdr-podcast.com/episodes/the-embedded-buddy-system/ to see the show notes and transcript! **Sponsor:** Poststation (https://onevariable.com/poststation/), a tool from OneVariable that makes it easy to set up communication between your desktop, laptop, or an embedded linux system, to as a many connected microcontrollers as you need. If you're a company building a product around multiple devices, and would like to have all of the "plumbing", tooling, and device management handled out of the box, send us an email to [email protected] for early access. [00:00:00] Intro [00:02:27] What is the buddy system [00:05:35] Embedded Linux for the BIG stuff [00:07:45] Bare metal for the little stuff [00:17:50] Because I am who I am... use Rust for both [00:20:20] The best of both worlds [00:25:33] The buddy system is probably cheaper, developer time is expensive [00:28:39] Off the shelf & simple boards are cheap! [00:36:26] More buddies, more better [00:39:38] Buy yourself time with things that work enough [00:42:20] Treat your buddy as a partner, not a black box # Shownotes - Poststation http://onevariable.com/poststation - set-top box STB https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Set-top_box - system on a chip SoC System_on_a_chip, Raspberry Pi 4 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raspberry_Pi_4, ARM Cortex-A https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARM_Cortex-A - Raspberry Pi Pico https://www.raspberrypi.com/documentation/microcontrollers/pico-series.html, RP2040 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RP2040, ARM Cortex-M https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARM_Cortex-M - RISC-V https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RISC-V, Allwinner Technology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allwinner_Technology - Mac Mini M4 https://www.apple.com/us/shop/buy-mac/mac-mini/m4 - apt-get https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/APT_software, BitBake tool https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BitBake, virtual private server VPS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_private_server - Tesla running Linux https://www.zdnet.com/article/tesla-starts-to-release-its-cars-open-source-linux-software-code/ - embassy https://crates.io/crates/embassy - DRAM https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_random-access_memory, Double Data Rate 2 Synchronous Dynamic Random-Access Memory DDR2 SDRAM https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDR2_SDRAM, Double Data Rate 3 Synchronous Dynamic Random-Access Memory DDR3 SDRAM https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDR3_SDRAM, SRAM https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Static_random-access_memory - ThinkPad https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ThinkPad, Ultrabook https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultrabook - Real-time computing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Real-time_computing describing soft and hard real-time, SawStop https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SawStop - real-time patch set for the Linux kernel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PREEMPT_RT, merged in kernel 6.12 https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.12-Does-Real-Time - Mandrake linux https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandriva_Linux, Fedora Linux continuation of the Red Hat Linux project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fedora_Linux, Slackware https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slackware - Postcard RPC https://crates.io/crates/postcard-rpc - Isomorphic JavaScript https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isomorphic_JavaScript - memory management unit MMU https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_management_unit - Kubernetes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kubernetes - Kubernetes article https://www.macchaffee.com/blog/2024/you-have-built-a-kubernetes/ - Floppotron https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floppotron - VHDL https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VHDL - JLCPCB https://jlcpcb.com/, WinChipHead WCH https://www.wch-ic.com/about_us.html, CH334F, a single chip USB HUB IC https://www.wch-ic.com/products/CH334.html - James' stream of Poststation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3v6C7ztqBs0&t=304s - LTT's video "How Many USBs Can You Plug In At Once?" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hiwaxlttWow - USB4 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB4, Thunderbolt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbolt_interface - tokio channels https://tokio.rs/tokio/tutorial/channels - Bill of materials BOM https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_of_materials, Non-recurring engineering / expenses NRE https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-recurring_engineering - Byte order mark https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byte_order_mark