Embedded Systems Weekly – Issue 50

Issue 50 – 29 April 2016

Hardware

WISP - WiFi-powered RFID tag

WISP, the Wireless Identification and Sensing Platform, is a family of sensors that are powered and read by UHF RFID readers. WISPs do not require batteries since they harvest their power from the RF signal generated by the reader. Share on Twitter ∙ Share on Facebook

Hacking A UART Where There Never Was Before

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Software

Intel releases the Arduino 101 firmware source code

The source code of the real-time operating system (RTOS) powering the Arduino 101 and Genuino 101 is now available for hacking and study purposes.Share on Twitter ∙ Share on Facebook

ulibSD a library for use SD cards in SPI mode with uControllers

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ext2/ext3/ext4 filesystem library for microcontrollers

The main goal of the lwext4 project is to provide ext2/3/4 filesystem for microcontrollers. It may be an interesting alternative for traditional MCU filesystem libraries (mostly based on FAT32).Share on Twitter ∙ Share on Facebook

Understanding Characters in C

Character data types are seemingly simple, but since C was designed for optimization, to save bytes and cycles, a few bad decisions were made along the way which have proved to be very expensive. Let’s take a look at characters, strings, and some problems that you need to know about.Share on Twitter ∙ Share on Facebook

nerves, craft bulletproof firmware in the stunningly productive elixir language

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Foreign LINUX - Run unmodified Linux applications inside Windows

Foreign LINUX is a dynamic binary translator and a Linux system call interface emulator for the Windows platform. It is capable of running unmodified Linux binaries on Windows without any drivers or modifications to the system. This provides another way of running Linux applications under Windows in constrast to Cygwin and other tools. It now runs a large bunch of console applications and some GUI applications.Share on Twitter ∙ Share on Facebook

Misc

Raspberry Pi Web Server using Flask to Control GPIOs

In this project you’ll create a standalone web server with a Raspberry Pi that can toggle two LEDs. You can replace those LEDs with any output (like a relay or a transistor).Share on Twitter ∙ Share on Facebook

100k cycles and beyond: Extraordinary Cycle Stability for MnO2 nanowires imarted by a gel electrolyte

The researchers at the University of California at Irvine realised that by coating a brittle component in batteries in a shell they can be recharged (or cycled) hundreds of thousands of times and not lose any power.
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Smarter smartmirror

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Random Teardowns - A couple of laptop batteries (aftermarket vs original)

Keep reading if you’ve ever wondered just how different the Chinese aftermarket batteries are compared to the originals.Share on Twitter ∙ Share on Facebook