Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS will continue to battle in the smart-phone and tablet arena (see “Google’s Android Versus Apple’s iOS: And The Winner Is?”). But there’s a lot more that will be going on in the embedded space.
The use of flash storage in the enterprise is on the rise, and parallel programming tools abound. Also, virtualization is continuing is downward movement into smaller embedded platforms, even as it is a requirement in the cloud. Communication with the cloud is increasing as well, and it will be getting easier to do this year.
So much for the broad perspective. Now for some details.
Virtualization Large and Small
The cloud is full of virtual machines, and developers working on tying embedded network devices to enterprise servers will have more options this year for providing complete solutions like Eurotech’s Cloud Devices (see “The Embedded Cloud Runs Java”). The cloud offers developers the opportunity to test and deploy server-side resources on demand for supported remote devices, but it requires developers familiar with this technology.
Virtualization on servers is taken for granted these days given the move to multicore and clustering. Many of the tools that are commonly used in high-availability systems like MontaVista’s Carrier Grade Edition 6.0 will be finding their way into areas outside the communication space since it isn’t the only application area that will require high reliability (see “Carrier Grade Linux Delivers Bare-Metal Virtualization”). New features like bare-metal virtualization are useful in a wider range of platforms.
Even more ubiquitous will be virtualization on single-chip, module, or single-board environments where two or three virtual machines will provide application isolation or support for legacy applications alongside new code. At this point, virtualization is occurring on 64-bit platforms, but 32-bit platforms will see more virtualization action this year.
Software tools For Working Smarter
Power debugging will likely be a checkbox item by the end of the year. IAR Systems and others have started to include this functionality in their debuggers (see “Power Debugger Finds Hot Spots”). IAR’s Embedded Workbench (Fig. 1) can match power utilization to lines of code.
Power is really only one facet of a design that is outside the conventional code area, so logic analyzer-style information might be more readily available to developers in the future as a normal part of a debugger’s feature set.
Are you using static and dynamic source-code analysis tools yet (see “Code Analysis Discussion With LDRA”)? This year might be a good time to start before your competition does. The goals of faster delivery times and lower bug counts will only be achieved by the use of improved development tools like these.
Developers are as smart as they have always been. But preventing bugs or identifying them during the design and development process is critical, especially with increasing application complexity as well as the inclusion of additional criteria such as security.
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