Articles – Page 160

June 7, 2016

“Now all that matters is if you can install your own Ethernet card without having to call tech support and confess your inadequacies to a stranger whose best career option is to work in tech support.” – Scott Adams

As engineers, we tend to think that we create our company’s products. Along with our friends over in Manufacturing, we make what we sell. Everybody else in the company is just ancillary; a kind of necessary evil.

Trouble is, nobody told the customers about that.

Customers – or end users, if you prefer – … Read More → "Give Your Receptionist a Raise"

State of Emulation

How Do the Different Emulators Stack Up?

by Bryon Moyer

June 6, 2016

Late last year, Cadence released their new emulator edition, the Palladium Z1. Seems like that makes it time to take a look at the emulation environment to see where the different providers lie. We recently talked about Mentor’s application approach, but that was a higher-level discussion; we haven’t looked at the actual boxes for a long time.

Looking at the big picture, it would appear that all of … Read More → "State of Emulation"

EE Times “Divested”

A Sad Day in the Electronics Trade Press

by Kevin Morris

June 3, 2016

Animal shelters can be heartbreaking places. It’s not so much because of the over-enthusiastic questionable-breed puppies bounding energetically around their cages, oblivious to the game of Russian roulette that their caretakers are playing with their lives. No, it’s the ten-year-old one-eyed dog, brought in by the owner who “just doesn’t feel like having a dog anymore” sitting despondently at the back of his cage, the wisdom of experience heavy on his brow, solemnly and knowingly awaiting his inevitable fate. That’s what makes visiting these places such a gut-wrenching experience.

… Read More → "EE Times “Divested”"

Toward a Hardware-Agnostic World

HSA Foundation Releases Specification v1.1

by Jim Turley

June 1, 2016

I think there’s something great and generic about goldfish. They’re everybody’s first pet. – Paul Rudd

It’s finally happened: processors are now completely generic and interchangeable.

Might as well go home, CPU designers. There is no differentiation left to exploit. All of your processor architectures, instruction sets, pipelines, code profiling, register files, clever ALUs, bus interfaces – all of it is now as generic and substitutable as 80’s hair band drummers. Your entire branch of technology has been supplanted by some programmers.

Okay, so maybe it’s not quite … Read More → "Toward a Hardware-Agnostic World"

The x86 Moat

Can Intel Defend the Data Center?

by Kevin Morris

May 31, 2016

Fortresses seldom fall on their own accord. Designed by engineers, they typically have the wherewithal to hold off the anticipated attacks. Historically, the most common cause of fortress demise is the unanticipated – a change in the underlying assumptions. When rifled cannon barrels came into existence, for example, the underlying assumption behind most fortress design was broken. Almost overnight, defenses that had been solid and reliable for decades became almost useless for their intended purpose. After a time, ticket booths were installed and they were transformed into relics – museums and monuments to a bygone era.

Intel’s data … Read More → "The x86 Moat"

Security Certifications

High- and Low-Level Assessments

by Bryon Moyer

May 29, 2016

The Internet of Things (IoT) is still the Wild West. Anyone can wake up some morning and declare a new idea for a sensor, a new protocol, a new product, a new application… pretty much anything – as long as it has “IoT” in the title of the press release.

And that’s great for spawning fresh ideas. But as civilization encroaches on this untamed territory, notions of governance are being suggested for limiting some of the possible excesses. We’ve talked about protocol standards numerous times before, but there are a couple of new, different standard efforts … Read More → "Security Certifications"

Challenging Challenge Questions

Do They Really Provide the Best Security?

by Bryon Moyer

May 26, 2016

The developed world – particularly the US – is a complex environment replete with residents from diverse places and backgrounds with widely differing experiences. But it’s not a homogeneous mix: cities will be more diverse than rural areas, and, even within cities, you’re going to get clusters of people with shared characteristics.

Well, there appears to be a cluster of people – not sure where – that have the following traits:

They’ve lived in one place, and they went to one set of schools.
They’ve had one set of friends for their … Read More → "Challenging Challenge Questions"

Cooling Off Accelerated Computing

Intel/Altera Attacks Memory Bottleneck

by Kevin Morris

May 25, 2016

A battle is on to claim supremacy in the next generation of computing. Alliances are forming, battle plans are being forged, and armies are amassing.

The enemy, quite simply, is power. No matter what kind of computing we’re doing, from IoT edge devices to massive data center and high-performance computing (HPC) server applications, the single limiting factor is energy consumption. Our IoT device may have to survive indefinitely on minuscule doses of harvested energy. Our mobile device needs to live an entire day on a single battery charge. Our server farm has … Read More → "Cooling Off Accelerated Computing"

Code, Copyright, and Craziness

Google and Oracle Battle it Out Over Code Copyright

by Jim Turley

May 24, 2016

“I’m not a doctor, but I play one on TV.” – Chris Robinson

I’m not a lawyer (thankfully), but that won’t stop me from rendering a legal opinion: This is nuts.

Let’s start with a car analogy. You decide that your trusty, rusty Ford F-150 pickup truck needs an oil change and a new oil filter. You buy the oil and the filter at your local auto-parts store, jack up the old wreck, and proceed to change them both in your driveway. Ford has no problem with this.

Nanoparticle Resists

Are They Next In Line for Aggressive Nodes?

by Bryon Moyer

May 23, 2016

Back when we covered the state of EUV lithography, we mentioned yet another ongoing resist tale: that of nanoparticles. It seemed like its own independent story, but, as it turns out, it’s part of a larger narrative – one we’ve already broached in the past.

This whole resist angle of EUV has dragged me kicking and screaming deeper into the world of chemistry, a realm where I don’t exactly feel at home. And yet, there are some interesting … Read More → "Nanoparticle Resists"