In this issue of EE Times' design section, we've pulled together a list of our top 10 design features of 2009, as selected by you, the audience, based solely on viewership. The selections come from across all our design sites, including Embedded.com, DesignLines, Planet Analog and TechOnline.
Clearly, software--in particular C--remains at the fore of your concerns, which is good, given how much more product-development time is devoted to software vs. hardware. Although the controversial title of this year's outright winner, "Real men program in C" by Michael Barr, may have had much to do with its initial popularity, it nevertheless struck a chord with you.
The comments from you on this story--and they are extensive--make clear three points: the schism between hardware and software developers goes all the way back to your college professors; that C and C++ are going to be with us for some time to come as no replacements are in sight, not even Oberon-07; and that further education beyond C is wise for your career but is still hard to come by.
The other winners from 2009 show the popularity of teardowns of hot products, such as the Palm Pre, as well as the need for solid educational features such as our look at the Serial Peripheral Interconnect (#5) that first appeared in 2002 but remains popular and Engineering 101 (#9). In this context, it would have been cold indeed to leave off #11 on our "top 10" list: "IGBT Tutorial--Part 1: Selection." It missed the #10 slot by only a couple of hundred views, yet for three years running has been one of our top-ranked features. Congratulations to the authors, Jonathan Dodge and John Hess of Microsemi's Advanced Power Technology group, and to all the authors of the 2009 winners.
1. Real men program in C
2. Bug-killing standards for firmware coding
3. A first look inside the Palm Pre
4. Dive into C++ and survive
5. Introduction to Serial Peripheral Interface
6. HDMI/DVI HDCP handshake problems and how to avoid them
7. Poor reasons for rejecting C++
8. A crash course in UML state machines: Part 1
9. Book Excerpt: Electrical Engineering 101 (Part 1 of 5)
10. Background subtraction, Part 1: MATLAB Models
Honorary mention:
IGBT tutorial: Part 1--Selection
