Blog Review: March 26

Synopsys’ Eric Huang has discovered a video of Superman using a GoPro camera (scroll down to bottom of page). So this is what it’s like to stop bullets with your hand.

Cadence’s Tom Hackett zeroes in on mobile interfaces in a video—SoC fabric, memory and chip-to-chip. Nice whiteboard drawing.

Mentor’s Anil Khanna looks at a methodology for developing high-performance embedded software apps. Given the timetable for delivering software, this is an area that definitely deserves lots of attention.

Along the same lines, ARM’s Anton Lokhmotov provides some insights into engineering software for accelerated systems—with an eye on low energy consumption. And therein lies the problem.

Semico Research’s Michell Prunty continues her search for unusual robot skills. This one may be a fierce table tennis opponent, but can you imagine trying to play doubles with this thing? How about five on one?

Synopsys’ Mick Posner has the flu. He even has a picture of the flu virus, which looks something like a badly carpeted rugby ball. Don’t be fooled. Playing rugby with the flu is a bad idea.

Mentor’s John Day points to the ultimate use of real-time computing—avoiding pothole damage with your car. But no matter how good the algorithm, effectiveness depends on how fast you’re driving—and the size of the pothole (see below).

The algorithms didn’t help.

ARM’s Blair Hartley focuses on processing power versus battery life in mobile devices. Yes, there is something wrong with this equation.

Cadence’s Richard Goering looks at test-driven development and how HP engineers applied it to UVM-e. There’s a video to go along with it, as well, focusing on software development.

Synopsys’ Marc Greenberg puts the Intel DDR4 announcement by Intel in perspective. And yes, it is a big deal.

Mentor’s Michael Ford points to one of the most glaring security holes in the supply chain—traceability. Counterfeit parts have been around for years, but they’re taking on new significance as hardware becomes a bigger piece of the security puzzle.

Cadence’s Brian Fuller headed to Nuremberg for Embedded World to look for networked cars, security challenges and IoT applications. Linked sausage, anyone?

And in case you missed last week’s Manufacturing, Design & Test newsletter, here are some noteworthy blogs:

Executive Editor Mark LaPedus spent days talking to people and listening to presentations at SPIE, but not all of it made headlines.

Lithography guru Marc David Levenson writes that if designers can stand all the rules that come with quadruple patterning, the road is clear to 10nm and maybe beyond.

Mentor Graphics’ David Abercrombie shows how to maximize the efficiency of double patterning error debugging.

Applied Materials’ Bharat Ramakrishnan examines two of the biggest challenges for wearable electronics—thick form factors and battery life.

Patterning expert Mike Watts finds significant progress is being made on a number of fronts with amazing new materials.

Semico Research’s Michell Prunty says standards are sorely lacking for smarter lights, but the possibility for saving energy through intelligent management of utilities is enormous.

SEMI’s Kevin Nguyen notes that progress is being made in 450mm standards, with 19 standards published so far.