Author Archives: Wilfried Elmenreich

About Wilfried Elmenreich

Understanding the communication networks of the future.

Testing embedded user interfaces with paper prototyping

Posted on June 8, 2011 by Wilfried Elmenreich

Paper prototyping is a usability test where users access an interface by interacting with a paper version of the interface that is manipulated by a second person emulating the computer. The second person only manipulates the paper interface, but is … Continue reading →

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A simple sensor fusion algorithm

Posted on April 30, 2011 by Wilfried Elmenreich

Let’s assume, you have a set of sensors measuring the same property. By using competitive sensor fusion (see previous post for an explanation) you expect to increase the accuracy and reliablilty of the result. In the paper [1] you can … Continue reading →

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The different types of sensor fusion: complementary, competitive, and cooperative

Posted on March 30, 2011 by Wilfried Elmenreich

Sensor Fusion is the combining of sensory data or data derived from sensory data such that the resulting information is in some sense better than would be possible when these sources were used individually. (W. Elmenreich. Sensor Fusion in Time-Triggered Systems, … Continue reading →

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An alternative UART that does not need special quartz frequencies

Posted on January 2, 2011 by Wilfried Elmenreich

A UART (Universal Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter) is a component that transmits chunks of data (typically character size, i.e. 7 or 8 bits) onto a serial communication line. Almost every microcontroller features at least one UART component, that can be configured to … Continue reading →

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Model-based development using open source tools

Posted on November 25, 2010 by Wilfried Elmenreich

Embedded systems engineering faces increasing demands for more functionality, rapidly evolving components, and shrinking schedules. Model-based development promises higher comprehension by modeling on several abstraction-levels, formal verification, and automated code generation. Typically, tools for model-based embedded systems development are closed … Continue reading →

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Innovation award for embedded systems engineering course

Posted on October 17, 2010 by Wilfried Elmenreich

Congratulations to Armin Wasicek, who won an award on innovation in teaching for a course on embedded systems engineering at Vienna University of Technology! The course teaches hands-on experience with uses the ESE-board for practical exercises, homework, and examinations. The … Continue reading →

Posted in Hardware, Protocols, Real-Time Networks | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Evaluating the static and dynamic memory consumption for AVR microcontroller programs

Posted on October 6, 2010 by Wilfried Elmenreich

RAM memory is the most valuable resource on a microcontroller. For AVR8 MCUs, static memory can be assessed using the avr-size command. For dynamic memory consumption, the program mem_eval is presented. Continue reading →

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Wireless networks – A case for cooperative relaying

Posted on September 22, 2010 by Wilfried Elmenreich

Utilzing diverse channels via cooperative relaying can bypass the fading problems in wireless communications. Continue reading →

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The embedded systems engineering board – cool stuff for learning embedded systems engineering

Posted on September 21, 2010 by Wilfried Elmenreich

There are several microcontroller boards availaible – all come with several interfaces for I/O and programming of the MCU flash. However, if you are into distributed systems, the required board should be a networked system. While it is possible to … Continue reading →

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