re embedded vs digital design

Yeah, embedded was what I was talking about and trial&error was what I was worried about. What I've seen people write up is a lot more difficult than software in general. I remember one had severe application issues when it ran with instant on that were eventually resolved as the PLL's not synced up. They put a delay in to let them warm up. Program worked fine. Seen some stuff in immunity-aware programming talking of similar issues. A comprehensive, free collection of stuff like that with tips would be a boon to hobbyists and pro's alike.

re book recommendations

Thank you. I'm already on Ganssle's newsletter. Good stuff in it. I've been published in one or two. Ancient hardware factored into my recommendations for two:

http://www.ganssle.com/tem/tem277.html

http://www.ganssle.com/tem/tem262.html

Ganssle confirmed that one SOC was taking the approach where it had a badass ARM Cortex plus a M0 for interrupts and such. It's claims were like a watered down version of Channel I/O. Cheap, too. :)

Btw, here's your 1-bitter. The link saying datasheet and VHDL design has the PDF's and code. The manual might have tricks worth remembering on other architectures.

http://www.linurs.org/mc14500.html

re Bitsavers

I already have over 10,000 papers from CompSci on my computer, a subset I read instead of skimmed. I keep planning to go through BitSavers to find more interesting stuff but afraid of accumulating useless junk. I just keep putting it off. I was able to pull interesting data on some interesting systems. They even had detailed books on OpenVMS drivers and internals. Something I'd have had to pay for when trying to clone its legendary reliability. Similar stuff on Tandem's NonStop architecture, patents on which should be expired by now or close. I'm keeping an eye there.

My own work was research and occasional work in high-assurance systems. I focused on security as it was hardest and most important with safety or predictability next. I have all the key papers from the past with many of today's best. The lessons learned papers had the most wisdom showing me every step of the way how they tried, failed, and/or succeeded in specific ways. I applied those lessons to my own work. After a brain injury, I'm like INFOSEC's Jason Bourne where I don't remember shit but what's left kicks in to help on forums and such. My main role is evangelist of high-assurance and old wisdom to embed it into more projects. Successes are few but keep it worthwhile. Best, recent example is Tinfoil Chat: Ottela applied every bit of feedback we gave him on Schneier's blog to make one badass design that deserves a rewrite in systems language.

I'll send you my stuff later today. Some people find it useful. Especially since the advice pre-empted the Snowden leaks defeating around 90% of their attacks. Funny that security "pro's" still argue with the shit while pushing what got defeated. In high assurance, it's mandatory to learn from the past. In retrospect, I wish I did lots of embedded or digital design before my memory loss as hardware/software interface is where best results are at. The analog and RF levels, too. I've mostly completed a secure ASIC design methodology and RAD strategy, though, so that will come as quickly as CompSci decides on right HW architecture. :)