4 ms·

As an embedded programmer, I wholeheartedly second this. I'm in an area where there are relatively few opportunities to do close to the metal work. The ones th

As an embedded programmer, I wholeheartedly second this. I'm in an area where there are relatively few opportunities to do close to the metal work. The ones that do, don't pay any more than backend web developers make. In fact I've come to assume that they can offer less due to either the intrigue of the work, or because you often compete with computer/electrical engineers who aren't expecting outsized developer salaries. Likewise, while I have loved the skills I've learned in embedded and low-level work, working at an embedded shop has taken a lot of the joy out of the learning. You trade off an inherent rewarding development environment with the realities of developing against hardware, where project cycles are long, you're often dependent on horrible vendor APIs and support, and where everything moves much slower. The counter to that is the type of work I believe you're describing, which sounds like HFT optimization on Intel. I got into embedded because I wanted to eventually end up there, but again, it's an extremely limited market. And as someone who has indeed dabbled in the Fog optimization manuals, you quickly learn to realize how much the ROI of assembly isn't worth it. The future of speed isn't going to be going lower down the programming stack. It's going to be in new hardware: FPGAs and ASICs, writing RTL for system specific CPUs. And that is highly exciting, though it necessitates a pure programmer has to learn hardware at a deep level as you imply. As for me, I concur with the statements others are making about using my skillset for security research and reverse engineering. Working in embedded development has bored me to tears, and taken the magic out of learning to love the skills themselves. I'd much prefer to work at a pace that isn't limited by the pace of a cross functional team of software and hardware engineers. Learn the skills, yes, completely. The knowledge is worth it. But for the love of God, don't get expect to get joy out of working in it.

aswanson 10y ago
Could not have said it any better. Embedded development is dominated by hardware engineers who make decisions very often without the software development teams input, placing embedded folk square in the target of management angst as well. Choosing Broadcom chips without drivers, 3rd party experimental hardware who wont release data sheets, choosing USB chips that don't support host mode, miswired memory interfaces that mismap fpga access, FPGAs that cause spurious bugs when consuming more power than necessary in certain modes, all lay squarely on the embedded devs shoulders and can manifest at first looking like pure software problems with the schedule pressing. Not a pretty world.
- CalChris 10y ago
  In defense of HW engineers, they're often staring at a cost of goods spreadsheet. Earlier in my career, I had a driver that compiled to about 8500 bytes. I noticed the part was spec'd at 16K and wondered if it could get re-spec'd at 8K if I got it down to 8K. Yep and I got mad props from the HW types.
  - aswanson 10y ago
    Understood, but when they stare at that COG sheet they should also have the prescence of mind to look for hidden costs. A toolchain and IDE with a C compiler is going to cost much less in the end to the project than a 8K chip with an assembler and no debug environment/support tools will save it. It's very easy to be penny wise and pound foolish in this area.
- throwaway777836 10y ago
  Are you me? Honestly, that all sums it up even better. In an embedded role, you are always a second class citizen. After 6-12 months of planning by the hardware folks: "The hardware is all done. Where's the software? What do you mean it's not finished, you had all year...?" You're a complete afterthought, and it's only amplified when working with a team that doesn't really "get" that without access to the actual, finalized hardware you're extremely limited in capabilities. It only gets better when they decide to go with one-off vendors who have a single product support engineer and its pulling teeth any time something goes wrong. It's often hardware related, but who cares -- you're the guy at the end of pipeline who's tasked with making it work, so yeah, you feel the wrath. I'm only extra cynical because I'm dealing with that right now. As I have many times before, though. It's part and parcel.
  - Taniwha 10y ago
    OK, I've worn both hats - chip designer and embedded systems programmer - it makes me better at both - I get to be thye chip guy who understands software and the software guy who understands hardware - it means I get the interrupt setting/clearing logic race free and make sure all the registers can be read, and can make tradeoffs that minimise the amount of hardware we have to build. The big issue is timing (and latency) - the chip guys are working on long timelines - they're already working on the next chip when the first chip's silicon comes back, their investment and attention is elsewhere, the software guys aren't going to rev up much before real hardware is in their laps, and certainly aren't going to spend any time on that second chip while they're still wrangling the first one - it's not so much a cultural gap between the groups as a gap in time
bitwiseand 10y ago
Please don't discourage people without having the full view. There are many good low-level teams with software first people. At least in the bay area there are many exciting projects for people with this skill set. Self driving cars (Waymo, Tesla etc) , VR / AR headsets (Microsoft, Facebook etc.), Phones (Qualcomm, Google etc.) , Wearables (Apple, Fitbit) GPUs (Nvidia) and startups AirWare etc.. Here is a sample opening at Waymo - https://careers.google.com/jobs/#!t=jo&jid=/waymo/embedded-software-engineer-waymo-1600-amphitheatre-pkwy-mountain-view-ca-2481830031& https://careers.google.com/jobs/#!t=jo&jid=/waymo/embedded-s... Sure my experience may be skewed too but there are definitely great jobs with rewarding experiences of shipping tangible products for low level programmers. Not many people get the joy of shipping something your friends and family use and literally say "wow".

aswanson 10y ago

Could not have said it any better. Embedded development is dominated by hardware engineers who make decisions very often without the software development teams input, placing embedded folk square in the target of management angst as well. Choosing Broadcom chips without drivers, 3rd party experimental hardware who wont release data sheets, choosing USB chips that don't support host mode, miswired memory interfaces that mismap fpga access, FPGAs that cause spurious bugs when consuming more power than necessary in certain modes, all lay squarely on the embedded devs shoulders and can manifest at first looking like pure software problems with the schedule pressing. Not a pretty world.

CalChris 10y ago
In defense of HW engineers, they're often staring at a cost of goods spreadsheet. Earlier in my career, I had a driver that compiled to about 8500 bytes. I noticed the part was spec'd at 16K and wondered if it could get re-spec'd at 8K if I got it down to 8K. Yep and I got mad props from the HW types.
- aswanson 10y ago
  Understood, but when they stare at that COG sheet they should also have the prescence of mind to look for hidden costs. A toolchain and IDE with a C compiler is going to cost much less in the end to the project than a 8K chip with an assembler and no debug environment/support tools will save it. It's very easy to be penny wise and pound foolish in this area.
throwaway777836 10y ago
Are you me? Honestly, that all sums it up even better. In an embedded role, you are always a second class citizen. After 6-12 months of planning by the hardware folks: "The hardware is all done. Where's the software? What do you mean it's not finished, you had all year...?" You're a complete afterthought, and it's only amplified when working with a team that doesn't really "get" that without access to the actual, finalized hardware you're extremely limited in capabilities. It only gets better when they decide to go with one-off vendors who have a single product support engineer and its pulling teeth any time something goes wrong. It's often hardware related, but who cares -- you're the guy at the end of pipeline who's tasked with making it work, so yeah, you feel the wrath. I'm only extra cynical because I'm dealing with that right now. As I have many times before, though. It's part and parcel.
- Taniwha 10y ago
  OK, I've worn both hats - chip designer and embedded systems programmer - it makes me better at both - I get to be thye chip guy who understands software and the software guy who understands hardware - it means I get the interrupt setting/clearing logic race free and make sure all the registers can be read, and can make tradeoffs that minimise the amount of hardware we have to build. The big issue is timing (and latency) - the chip guys are working on long timelines - they're already working on the next chip when the first chip's silicon comes back, their investment and attention is elsewhere, the software guys aren't going to rev up much before real hardware is in their laps, and certainly aren't going to spend any time on that second chip while they're still wrangling the first one - it's not so much a cultural gap between the groups as a gap in time

bitwiseand 10y ago

Please don't discourage people without having the full view. There are many good low-level teams with software first people. At least in the bay area there are many exciting projects for people with this skill set. Self driving cars (Waymo, Tesla etc) , VR / AR headsets (Microsoft, Facebook etc.), Phones (Qualcomm, Google etc.) , Wearables (Apple, Fitbit) GPUs (Nvidia) and startups AirWare etc.. Here is a sample opening at Waymo - https://careers.google.com/jobs/#!t=jo&jid=/waymo/embedded-software-engineer-waymo-1600-amphitheatre-pkwy-mountain-view-ca-2481830031& https://careers.google.com/jobs/#!t=jo&jid=/waymo/embedded-s... Sure my experience may be skewed too but there are definitely great jobs with rewarding experiences of shipping tangible products for low level programmers. Not many people get the joy of shipping something your friends and family use and literally say "wow".