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Started out with the 8052 in college. Graduated to the PIC. Upgraded to the AVRs. Last seen with Xilinx FPGAs before being kidnapped by fullstack web developmen

Started out with the 8052 in college. Graduated to the PIC. Upgraded to the AVRs. Last seen with Xilinx FPGAs before being kidnapped by fullstack web development. Man do I miss this stuff. Articles like these make me want to get back into it.

MrBuddyCasino 9y ago
Why did you leave? I'm making the opposite journey right now, minus the job switch.
- tw1010 9y ago
  Not the parent. But I've done a bunch of both hardware and software and frankly I would go for software any day of the week. It's a lot harder to get into a flow with hardware. And it just feels a whole lot less free than software. You can go from pretty vauge idea to a working prototype very rapidly with software, but with hardware that both takes a lot longer and the types of things you can imagine is a lot more constrained. If you want a taste, go build some stuff in pure x86. You'll pretty quickly get tired of it and will want to build higher order abstractions, and then you're back in software-land.
  - MrBuddyCasino 9y ago
    Interesting, I felt the opposite. Doing stuff with hardware expands your creative horizon to do things in the real world, freeing yourself from the confines of the virtual realm. 3D print what you need, make it come alive with MCUs. Also much of modern software development feels like just plugging lego bricks, but in embedded you actually have to know how stuff works, down to the register level. But then those were purely hobby projects, maybe it feels very different when doing it for a living.
- dopeboy 9y ago
  At the time, I was in NYC and I wanted to stay. I couldn't find any hardware related jobs there so I switched over to software. Now I live in the bay area and am working on a startup. Iteration cycles are much more faster so I can learn quicker and ship quicker. Also, distribution is a lot easier.
jsolson 9y ago
The current gen Xilinx stuff is pretty awesome. Digilent is even making boards aimed at the "maker" community: http://store.digilentinc.com/arty-a7-artix-7-fpga-development-board-for-makers-and-hobbyists/ http://store.digilentinc.com/arty-a7-artix-7-fpga-developmen...

MrBuddyCasino 9y ago

Why did you leave? I'm making the opposite journey right now, minus the job switch.

tw1010 9y ago
Not the parent. But I've done a bunch of both hardware and software and frankly I would go for software any day of the week. It's a lot harder to get into a flow with hardware. And it just feels a whole lot less free than software. You can go from pretty vauge idea to a working prototype very rapidly with software, but with hardware that both takes a lot longer and the types of things you can imagine is a lot more constrained. If you want a taste, go build some stuff in pure x86. You'll pretty quickly get tired of it and will want to build higher order abstractions, and then you're back in software-land.
- MrBuddyCasino 9y ago
  Interesting, I felt the opposite. Doing stuff with hardware expands your creative horizon to do things in the real world, freeing yourself from the confines of the virtual realm. 3D print what you need, make it come alive with MCUs. Also much of modern software development feels like just plugging lego bricks, but in embedded you actually have to know how stuff works, down to the register level. But then those were purely hobby projects, maybe it feels very different when doing it for a living.
dopeboy 9y ago
At the time, I was in NYC and I wanted to stay. I couldn't find any hardware related jobs there so I switched over to software. Now I live in the bay area and am working on a startup. Iteration cycles are much more faster so I can learn quicker and ship quicker. Also, distribution is a lot easier.

jsolson 9y ago

The current gen Xilinx stuff is pretty awesome. Digilent is even making boards aimed at the "maker" community: http://store.digilentinc.com/arty-a7-artix-7-fpga-development-board-for-makers-and-hobbyists/ http://store.digilentinc.com/arty-a7-artix-7-fpga-developmen...