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embeddedgurus.com
Company blog · embeddedgurus.comsystemshardware
embeddedgurus.com is the company blog at embeddedgurus.com, writing about systems and hardware. Since 2010, 45 different Hacker News readers have linked it 56 times, most often “Are we shooting ourselves in the foot with stack overflows?”. No feed was found, so read it on the site itself.
Rarely recommended · 3 of 33 sampled comments recommend it?
Why HN links it
HN readers link this embedded-software blog for posts on bugs and safety in embedded code, such as Toyota unintended acceleration analyses, the gotofail bug and embedded C practice. Most links are cited as sources.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 33 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Most-linked posts?
- Are we shooting ourselves in the foot with stack overflows?6 people · 7 mentions · first linked 2014-02-18
- /barr-code/2013/10/an-update-on-toyota-and-unintended-acceleration/3 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2018-01-17
- /barr-code/2013/10/an-update-on-toyota-and-unintended-acceleration/3 people · 4 mentions · first linked 2014-05-07
- /barr-code/2014/03/apples-gotofail-ssl-security-bug-was-easily-preventable/3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2021-09-25
- C: The Immortal Programming Language « Barr Code2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2018-02-22
- /barr-code/2009/11/breathalyzer-source-code-analysis/2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2014-08-24
- Dangerous Embedded C Coding Standard Rules (2011)2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2011-08-30
What Hacker News says?
You mean this one? http://embeddedgurus.com/state-space/2014/02/are-we-shooting...
Comment linking /state-space/2014/02/are-we-shooting-ourselves-in-the-foot-with-stack-overflow/
on “Tesla Adds Titanium Underbody Shield and Aluminum Deflector Plates to Model S”Submitted Are we shooting ourselves in the foot with stack overflows? as a story · 267 points
HN discussionTop 10 Causes of Nasty Firmware Bugs https://embeddedgurus.com/blog/2010/12/top-10-causes-of-nast... it would be great if all those would be easy issues, or solved.
Comment linking /blog/2010/12/top-10-causes-of-nasty-firmware-bugs/
on “Discover the world of microcontrollers through Rust”Submitted Efficient C Tip – use the modulus (%) operator with caution as a story · 37 points
HN discussiongreat rant, but then he submits code like if (mpa && mpa->locale) freelocale(mpa->locale); which are known to cause bugs fairly easily (see gotofail [0]) [0] https://embeddedgurus.com/barr-code/2014/03/apples-gotofail-...
Comment linking /barr-code/2014/03/apples-gotofail-ssl-security-bug-was-easily-preventable/
on “Mpv – A free, open source, and cross-platform media player”Submitted Dangerous Embedded C Coding Standard Rules (2011) as a story · 34 points
HN discussionAnd the coding style doesn't exactly avoid errors as well. "Do not unnecessarily use braces around a single statement: if (condition) action(); and if (condition) do_this(); else do_that(); " Didn't people learn from the goto fail bug ? http://embeddedgurus.com/barr-code/2014/03/apples-gotofail-s...
Comment linking /barr-code/2014/03/apples-gotofail-ssl-security-bug-was-easily-preventable/
on “OpenSSL Security Advisory”Submitted C: The Immortal Programming Language « Barr Code as a story · 14 points
HN discussionI don't know if they ever proved beyond possible doubt that any particular incident was caused by a software bug, but they did show that there were myriad ways in which the software in question could cause the acceleration problems. (In particular the process which handled reading the accelerator pedal position could crash and leave the throttle value fixed without tripping the watchdog timer, which iirc was doubly…
Comment linking /barr-code/2013/10/an-update-on-toyota-and-unintended-acceleration/
on “Openpilot – open-source self-driving agent”Submitted The absolute truth about abs() as a story · 4 points
HN discussionDefine "okay." Cruise control has gotten "stuck" at 50mph[0], and electronic throttle control has left the throttle open disregarding user input[1]. So yeah, it's not some apocalyptic, universally-agreed failure that happens every day, but people have actually been killed[2] because the machine did something the driver wouldn't have done if they were in full control. (Maybe it's "compensated" for by deaths that were…
Comment linking /state-space/2014/02/are-we-shooting-ourselves-in-the-foot-with-stack-overflow/
on “For $10,000, your car can drive itself – Cruise (YC W14)”Submitted EEPROM Wear Leveling « Stack Overflow as a story · 3 points
HN discussionToyota's problem was real, and the author hot it wrong: http://embeddedgurus.com/barr-code/2013/10/an-update-on-toyo...
Comment linking /barr-code/2013/10/an-update-on-toyota-and-unintended-acceleration/
on “The Engineer’s Lament”Submitted Combining C's volatile and const Keywords as a story · 3 points
HN discussionIf Toyota had anything to do with that analysis then it wasn't independent. My recollection of the Barr analysis is that a particular failure case was in fact described which occurs during certain conditions of memory exhaustion: http://embeddedgurus.com/barr-code/2013/10/an-update-on-toyo... "the team led by Barr Group found what the NASA team sought but couldn’t find: 'a systematic software malfunction in the Main…
Comment linking /barr-code/2013/10/an-update-on-toyota-and-unintended-acceleration/
on “The Engineer’s Lament”Submitted 3 Byte Integers as a story · 2 points
HN discussionUhhh. https://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/toyota-pay-12b-hiding-deadly-... https://mashable.com/2014/03/19/toyota-lied-aceleration-reca... https://www.rs-law.com/unintended-acceleration/ And here's an article by one of the experts who reviewed Toyota's code and found the smoking gun: https://embeddedgurus.com/barr-code/2013/10/an-update-on-toy...
Comment linking /barr-code/2013/10/an-update-on-toyota-and-unintended-acceleration/
on “Flash Memory Wear Killing Older Teslas Due to Excessive Data Logging: Report”Submitted Boeing Dreamliner ‘Bug’ as a story · 2 points
HN discussionYes, and the PIC's return point stack is tiny. 2 (!) on the smallest machines, 8 on most, 31 on the "high end" PICs.[1] [1] http://embeddedgurus.com/stack-overflow/2009/04/pic-stack-ov...
Comment linking /stack-overflow/2009/04/pic-stack-overflow/
on “What is “the stack”?”Submitted A Look Back at the Audi 5000 and Unintended Acceleration (2014) as a story · 2 points
HN discussionI think it means that this was the first conflict that it had in against Scuds. There was a software update made a few days before this incident that was in response to another Patriot/Scud engagement. The big issue with this time was that the missile didn't even fire. http://embeddedgurus.com/barr-code/2014/03/lethal-software-d... It's interesting that there were 6 software updates to the Patriot missile batteries…
Comment linking /barr-code/2014/03/lethal-software-defects-patriot-missile-failure/
on “One second per second is harder than it sounds”Submitted Novel uses for RTC registers as a story · 2 points
HN discussion> Taking 60-90s completely out of protection to reboot a critical defensive system when someone might, at any moment, toss a Mach 5 projectile at you from a couple hundred miles away is a far-from-ideal fix, even if it had been communicated properly to the end users (which it wasn't.) https://embeddedgurus.com/barr-code/2014/03/lethal-software-...
Comment linking /barr-code/2014/03/lethal-software-defects-patriot-missile-failure/
on “Failed intercept at Dhahran caused by a software error in handling of timestamps”Submitted The Personal Computer vs. The Chemistry Set as a story · 2 points
HN discussionMaking a PoC is usually only the beginning. Firmware upgrades for microcontrollers may be difficult to do in the field, without UART and JTAG debugging. If clients expect that pretty demos will continue working, they might be quite disappointed. It's better to follow good design patterns (Active Objects, state machines [1]) from the start when possible. dmitrygr is a legendary embedded hacker [2]: his Transcend WiFi…
Comment linking /state-space/2016/04/beyond-the-rtos-a-better-way-to-design-real-time-embedded-software/
on “Reverse Engineer the BL602 WiFi Driver”Submitted How to lockup the in-flight entertainment system on a Boeing 777 as a story · 2 points
HN discussionApples famous "gotofail" SSL Security Bug was due to this https://embeddedgurus.com/barr-code/2014/03/apples-gotofail-...
Comment linking /barr-code/2014/03/apples-gotofail-ssl-security-bug-was-easily-preventable/
on “The world's worst Linux kernel module”Submitted Protothreads vs State Machines (the comments make for interesting reading) as a story · 2 points
HN discussionAnd CARS too: http://embeddedgurus.com/state-space/2014/02/are-we-shooting...
Comment linking /state-space/2014/02/are-we-shooting-ourselves-in-the-foot-with-stack-overflow/
on “The programming error that cost Mt. Gox 2609 Bitcoins”Submitted Unintended Acceleration and Other Embedded Software Bugs as a story · 2 points
HN discussion
