Wednesday, April 25, 2007

    Microsoft shows its Hand Gestures

    webware.com captured a video demonstration of hand-gesture recognition technology from Microsoft Research.
    One of the coolest uses for this was maneuvering around Microsoft Virtual Earth using your hands. Microsoft showed off two methods, the first using a projector that gleams down on a table top. Using your hands, you can pull the map around, and zoom in and out by pinching in a similar fashion to what Apple has done with the iPhone.

    Click here

    Stay away from the C18 Class at this year's Worldwide MASTERs Conference

    I volunteered to help teach the MPLAB C18 class at this year's MASTERs Conference in Phoenix, Arizona. So, unless you're a glutton for punishment, you'lll definitely want to stay away from the class this year. There are plenty of other classes for you to attend. :-)

    I also plan to hang out at the Development Systems table in the Ask the Expert booth. You can come by and chat with me and a few other people from the MPLAB IDE, compiler, and hardware teams. At the other tables, you'll find applications engineers from all of Microchip's divisions.

    Get all the info you could ever want at the Microchip website <http://www.microchip.com/masters>.

    Saturday, April 21, 2007

    Microchip Community Search powered by Google

    I created a custom Google search to help us find past Microchip forum posts quickly. This custom search also searches Hi-Tech's PICC forum and CCS's Compiler forum.

    Tuesday, April 17, 2007

    Using MPLAB SIM's realtime watch with DMCI in MPLAB IDE 7.52

    I created a new video showing how to use MPLAB SIM's realtime watch feature. You can combine this simulator feature with the Data Monitor and Control Interface (DMCI). The video also shows a few features that were new to MPLAB IDE 7.52, such as the editor's open include file function and DMCI's Interactive Hot Tracking. Be sure to have the project/workspace that you created with the first video readily available.




    C30 Source Code:

    #include <p33fxxxx.h>
    #include <math.h>

    #define SCALE 100.0
    #define INTERVAL 0.001

    volatile int result;
    long double __attribute__((persistent)) t;
    int __attribute__((persistent)) Amp;
    int __attribute__((persistent)) Freq;

    int
    main (void)
    {
    t = 0;
    while (1)
    {
    result = ((long double)Amp)
    * (sinl (((long double)Freq/SCALE) * t));

    t += INTERVAL;
    }
    return 0;
    }

    Wednesday, April 11, 2007

    Knowledge@Wharton's interview with Ray Ozzie, the Man Who Would Change Microsoft

    Knowledge@Wharton posted an interview with Ray Ozzie, Microsoft's new Chief Software Architect.
    At Microsoft, Ozzie has led the company's "Live" initiative, focused on supplementing Microsoft's traditional desktop applications with web-based software and services. But his mission is much broader: to make sure the company's various product groups coordinate their efforts to take advantage of what he termed -- in a now famous memo sent to Microsoft's executive staff on October 28, 2005 -- the "Internet services disruption."

    Accomplishing this feat won't be easy, in part because Microsoft is facing challenges on multiple fronts -- technical, business and cultural. New cross-platform technologies threaten to establish a new layer of abstraction that could reduce the importance of the operating system as a software development platform. Emerging business models -- such as open-source software and "free" advertising-supported applications -- threaten to undermine the economic basis for Microsoft's longstanding success. And while Microsoft's size provides it with enormous resources, some wonder whether this may make it difficult for the company to remain agile enough to break from its past successes and address these new challenges.

    Click here to read or listen to the interview.

    Beyond3D post Intel presentation on CPU-GPU war

    From Beyond3D -- Intel presentation reveals the future of the CPU-GPU war
    Back in February we reported that Intel's Douglas Carmean, new Chief Architect of their Visual Computing Group (VCG) in charge of GPU development at Intel, had been touring universities giving a presentation called "Future CPU Architectures -- The Shift from Traditional Models". Since then he's added a few more major university stops, and now the feared B3D ninjas have caught up with him. Our shadow warriors have scored a copy of Carmean's presentation, and we've selected the juicy bits for your enjoyment and edification regarding the showdown that Intel sees as already underway between CPU and GPU makers.

    Wednesday, April 04, 2007

    How to create a C30 project in MPLAB IDE 7.52

    I put together a very quick video showing new users how to create a simple MPLAB C30 project in MPLAB IDE 7.52. I'm hoping that this video will help new users get up and running. I have to cruise along at a snappy pace due to filesize restrictions, but I hope you can follow along.

    Tuesday, April 03, 2007

    Photosynth Tech Preview

    Have you tried the Photosyth Tech Preview from Microsoft Live Labs yet? It's an interesting technology that I'm sure many web marketing teams will be able to put to good use in a big way.


    Video: Take the Photosynth Tour

    Monday, April 02, 2007

    Hi-Tech Unveils "Omniscient Code Generation" in C compiler for Microchip PIC18

    From Embedded.com
    According to Clyde Stubbs, CEO and Founder, HI-TECH Software, the new methodology, cakked Omniscient Code Generation (OCG), overcomes many of the pitfalls of conventional compilers that frequently miss inconsistent calling conventions, variable declarations, and redundant code because they compile each module independently and separately.

    "OCG optimizes the size of each pointer variable, based on its usage, eliminates the need for many non-standard C qualifiers and compiler options," he said, "and produces more optimal interrupt context switching code, and customizes the functionality of library function."