Embedded Tools Apps Store Inside IDE

Are you under increasing pressure to develop products with fewer engineering resources and shorter deadlines? The folks at Atmel just announced the Atmel Gallery integrated apps store as part of the newest version of the Atmel Studio 6 integrated development platform. With Atmel Gallery, you can access tools, such as compilers, peripheral configuration, code editing and embedded software, right from the Studio 6 environment. These tools come from Atmel and third parties. Also, Studio 6 now includes Atmel Spaces, a workspace for development of open-source, collaboratively developed projects. Studio 6 is one example of how the embedded development platform continues to evolve to address some pressing challenges that embedded design engineers are facing today.

Here’s an interesting article from EE Times about how development environments are changing.  

Learn more about Atmel Gallery and Atmel Spaces.

Powering Down 32-Bit MCUs

32-bit microcontrollers are getting designed into pretty much every electronic product. Until recently they were used primarily in industrial and automotive applications, but with improved architectures leading to significantly lower power consumption, MCUs are now being adopted in a broad range of portable and battery-powered applications. The folks at Atmel have introduced a new, ultra low power family of ARM® Cortex™-M4 processor-based MCUs that consume just one-third the power of currently available solutions. Various sleep modes that enable the MCU to shut down unused modules along with software-controlled clock gating are used to tailor the power consumption based on the application’s requirement. In addition, unused peripherals can also be fully shut down individually and enabled again during runtime, further lowering power consumption without compromising system operation. Learn more about SAM4L devices.

Monitor Hurricanes with Arduino Platform

When Mother Nature roars in the form of hurricanes, like the recent Hurricane Sandy on the U.S.’s East Coast, social media sites like Twitter demonstrate how critical it is to be able to easily share information. With the Arduino platform, you can create a DIY auto-Tweeting weather station. See photos and learn how here.

How Touchscreens Have Evolved….and Where They Are Heading

Interesting piece from Mashable about the history of touchscreens. For sure, touchscreens are part of our everyday lives now. Toddlers are growing up adept at using their fingertips to apply commands.

How do you think touchscreens will continue to evolve?

AVR MCUs Inside Race Cars

It’s pretty amazing when you realize the variety of applications that can be powered by microcontrollers. Did you know, for example, that AVR microcontrollers are inside race cars? One group of engineering students used an AVR AT90CAN128 microcontroller to power the steering wheel of a race car. They wrote, “This microcontroller is an excellent choice for use in automotive systems because it offers a wide variety of functions, among these a CAN controller, and it is affordable and it is easy to use.” Read article.

Here’s video of a Formula One gaugeboard, made with an AVR XMEGA ATmega16 microcontroller.

Just a few examples we’ve run across. Have you found microcontrollers in surprising places?

Inside Microsoft Surface Tablet

The folks at iFixit have taken a good look inside Microsoft’s new Windows RT-based Surface tablet. Of course, we’re happy that the tablet contains four of our maXTouch touchscreen controllers inside, three mXT154E devices and a mXT1386 device. It’ll be interesting to see how widely adopted the Surface might be in the workplace. We played with one recently, and found it very easy to type on the keyboard that’s integrated into the tablet cover. And, of course, there’s access to a version of Microsoft Office and other productivity apps.

http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Microsoft+Surface+Teardown/11275/1

Marrying Touch and Sensor Hub

Do you design gaming or navigation apps, or any apps that rely on motion-related data? We’ve just announced a new single-chip solution that integrates touch and sensor hub functionality. It processes data from accelerometers, gyroscopes and magnetometers in real time, so you can create an even better user experience. Learn more: http://www.atmel.com/Microsite/maxtouch_sseries/sensorhub.aspx?utm_source=Blog&utm_medium=Social%2BMedia&utm_campaign=Sensor%2BHub

Atmel CEO sees this as the age of the microcontroller

Great article by Atmel’s CEO Steve Laub in Electronics Weekly on how microcontrollers are powering today’s smart devices: http://www.electronicsweekly.com/Articles/24/10/2012/54842/atmel-ceo-sees-this-as-the-age-of-the-microcontroller.htm

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