Best Practices Archives

Code maintenance and magic numbers

Posted by Matthew Eshlemanon May 18, 2022May 18, 2022in Best Practices, Commentary1 Comment

We encounter many forms of magic numbers in the field of firmware and embedded software. How do we ensure maintainable code when working with these values? This post provides an exampl

A survey of concurrency bugs

Posted by Matthew Eshlemanon March 1, 2021March 8, 2021in Best Practices, Commentary, Favorite Code Tricks, Real Time3 Comments

Concurrency is hard. Multithreaded code is hard. This post surveys common concurrency related bugs and outlines possible solutions.

Stopping Bugs: Code Reviews

Posted by Matthew Eshlemanon October 10, 2020in Best Practices, Commentary1 Comment

Code reviews are a critical best practice in our never-ending battle to stop bugs.

The Anatomy of a Race Condition

Posted by Matthew Eshlemanon June 21, 2020in Best Practices, Commentary, Real Time3 Comments

What is a race condition? This post defines and explores this troublesome software flaw.

The Matthew Test: 15 Steps to Better Embedded Software (and Firmware)

Posted by Matthew Eshlemanon March 23, 2020March 26, 2022in Best Practices, Commentary4 Comments

15 quick yes/no questions and associated recommendations for creating better embedded software and firmware.