Memos From the Cube

After submitting my “atomic.h” header file (which dealt with the problem of atomic access blocks in a easy manner) to the avr-lib-c project about a year ago, It’s finally gone into the CVS repository. That gives me a nice warm feeling – I’ve now officially contributed to the project in some small way.

My new “interrupt.h” header file is also almost ready, pending any extra change requests. Having to make the header files for the project has reinforced my love for working solo on projects. The red tape to get a simple change into a public collaborative project is enormous; first any changes have to be discussed, then written, then documented, then reviewed, then any changes made before it is incorporated into the source mainline. It’s rather reminiscent of the “Vogons” and their over-the-top bureaucracy in Scott Adam’s “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” novel. Being the sole programmer for your own project gives you a lot of freedom to make the changes you want to make in a timely manner.

I’ve recently updated the MyUSB main source (again) as well as the Mouse Demo source to reflect the new advancements in the library. I’ve also solved the problem of being unable to easily determine which events are not hooked in the user application, by a quick Java application I wrote up this morning. That gives birth to a new “HelperApps” directory of MyUSB, which houses any Java applications I make to automate MyUSB library related tasks for building and for the end-user. Having to make a whole Java applet for a simple task is a little overkill, but is cross-platform, and gives a nice formatted list of the unhooked events by checking the MyUSB events header files, and the target application’s linker MAP file.

The helper application is yet to make it into the source on my site, while I fix up the bugs and get it suitable for general use.

SWATVAC week has now started, which is the week of holidays before my exams start. Next week I’ll be doing my exams proper, and I’m petrified.

UPDATE: My new Interrupt.h header file has now also made it into the CVS. Hurrah!