Monthly Archives January 2017

Compilers

January 23, 2017

Whilst developing for the Renesas H8S using the supplied compiler, issues were found with floating point support and code generation. I successfully built the GNU C compiler, floating point library and utilities for the H8S for the windows platform. I provided patches to the compiler maintainers for H8S features which were accepted. My compiler was available on the internet and was widely used by H8S developers. I created the io.h files by extracting the register and bit definitions from the datasheet, then using a script convert to valid C. Custom start up code to allow system upgrades, and non volatile
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Axeze RFID access control

January 23, 2017

At Axeze I debugged a RFID access controller using Microchip controllers. I also researched and demonstrated new technologies using RFID and Biometric Fingerprints and Facial recognition. These technologies were to be integrated with Axeze Access control and Time/Attendance monitoring.
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Quest V-Touch

January 18, 2017

In 2002 I joined Quest Retail technology as the Hardware design Engineer responsible for the development and release to manufacturing of the VTouch Point of Sale Terminal (POS). The VTouch was a Renesas H8S2633 controller using 1024 x 768 tft lcd touch screen with an Epson graphics and Cirrus Logic ethernet controllers. The product was incredibly successful with large stadiums needing high reliability and low ongoing costs. The processing power of the H8S was capable of running TCP/IP allowing the POS terminals to be networked over ethernet and WiFi. I developed TCP/IP firmware for configuring and upgrading terminals over ethernet
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Quest ECM

January 18, 2017

Quest used a serial network based on RS485. The Quest ECM50 was an intelligent controller that used ethernet to communicate with the Point of Sale host PC and RS485 (Questnet) to a network of Quest Terminals. I was responsible for the design and release to manufacturing of the ECM design and also writing and maintaining the Firmware it contained. The ECM design was very clever as the code development could take place on any production ECM and then be recompiled for ROM and downloaded via ethernet making development quick and easy.
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