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The most significant "embedded" individual
Rich Nass
5/1/2008 12:00 AM EDT
We recently took a poll on Embedded.com, the sister website for Embedded Systems Design (ESD) magazine, and the results ran from thoughtful, to interesting, to comical. We asked two related questions:
1. Who is the most significant individual in the embedded space over the last 20 years?
2. Why is this person the most significant individual in the embedded space?
The reason for the 20-year time span had to do with this being the 20th year of the publication. We'll be celebrating that special anniversary in November.
The person mentioned most often is our own "embedded" celebrity, Jack Ganssle. Jack writes a monthly column in ESD and a weekly column for Embedded.com. He's also an instructor at the Embedded Systems Conference (ESC) in all locations, including San Jose, Boston, and India.
Here are two of the reasons given as to why Jack is the most significant individual in the embedded space:
"Jack has had his finger on the pulse of embedded systems for as long as I can remember (25+ years). He knows the industry, products, tools, and people, and has great insight into all things embedded."
"He has expertise in the various subjects in the embedded domain, the ability to find solutions to various problems faced by the embedded professionals, as well as reasoning and presenting ability."
Others mentioned include Linus Torvalds, the creator of Linux; Jerry Fiddler, the founder of Wind River; Steve Jobs, for continually pushing the technology envelope; Reinhard Keil, for his development and promotion of Keil tools; and Intel's Gordon Moore, because, as our reader points out, "he constantly pushed for greater density in microprocessors."
A key mention goes to Richard Stallman, Founder of GNU Project and Free Software Foundation. As a reader points out, "The GNU C compiler has enabled free software development for a wide variety of embedded platforms, and it wouldn't have been possible without Stallman's vision of a free software development toolset." It's hard to argue with that logic.
And of course, there was the obligatory mention of Elvis Presley, "because he wears blue suede shoes." You gotta love embedded systems developers.
The survey is closed, but feel free to add to the list.
Richard Nass is editor in chief of Embedded Systems Design magazine. He can be reached at rnass@techinsights.com.|
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Dan at ECS
5/1/2008 12:43 PM EDT
Ganssle is the clear choice, his wisdom, not to mention the bread & depth of his experience, are unsurpassed.
I'd have to give Jean LaBrosse a close second though.
I've always respected Jim Ready (VRTX / Monta Vista) and Dan Dodge (QNX) as well.
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Dan at ECS
5/1/2008 12:44 PM EDT
D'oh! Typo while feeding the baby (not a good multi-tasker) -- the *breadth* of Ganssle's experience....
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bgat
5/8/2008 10:10 AM EDT
Have you seen Jack's boat? Clearly, his experience has earned him some "bread", too. :)
Granted, he used to *live* on the thing...
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BradBob at WA
5/15/2008 7:53 AM EDT
Yes, I too can appreciate nominating Jack or Gordon or any number of others past and present that have made the embedded space what it is today.
Lets not forget the "enablers" that allow us to do what we do so well, like Gates (M$), Bill Joy (Sun), Kernighan, Ritchie, Stroustrup and and the IBM PC inventors. If it weren't for the very capable development platforms and languages we would still be flipping toggle switches and memorizing op-codes.
I remember the first emebedded development system I worked with from Intel (like the MCS) that cost many thousands to buy and maintain. Would the relative capability we enjoy today be affordable with a similar kind of specialized system?
We are the benifactors of multiple areas of technology convergence and synergies (apologies for the buzz-words).
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ESD editorial staff: SRambo
5/15/2008 2:34 PM EDT
Reader feedback:
Don't forget Jim Ready, founder of Hunter & Ready systems' VRTX --one of the early embedded operating systems (which runs the Hubble Space Telescope among other things) which still exists today, sold by Mentor Graphics, and later founder of MonteVista embedded Linux.
When I was just staring out in engineering, I was porting VRTX to a board and called the company. Jim Ready himself answered my call and helped me out. I was very impressed, so say the least!
I did some research and found out from this link:
http://www.sdtimes.com/content/article.aspx?ArticleID=28319
that VRTX was the first commercial embedded operating system and that VxWorks was originally just a c-library meant to be run on top of it.
So I would say that Jim Ready is the most significant 'embedded' individual. He started the industry and continues to lead it to this day. Quite an accomplishment.
--Tom Biggs
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