
Embedded
I am Elecia White alongside Christopher White. We’re here to chat about the interests, careers, and lives of engineers, artists, educators and makers. Our diverse guest list includes names you may have heard and engineers working quietly in the trenches. Either way, they are knowledgeable, enthusiastic, and inspiring.
We’d love to share our enthusiasm for science, technology, engineering, art, and math (STEAM).
Latest episodes

Dec 6, 2019 • 1h 3min
312: Two Meter Exhaust Port
Chris and Elecia talked through how security holes can get explored on a fictional product. Thanks to an Embedded listener who enjoyed hearing from Jacob Martinez about helping young adults have access to technology, we have a grant to match donations to DigitalNEST up to $2500. Donate here: give.digitalnest.org/embeddedfm We talked through OWASP Top 10 Embedded Application Best Practices but OWASP Internet of Things and OWASP Mobile Security are also very useful. GREAT explanation of buffer overflow attacks by Coen Goedegebure XKCD Little Bobby Tables

Nov 28, 2019 • 55min
204: Abuse Electricity (Repeat)
Phoenix Perry (@phoenixperry) spoke with us about physical games. Phoenix is CTO of DoItKits (@DoItKits). More about Phoenix: Bot Party Her site: PhoenixPerry.com She enjoyed Obelisk Gate by NK Jemisin Physical games are sometimes called Alt Ctrl such as at the Alt Ctrl Game Jam. Phoenix co-founded Code Liberation with Catt Small, Nina Freeman, and Jane Friedhoff. “Code Liberation catalyzes the creation of digital games and creative technologies by women, nonbinary, femme, and girl-identifying people to diversify STEAM fields.” There is an 8-part workshop in London in Summer 2017 (more info). Some other interesting people: Lynne Bruning (http://etextilelounge.com/) Helen Steer (http://doitkits.com/) Perla Maiolino Rebecca Febrink How to Get What You Want wearables site Yoga Pants AutoDesk Fusion360 I know you only read the show notes because you wanted this link: Velastat LessEMF has the supplies for ghost hunting!

Nov 22, 2019 • 1h 8min
311: Attack Other People's Refrigerators
Rick Altherr (@kc8apf) spoke with us about firmware security and mentoring. Rick is a security researcher at Eclypsium. His personal website is kc8apf.net. Rick’s deeply technical dive into reverse engineering car ECUs and FPGA bitstreams was on the Unnamed Reverse Engineering Podcast, episode 24. He also spoke with Chris Gammell The Amp Hour 357 about monitoring servers, many many servers. Firmware security links: STRIDE threat model OWASP Top 10 Security Risks OWASP IoT Firmware Analysis OWASP Embedded Application Security Best Practices Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures Elecia’s Device Security Checklist (wasn’t mentioned) Thank you to our Embedded Patreon supporters, particularly to our corporate patron, InterWorking Labs (iwl.com).

Nov 15, 2019 • 1h 12min
310: While Loops Dressed up for Halloween
Aimee Lucido (@AimeeLucido) is a software engineer and children’s book author. Her first book is Emmy in the Key of Code about music, learning to code, and fitting in. We spoke with Aimee about writing, programming, publishing, and putting beautiful words together. You can get a copy of Emmy in the Key of Code from Booksmith, IndieBound, Barnes & Noble, Target, or Amazon. The music playlist can be found in Google Play or Spotify. Aimee’s website is aimeelucido.com. She also writes crossword puzzles for American Values Club and New Yorker. Some other authors and books we talked about: The Crossover by Kwame Alexander The Red Pencil by Andrea Davis Pinkney, illustrated by Shane W. Evans Pulitzer-prize winning Kendrick Lamar After the show, I asked Aimee about resources for learning to read as a writer, she suggested looking at the KidLit Craft Blog. Thank you to our Embedded Patreon supporters, particularly to our corporate patreon, InterWorking Labs (iwl.com).

Nov 8, 2019 • 55min
309: Nature's Engineers
Pete Staples of Blue Clover Devices (bcdevices.com, @theiotodm) spoke with us about tools for manufacturing hardware. Some posts and products from Blue Clover Devices: PLT Spec Sheet and ICT System How to write PLT Board Test Plans (using YAML) PCB Design Tips and More PCB Design Tips Flying Probe Testers in a Nutshell Zephyr - an OS for IoT BC Devices github Behind the scenes at factories: Shenzhen Tena RT3188 HDMI Stick Factory Tour Inside a PCB Soldering Factory - in China Thank you to our Embedded Patreon supporters, particularly to our corporate patron, InterWorking Labs (iwl.com).

Nov 1, 2019 • 48min
308: More Energy
Jacob Martinez (@jacobotech) spoke with Elecia about DigitalNEST (@DigiNEST), a non-profit devoted to giving high school and college age students access to technology, job training, and career development. DigialNEST is based in the agricultural communities of Salinas and Watsonville, CA. Students who work through the course tracks at DigitalNEST can be invited to join the BizzNEST consulting group. The conference we spoke of was NEST Flight (nestflight.org), held in September in Watsonville. DigitalNEST is a non-profit and is accepting individual and corporate donations: digitalnest.org/donate/.

Oct 24, 2019 • 59min
307: Big While Loop
Chris and Elecia explain when and why to use an operating system on a microcontroller (real-time or not). Thank you to our Embedded Patreon supporters, particularly to our corporate patreon, InterWorking Labs (iwl.com).

Oct 17, 2019 • 1h 2min
306: What Is in the Magic Box?
Dr. Loretta Cheeks (@loretta_cheeks) spoke with us about implicit bias in text, machine learning, getting a PhD, and STEAM outreach via Strong Ties (strongtiesaz.org). Also see: Loretta’s research on identifying implicit bias (The thumbnail image is from her work.) Lotetta’s TEDx talk on AI and remembering Yoshua Bengio wiki Thank you to our Embedded Patreon supporters for Loretta’s mic, particularly to our corporate sponsor, InterWorking Labs (iwl.com).

Oct 3, 2019 • 1h 5min
305: Humans Have a Terrible Spec Sheet
Amanda “w0z” Wozniak (@kainzowa) spoke with us about her career through biomedical engineering and startups. Amanda contributed a chapter to Building Open Source Hardware: DIY Manufacturing. (A book we spoke with Alicia Gibb about in #289.) Amanda’s chapter was titled Design Process: How to Get from Nothing to Something. For more information about the companies we discussed, check out Amanda’s LinkedIn page.

Sep 26, 2019 • 1h 16min
304: ADC Channel Six
What do you get when you connect the open-source reverse engineer of Valve’s Steam Controller and the main electrical engineer of said device? Jeff Keyzer (@mightyohm) and Gregory Gluszek (@greggersaurus) join us to talk about building and taking apart devices. Greg’s project is on github as the OpenSteamController. He used pinkySim, an ARM simulator. Jeff has left Valve and is now a freelance engineer as well as selling kits on mightyohm.com. The incredibly useful comic on how to solder lives there: mightyohm.com/soldercomic I-Opener was the computer discussed.