Amongst the deadlines as I reach the end of term was a 3,000 word essay for my ULSI module.  I decided on the topic of "Mulit-core and Parrallel Architectures for Data Processing and Gaming: A brief introduction to CELL Processor Technology".  I'm not going to recount my entire essay here, however I will speak a little about the CELL architecture.  You may be forgiven for never hearing of CELL before, after all it's not an every day common computer processor, however many people the world over own one.  

It's been a while since I've posted anything on here, mainly due to being busy with University studies and work, but I thought I'd post a bit of an update with the project. I have written some code for the DMX receiver however have had some problems implementing it, and with university being closed for Easter for a week I cannot get any help with it until Wednesday.

When Fred Goodwin, the ex-boss of the Royal Bank of Scotland, took early retirement his pension fund was doubled to £16m, ensuring him an annual £693,000 pension for the rest of his life (Figures sourced from the BBC news website).  At the time where he was 'pushed' from the job the RBS was in such as state that the tresury was preparing to pump £20bn of tax payers money into the company, but were also anxious to get new management in place.

Yet again it has been some time since I have posted something my project. So here is a short update to let you know where things stand.  Unfortunately  my progress has been hampered over the last week or so with some rather odd errors being chucked out by the C18 compiler when I was trying to complie my program.   I have since solved this issue, with the help of my project supervisor, and am now looking to integrate the keypad and screen driving segments of the code while formulating a final design for the hardware, which should be fairly simple, before moving onto the UART section.

I am aiming to have all of the intgration and code completed by the 12th March with the hardware being manufacturered, implemented and tested in the following week.

This walk, which as the title says originates from Over Silton (1 mile east of the A19, about 8 miles south of Thirsk), took us through some truly beautiful scenery. I cannot fully recount the route as it was sometime since we went however it involved some very muddy sections as well as some on barren moor land as well as surrounded by magnificent forestry.  The weather was lovely, although mainly overcast. We started the walk early and it was not until the latter stages that we came across any other walkers. Due to a slight error in navigation, as it seems a rather obvious feature at which was should have turned right at was recently removed, we ended up being slightly naughty and walking through a farmers field and then through an actual farm yard - luckily neither myself or John got shot. 

We called in at a friend of John's Grandparents and had a cup of tea and some cheese cake that really did hit the spot. After leaving there we had to traverse the muddiest part yet - where I discovered that the best technique in dealing with very muddy patches was to walk lightly but quickly. For the first time I was the better prepared one out of the two of us - with waterproof boots and gaiters, unlike John who only had boots thus ending up with rather muddy trousers. 

We got back to the car where I only had to swap my boots for clean shoes and remove my gaiters, mean while John scared the residents by changing his trousers in the middle of a side street.  I can't recall how long the walk took but in total google maps tells me we walked nearly 13.5miles. It was a very nice walk I would certainly do it again, minus the detour!