31st January 2008 - New Meeting Room
We have completed fitting out our new meeting room this week. This gives us a superb venue for design meetings and customer demonstrations.
23rd November 2007 - Moved premises
This week we have moved premises from Unit 6 to Unit 3, within Mount Pleasant Eco Park. Our new office is larger and has a more appropriate layout.
29th October 2007 - dsPIC Experts
This month we have successfully completed yet another dsPIC project. We are using Microchip dsPIC devices more and more. They are very cost effective and very good value. With flexible features like DMA they allow us to write fast, efficient code in a low cost design. We have now accumulated a significant level of experience that we can call ourselves dsPIC experts!
29th August 2007 - Recruited a new Windows Software Engineer
This month Steve Steele has joined our team as a Windows Software Engineer. Although we specialise in embedded software development, we have growing requirements from clients to provide Windows Software Development. Steve will also be developing Window CE and Embedded Windows XP solutions.
29th June 2007 - Easy Projects
After reasonable success with the free online project tracker, 'dotProject', we have migrated to a more fully featured, commercial product called 'EasyProjects.NET'. This is one application that allows our clients to view our project plans in Gantt Chart form, track progress, request feature changes, report bugs, view delayed tasks, and much much more.
4th June 2007 - New receptionist(s)
We have subscribed to a PA service called MoneyPenny, which frees up more of our time to spend on embedded software development.
30th March 2007 - Shared Project Management
This week our new project management system was put in place. We have started using a system called dotProject. This is project management software that allows our clients to see Gantt Charts of our schedules which are live! As our coders progress through the projects, the system is updated.
31st January 2007 - We've got organised!
Following our recent move, we have taken the opportunity to implement some new systems. These include migrating to Microsoft Exchange Server for our email system. This allows us to work as a team more effectively, sharing email folders, diaries and contacts.
17th January 2007 - File sharing
We now how a secure file sharing facility on our website, not only making it easier to transfer files to and from our clients, but also providing a central store for source code, executable, installation files, specification documents and all other important project documents.
29th December 2006 - We've moved!
Absolute Software has re-located over the Christmas period. From the 2nd January we will be operating from our new bigger, brighter premises. See our new contact details here. If you would like to see more about our new premises, take a look at the Eco Park's website.
27th November 2006 - New Agilent oscilloscope
As part of our continuous investiment in our tools, this month we purchased an MSO6014A 4+16, 100MHz Mixed Signal Oscilloscope
20th October 2006 - New UML CASE tool
This month we have adopted the Visual Paradigm UML CASE tool for our UML design work. Apart from being a highly professional solution, it also has a 'community' version so our clients can review our files free of charge.
4th October 2006 - Incorporation Anniversary
Today is our 2 year anniversary for becoming incorporated. Although we started trading in August 2000 as Smart Software, in October 2004 we incorporated the business and became Absolute Software Limited. Since then the business has gone from strength to strength.
2nd September 2006 - Baby boy!
Today at 4:50am, Paul Massey (director) became a father. Baby 'no-name' Massey was 8lbs 5oz.
29th August 2006 - More USB
This month we have successfully completed yet another USB product - the third this year! We have now coded USB products using HID, CDC (VCP), audio-streaming, MIDI and custom interfaces.
15th August 2006 - Further CPLD and dsPIC experience
This month we have been working on our first dsPIC project. The project has required that we use a dsPIC30F2010 to control a very small sensorless brushless motor.
Coincidentally, we are also starting our second dsPIC project this month, where we will be processing 32 channels of audio. In this case, we will probably use a dsPIC30F6010. This project will also require some CPLD work, using an XC9536 as a custom Manchester Encoding/Decoding UART.
26th July 2006 - Automotive Industry
This year at Absolute Software we have branched out into two new markets: the automotive industry and the pipeline industry. The entry into these markets speaks for itself regarding the level of quality we now provide.
16th July 2006 - Nordic Semiconductor project
This month we have been working on our first project using a Nordic Semiconductor product. This is a neat chip for transporting audio over 2.4GHz.
7th July 2006 - Bug-Tracking facility
This month we have added a bug tracking facility to our website. This tool brings you, the customer, closer to our team of programmers. You can report any bugs through our website and track how and when they are fixed. It also has a number of other useful facilities, such as being a central source for project documentation.
29th June 2006 - Our first Renesas project
We have started our first project using a Renesas microcontroller. The project is using a Renesas R8C/17 chip, this chip has very similar functionality to a PIC, but in this case the client specifically requested the use of this brand of microcontroller.
16th June 2006 - Recruited a new embedded programmer
This month we have taken on yet another new embedded programmer - our third in the past twelve months. Byran Wills-Heath is not only well qualified, but also has many years experience as an embedded programmer, making him a valuable new member to our team.
22nd May 2006 - Recruited admin staff
This month we have taken on yet another member of staff, Joanna Wahid. Jo will be helping us deal with the bookkeeping for our ever increasing portfolio of clients.
12th May 2006 - CPLD skills
Due to the requirements of a new project, we have now obtained CPLD design skills. The project required a CPLD for UART routing and memory mapping. Yet another useful skill in our ever increasing skillset.
24th April 2006 - Allen & Heath Software complete
This month we have completed the firmware for the new Allen & Heath 4-channel DJ mixer, the Xone:3D. This has been an exciting project for us, allowing us to demonstrate our wealth of experience, but also introducing us to some new technologies.
30th March 2006 - New skills acquired
This month we have been learning and understanding RFID. This research has been required for a car security system.
21st February 2006 - Registered with Technorati
Registered this page with Technorati Profile for increased visibility.
5th January 2006 - Hi-Tech Consultancy Status achieved
The process of achieving Hi-Tech consult status for Hi-Tech's embedded C compiler, was a slightly different experience to the similar Microchip scheme. The Hi-Tech process was focussed more on the personal level, so instead of applying as Absolute Software, we submitted Paul Massey, the managing director of Absolute Software.
2nd January 2006 - Recruited a new embedded programmer
Due to the huge demand for our resources, yet another highly qualified embedded programmer joined our team. Nikhil Patel has an impressive array of qualifications including a 'Masters of Science Honours Degree in Advanced Control and Systems Engineering' and 'B.Eng (Hons) (First Class) in Electronics and Communications'.
8th December 2005 - Established partnership with Ploytec
Special requirements from one of our main clients has required ASIO drivers for a USB device we are designing. Rather than re-inventing the wheel, we are working with Ploytec to provide a complete solution for our client. Ploytec's ASIO drivers provide ultra-low latencies for audio over USB, for both Windows and MAC operating systems.
1st November 2005 - Recruited a new embedded programmer
Due to our ever increasing portfolio of clients, today we added a new member to our team, Rob White. Rob not only increases our embedded programming capacity, but also brings new electronics skills to our team, enabling us to build more sophisticated prototypes and deal with more intricate re-work.
31st October 2005 - Microchip Consultancy Status achieved
After a grueling nine month application process of forms, interviews and more forms, we have successfully proved to Arizona Microchip that Absolute Software are not only competent embedded programmers, but that we are forward thinking and can bring something special to the PIC programming community.
5th July 2005 - USB Camera project completed
We successfully completed our first video based product PIC product. This was a USB digital camera that captured stills into static RAM and transmitted the data to the PC over USB, using the FTDI chip embedded USB solution.
9th June 2005 - Our first Dot Net Project completed
Originally, we adopted Microsoft Visual Basic because of its very convenient RS232 MSComm control and almost all of our projects require either RS232 or virtual comm port control, so we had been very reluctant to migrate to Visual Basic.NET because the component no longer exists as part of this package. We managed to solve this problem by importing the MSComm control into the dot net environment.
