“Dojo” translates to “place of the way” and represents an environment for immersive learning. Here at Dojo 5, we prioritize that learning by encouraging our engineers to always be on the look out for the latest news, new technologies, and new tools that help us modernize the firmware product development and deployment experience for our clients.
To help other engineers expand their knowledge as well, here’s a collection of interesting blogs, news, and tools that our engineers have been reading this last month.
Blogs
SWD to USBC
Using the USB-C specification and some custom HW to get SWD running over USB-C. This allows debugging while developing firmware using SWD, on devices that have a single USB connector for charging and firmware updates, without having to tear open the unit!
https://alvarop.com/2025/03/swd-to-usbc
Hardware discovery: ACPI & Device Tree
Diving into Hardware Discovery. How the kernel knows which physical devices exist and which of the many device drivers it contains can handle each device. Provides a bit of history and an overview of where we are now.
https://blogsystem5.substack.com/p/hardware-autoconfiguration
A Schematic Review Checklist for Firmware Engineers
Memfault recently did an Interrupt Live event for this article right at the end of march, talking about things firmware engineers should keep an eye out for during schematic reviews. An important topic during development!
https://interrupt.memfault.com/blog/schematic-review-checklist
Nordic SoftDevice unofficial survival guide
How to debug with the Nordic SDK BLE stack, specifically SoftDevice, an opaque binary blob, when attempting to transfer from freeRTOS to Zephyr.
https://m0agx.eu/nordic-softdevice-unofficial-survival-guide.html
News
Undocumented commands found in Bluetooth chip used by a billion devices
They made a big splash announcing hidden commands in the ESP32’s. Were undocumented commands found in popular bluetooth chips a huge security flaw? Maybe not, but you can find out more here!
Plus a great follow up breakdown of the whole situation! https://www.flyingpenguin.com/?p=67838
Announcing Guidelines Support Library v4.2.0
Microsoft’s Guidelines Support Library got an upgrade, including removing deprecated functions in favor of C++ standard library equivalents, and some performance improvement.
https://devblogs.microsoft.com/cppblog/announcing-guidelines-support-library-v4-2-0/
RP2350 now available to buy: a high-performance, secure microcontroller for your next project
Raspberry Pi unveils a new high power low cost microcontroller for integration into high-volume, low-cost end devices. Coming in at $1 USD or less depending on volume, it’s safe to assume we will be seeing lots of these in future projects soon.
Zephyr RTOS 4.1 Now Available: Performance Improvements, Support for IAR Toolchain, Rust, and More
Latest version of Zephyr Announced! Including some experimental Rust and IAR support.
https://zephyrproject.org/zephyr-rtos-4-1-is-available
Technical Learning / Guides
This month was Yocto learning month here at Dojo 5, and we got a nice collection of intro guides about it:
How to build Yocto with Apple Silicon
Do you want to get into building linux with Yocto, but your dev machine is a Mac? Getting started with yocto builds on apple silicon macs is simpler than you might think.
https://ejaaskel.dev/how-to-build-yocto-with-apple-silicon/
Yocto: Part 1 – A Definitive Introduction
If you have never used Yocto before, this guide will walk you through every step helping you understand the whole process.
https://kickstartembedded.com/2021/12/19/yocto-part-1-a-definitive-introduction/
BeaglePlay: Part 1 – Building a base image using Yocto
Are you curious about what goes into creating a custom linux image for some device? Well now you can find out how to get started using Yocto for a beagleplay board!
https://kickstartembedded.com/2023/08/06/beagleplay-part-1-building-a-base-image-using-yocto/
Are you curious about what goes into creating a custom linux image for some device? Well now you can find out how to get started using Yocto for a beagleplay board!
Videos
Making your shell magical
It lets shell history be synced and searchable across work laptop, personal laptop, personal desktop, and workbench computer. Plus it syncs aliases and environment variables and uses its startup command to make these available to the shell. A useful tool, and well-named to boot.
Verify your code consistency with an open-source tool
A docker image designed for use in CI that contains linters and helper scripts for a pile of different languages and file formats.
Wrap-up
At Dojo five we pride ourselves on staying informed and up-to-date with the latest in all things tech. Could your team benefit from some super talented engineers who are in the know for modern tips, tricks, and best practices? If so, book a call with us to get the conversation started! We look forward to hearing from you!
