--- title: "Software is free and can right any wrong" url: https://daily.dev/posts/software-is-free-and-can-right-any-wrong-fqm1wf6mv source_url: https://www.embeddedrelated.com/showarticle/1599.php type: article source: "EmbeddedRelated" published: 2026-05-31T07:48:04.511Z updated: 2026-05-31T09:18:04.912Z tags: ["embedded", "firmware", "fpga", "real-time-systems"] reading_time: 4 upvotes: 0 comments: 0 language: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Software is free and can right any wrong **[EmbeddedRelated](https://daily.dev/sources/embeddedrelated)** · 4 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary A veteran embedded developer reflects on the temptation to treat software as 'free' in embedded projects, pushing hardware responsibilities into firmware to save per-unit costs. Using examples like bit-banging UARTs and software-defined Ethernet, the post illustrates how far this can go. A cautionary story from a TI9900-era hydraulic control project shows how unchecked feature delegation to software eventually overwhelmed the system's real-time budget, requiring a major design review. The post closes by noting that FPGAs add another dimension to the hardware-vs-software trade-off. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: --- Tags: [#embedded](https://daily.dev/tags/embedded), [#firmware](https://daily.dev/tags/firmware), [#fpga](https://daily.dev/tags/fpga), [#real-time-systems](https://daily.dev/tags/real-time-systems) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/software-is-free-and-can-right-any-wrong-fqm1wf6mv)