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Comment by kls | Hacker News Reader

This is good advice, the problem is that you are suffering burn out. !0 years sounds about right. You need to get back to your roots and one way I recommend to do it, is to get into embedded. It gets you back into a small reward loop where little things net positive feedback. The other thing that I recommend to people is get closer to a research discipline. If you are really that burnt out, try applying your trade to a secondary science that you are interested in, chemistry, Bio-Engineering, astronomy something like that. There are a lot of cool projects that need help with code.

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How do you suggest getting started with embedded programming?

I start using PICAXE(http://www.rev-ed.co.uk/picaxe/) few years ago. It's incredibly cheap and easy to use. But i think it's essential to have electronic/mechanical knowledge in order to make interesting project.

Pick up an Arduino, or one of it's derivatives (like Netduino). Then span out. Once you've gotten 'in', you'll soon find other interesting platforms to develop on.

Spark fun has a good set of tutorials that cover all of the basics.

http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/tutorials.php

The nice part about their tutorial is they take you through all of the details such as building you own PCB and other items where some of the kits have all of the electronics built for you. It depends on your interest but I find designing the electronics to be as rewarding as actually programming a micro-controller. I am also the kind of guy that likes to understand ever small detail as well.

Jack Ganssle is an embedded guru and a great writer, check out everything he's written - books and online.

Start here: http://www.ganssle.com/startinges.htm ("How to become an embedded geek")

Get yourself a simple all-in-one hardware/firmware environment, like the one my company (Silicon Labs) makes: Look for the "MCUniversity Kit", it's $55, here: http://www.silabs.com/products/mcu/Pages/MCUniversity.aspx

Or check out http://hackaday.com/2010/08/11/how-to-launchpad-programming-... for info about Launchpad, a cheaper, similar solution from TI.

I've actually used Silicon Labs' MCU University kit, and I highly recommend it. I don't get any money directly from it, but Silicon Labs does pay my salary.

Strangely enough, if I had the money, I'd probably go back to university and study one of the splinter-subjects genetics must have exploded into during the past 15 years. I've kicked myself over the past years repeatedly for not staying in university and getting some research job there. Maybe I can have a look into the DIY aspect of biotech, that someone already mentioned.

How do you suggest getting involved in Bio-Engineering. I'm a programmer, I've applied to a few opportunities but no one has replied :-(

You need to first educate yourself on the subject at hand. Then when you know enough about the subject join one of the open source projects.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/cmiss/ http://www.physiome.org/

there are countless others just use Google. This will help you establish a network of individuals in the industry. Software skills along will not get you that far. You need domain knowledge as well as contacts in the industry.

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