Before You start- Embedded C
Why EWskills:
Since there are a lot of excellent code practice platforms available (from GeeksforGeeks to Leetcode), you might wonder why practice on EWskills?
The Answer is simple: firmware development is not general programming.
Writing C for a microcontroller is not the same as solving sorting or string problems in a coding contest.
When you’re working in embedded systems, you need to think closer to hardware, manage memory manually, access registers, hardware peripheral, handle constraints like no dynamic allocation, and often write code that works with limited CPU, RAM, and power.
What Makes Firmware Coding Different?
As a firmware developer, you deal with challenges that most general-purpose coders don’t. Some of those challenges:
- Bit-level operations — manipulating specific bits in control registers
- Pointers & memory safety — using pointers responsibly with real-world side effects
- Struct packing & alignment — understanding how memory layout affects performance
- Volatile & register access — learning how hardware reads/writes interact with C
- Custom drivers, buffers, state machines — building logic for actual hardware
- Optimization — every byte of memory and every CPU cycle counts
- Debugging at register level — where logic bugs don’t just crash, they corrupt hardware behavior
EWskills is the platform designed with firmware and embedded development in mind. All the problems are Firmware-focused — Practice register operations, memory buffers, struct overlays, circular queues, peripheral simulation, etc.
Before Practice
To get the most out of EWskills practice, you don’t need to be an expert — but you should have a few basics covered i.e. C language basics, bitwise logical operations, numbers system (Binary, Hex), etc. Also basic awareness about microcontrollers, registers will help.
For C language depth we recommend these courses by Piyush Itenkar. It covers core language concepts, and low-level techniques with practical CPU code execution flow.
What You’ll Practice & Learn with EWskills
Following points are covered
| Category | Topics Covered | Firmware Developer: Importance & Skill Gain |
|---|---|---|
| Bit Manipulation | Set/Clear/Toggle/Check bits, Bitfield ops, Rotate ops, Count bits, Carry flag, Highest bit, Macros, extract nibbles, Bit reversal/spreading/compression. Bitfield overlay using struct/union, | Core to manipulating hardware registers, configuring. Master register operations, bitfield layouts, and packed format handling |
| Pointers & Memory | Basic/Double/Struct pointers, void*, pointer walking, simulated memcpy, circular buffer, memory scanning, FSM, Pointer to structs, function pointers, Simulated memcpy, circular buffer, state machines. | Essential for memory-mapped IO, direct memory access, and low-level data movement. Confident pointer usage, buffer manipulation, FSM implementation |
| Structs & Unions | Nested struct fields, Union views, Bitfield overlays, Struct padding, Endianness, Register layout, ADC/memory modeling | Simulates hardware behavior and allows efficient packed data representation, Protocol Framing, cross platform portability. Accurate modeling of hardware registers and data layouts |
| Strings & Character Handling | Custom strlen, strcpy, strcmp, ASCII Conversion, checks, parsing, atoi/atof, delimiter splitting, UART-safe routines | Needed for interpreting UART commands, menus, displays, and config data in embedded systems. Parse/input handling, CLI implementation, ASCII-safe operations |
| Embedded Data Handling | Stack with array, shell parser, struct filtering, GPS parsing, command interpreters | Common for logging, CLI inputs, protocol parsing, and low-level config Implement simple interpreters, structured data filtering |
| Sorting & Searching | Linear/binary search, Min/Max, Kth, Top-N, Sort struct arrays | Often needed in calibration, real-time filtering, or sorting sensor data. Build efficient sort/filter/search utilities |
| Type Conversion & Math | Signed/unsigned mix, shift/mod tricks, int↔string conversions, base conversions (binary, hex), manual itoa/ASCII output | Required in memory-limited firmware (avoid heavy libs), and for interfacing with text-based protocols like UART. Build lightweight converters, handle traps in mixed-type math. |
We are continuously improvising and adding new challenges close to firmware development.
Who Should Practice Here?
- Embedded Developer who wants to sharpen low level coding fluency & get pro.
- Engineering students who want to get ready beyond theory.
- Freshers/Professionals preparing for firmware/embedded job roles
- Developers shifting from application to systems programming
- Makers/ Hobbyist Building Real Embedded projects.
Start Slow, Go Deep!
Mastering embedded programming is not about speed—it’s about depth. So, take your time. Understand every bit, every variable, flow, every memory access.
The goal is to help you think like a professional firmware developer and gain confidence.
Let’s get started.