Hardware/Software Integration

Hardware/software integration is the ability to connect physical instruments, actuators, and sensors to controlling software — so a setup can be driven and evaluated programmatically instead of operated by hand.

Why it's more than just programming

Unlike pure software development, this work has to account for physical constraints: timing, signal noise, device communication over hardware interfaces, and the behavior of real components that don't always match an idealized model.

Hands-on experience

For my bachelor's thesis, I developed an absorption-imaging system using infrared lasers for an ion microscope and automated the image acquisition in C++ — from driving the lasers, to synchronizing capture, to processing the resulting image data.

Carrying it into production

I apply the same mindset today when developing qualification software for EUV assemblies: test systems need to communicate reliably with software, capture measurement data automatically, and document results reproducibly.