[dcb]

So, how do you "refactor" code, and be reasonably sure you didn't break something?

Conventional methods utilize automated unit testing, and developers write a bunch of code to analize the core code. Then when you make a change and before you inflict it on everyone else, you run the new code against these automated tests and see if anything strange happens.

Ok, so that's fine for like a desktop or server program, no additional hardware needed, just lots of test code to cover lots of scenarios. But what about an embedded project?

Well, the answer is (IMHO) that the developers need to have at their disposal a complimentary bit of hardware. With the guino I use another atmega168 that generates signals, and validate the on screen displays.

For this project maybe it makes sense to do something similiar, have an atmega that simulates current,throttle,temp,overcurrent signals and monitors the pwm output (and possibly the uart output) to ensure that it still looks right.

But it means we have to build it.

Thoughts?