Infinite Algorithms

There are many different types of algorithms. The kind of algorithms that consumer electronics devices need can be broadly defined as signal processing algorithms. That is, the devices have to process the input signals to detect some condition (detection algorithm), or estimate some parameter such as temperature (estimation algorithm) or control the device automatically so that it does something useful and safe (control algorithm).

It is also possible to string together many sub algorithms to create a more complex algorithm. For instance a compression algorithm can contain internally a few estimation algorithms, a control algorithm, and another type of compression algorithm. An error control algorithm can have a detection algorithm and an estimation algorithm. A search algorithm can be a combination of detection and estimation algorithms. A face detection and tracking algorithm may consist of a dozen of different component algorithms.

An algorithm can operate upon different types of data which could be an analog signal (time-continuous and amplitude-continuous) or a discrete signal (time-discrete and amplitude-discrete) from an analog-to-digital converter (ADC).

Most of the algorithmic implementations convert the analog signal to a digital or discrete signal so that the algorithm can be implemented with digital hardware.

This means that we need specify:

data sample size in bits
Operating clock frequency and power
Bus bandwidth and data movement paths
relationship between data size and overall quality
number and sequence of operations on data
ways of speeding up the operations
ways of reducing the cost of hardware
means of improving the overall quality
selection of hardware technology: DSP, FPGA, or ASIC
means of prototyping the system
means of verifying the operations
interfacing to input, output, and system signals
Packaging and bill of materials
standards' compliance