[En-Nut-Discussion] [btnode-development] improving the energy efficiency of ethernut.. :)

[Mustafa Yuecel]

Hi Matthias

> besides energy, as it saves context-switches it could also make some  
> apps faster.

Another point to energy saving: on our BTnodes (ATmega128L) where the
heap resides on the external SRAM, the idle thread consumes the most
power (do something like incrementing variables: 9 mA, idle: 14 mA), as
long as a low power state is not set with NutThreadSetSleepMode.

Anyway, the current idle thread implementation is not optimal, instead
of some nop-instructions, it calls the whole time NutThreadYield and
NutThreadDestroy. If we can avoid somehow the continuous/frequent heap
access in the idle state, I think it will be a good idea to have a
further look at their solution...

Best,
Musti