Fascinating: the AVR “ATtiny” and “ATmega” chips from Atmel can be programmed in standard C and C++. The chips cost a few Euro each, the compiler is gcc, and there’s a ready-to-run package for Mac, Linux, and Windows. There’s even a low-cost standardized hardware platform, called Arduino. It’s all open source, software as well as hardware designs.
Here’s the Nano version (specs), with on-board USB, ready to be plugged into a breadboard:
Wow. Low-end computing sure has come a long way.