KPro 4 Live Tuning - What changed?

[The Spectacle]

Surprised no one asked this already.

The help file states:

How Live Tuning works

Live tuning works by altering the ECU so that the ECU copies table information from flash memory (which cannot be changed without uploading the whole calibration to the ECU) to RAM (which can be changed quickly while the ECU is running). This copying process occurs every time the ECU RAM is cleared, which is every time the ECU is reset or power removed from the ECU. When tables are edited in KManager, the changes are sent to the ECU where the RAM tables are updated, so that the ECU tables are updated in a fraction of a second.

The way its written is somewhat confusing. My best guess - during live tuning, KPro4 edits parameters in the ECU RAM, then writes those edits to flash memory at a later time. Is that correct?

My question. For YEARS you guys have had this stance in regards to live tuning with KPro:

Realtime programming of a K-Pro is not possible. It's not soemthing that can be worked on. THis is due to the type of processor used by Honda. If you have complaints talk to Acura/Honda.

or

The processor Honda uses in the ECU uses flash memory. It cannot be updated without suspending the operation of the ECU. The only way to make the ECU real-time updatable would be to change the ECU processor and memory type.

Both quotes pulled from this thread: http://www.hondata.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=6309 (I couldn't quote directly because it is locked).

I'm curious as to what changed behind the scenes that enabled you implement this feature in KPro. Did you discover an implementation detail that was missed years ago? Did the new KPro 4 board contain hardware something that enabled a feature that the previous boards did not? You also took a hardline stance about the possibility of running closed loop from the analog inputs, which also changed in KPro 4 (although that felt like more like "we'll get to it when we feel like it" type of thing vs it not being possible at all). I realize there's some trade secrets you may not want to reveal, but any info you can provide would be greatly appreciated. I'm just super curious.

[Hondata]

Live tuning works as stated in your quote. It does not update the flash memory in the ECU until you do an upload.

There is a difference between realtime programming and live tuning. The ECU processor does not allow realtime programming. We have worked around this by creating the technique outlined in your quote, which we called 'live tuning'.

With the KPro4 we were able to add the features which were not technically possible with earlier systems (closed loop from analog inputs, realtime, protection etc). The KPro4 has 25 times the raw processing power of any of the previous KPros as well as a built in numeric processor, so we were able to change how the ECU & KPro communicate so that we could add the above features.