Product category: Design and Development Hardware
News Release from: Luminary Micro | Subject: EKT-LM3S8962 etc
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial Team on 17 March 2008
Evaluation tools ease embedded
development
Evaluation kits are now available featuring an evaluation version of Code Suite development tools which is always unrestricted when used with the evaluation board.
Code Red Technologies and Luminary Micro have collaborated to launch Code Suite development tools for Stellaris Evaluation kits are now available featuring an evaluation version of Code Suite development tools which is always unrestricted when used with the evaluation board
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 25 May 2006 at 8.00am (UK)
Related stories
MCU family expands with motor control to the fore
32bit microcontrollers offer new features such as an analogue-to-digital convertor (ADC) and a sophisticated motion control unit, as well as larger on-chip memories.
MCU evaluation kit includes IAR's workbench
Evaluation kit functions as both an evaluation platform for the Stellaris LM3S811 microcontroller and a serial in-circuit debug interface for any Stellaris MCU-based target board.
With features previously unavailable to MCU developers, Code Suite incorporates Code Trace, a software feature that capitalises on the serial wire viewing (SWV) technology in Stellaris microcontrollers to deliver unprecedented visibility during debug.
Code Trace delivers high accuracy profiling, interrupt statistics, interrupt tracing, RTOS event tracing, and a unique no-overhead host-strings viewing mechanism which provides printf style debugging and logging without intrusiveness.
Interrupt tracing provides impressive graphical visualisation of what is occurring in a real time system.
Further reading
Cortex-M3-based MCUs major on motion control
Five new Stellaris microcontrollers and corresponding development kits offer increased functionality for sophisticated motion-oriented applications.
Prototyping/debugging kit for ARM controllers
Luminary Micro's Stellaris LM3S811 Evaluation Kit comes with a 30-day evaluation version of CodeSourcery's Sourcery G++ software-development environment.
The future of the MCU market
Jean Anne Booth, Chief Marketing Officer of Luminary Micro, discusses the fragmentation and impending consolidation of the MCU market.
"Code Red Technologies has created sophisticated development tools specifically for MCU users, with many features never before available to developers of deeply embedded systems", says Jean Anne Booth, Chief Marketing Officer of Luminary Micro.
"Code Suite users will be impressed with how Code Trace capabilities speed sophisticated embedded software to market".
"That the evaluation tools are not time- or memory-limited should also prove quite popular".
"We are very pleased to be working with Code Red Technologies to offer the newest and most innovative tools first to the users of our Stellaris microcontrollers".
Created from the ground up for 32bit MCU application developers, Code Suite offers a complete professional development environment for C, C++ and assembler programming along with features and facilities previously unavailable in deeply embedded systems.
The new features include MCU-specific project wizards, an embedded debugger, text indentation, function folding, online and offline integrated MCU help, extensive project management automation and integrated source repository support.
These MCU-specific features facilitate the rapid creation of the necessary startup and initialisation code for programming a Stellaris microcontroller.
"Code Red Technologies is proud to work with Luminary Micro to bring its advanced tools technologies to market", says John Rayfield, CEO of Code Red.
"Stellaris ARM Cortex-M3 microcontrollers deliver truly impressive in-system performance, in addition to being the largest selection of ARM-based microcontrollers on the market".
"With Luminary Micro's wide range of easy-to-use evaluation kits, we are able to cost-effectively show embedded developers how Code Red delivers the best development environment for MCU users by exploiting the strengths of the Stellaris debug architecture for both run-stop control and trace".
Built on the solid Eclipse IDE with extensive enhancements added by Code Red Technologies, Code Suite is delivered in a simple single installer, and provides a seamless environment for development.
Project wizards create linker scripts and all startup code required to have embedded applications running on your target in minutes.
Code Suite also works with RTOSs for designs where the resources of a real-time kernel are required, and includes a FreeRTOS project wizard.
These co-ordinated enhancements allow much faster development, debug, test, and profiling of applications, allowing shorter time to market for even the most complex MCU-based applications.
The integrated advanced debugger provides automatic Flash download (when needed), and full access to the innovative peripherals integrated in Stellaris microcontrollers, including an interactive display of all peripherals and registers on the devices.
For ease of use, all registers and bit-fields are displayed in their natural formats.
"Many designers are moving to high-performance microcontrollers such as those from Luminary Micro, and are finding that the pure interrupt-driven model does not scale as processing power increases", says FreeRTOS.org founder Richard Barry.
"The FreeRTOS community helps ensure a simple, compact Real Time Kernel is available to make migration as simple and painless as possible".
"With the out-of-the-box project wizard support in Code Suite, it is easy for microcontroller developers to use an embedded RTOS, and FreeRTOS's ability to move from an open-source solution to a commercial licence provides excellent flexibility for users".
New evaluation kits are now available from Luminary Micro and Code Red Technologies that incorporate Code Suite, and allow the use of the full unrestricted use of the development environment.
These kits, which are priced from US $49 to $89, are available for a number of different configurations including: the EKT-LM3S8962 Stellaris LM3S8962 evaluation kit with Code Suite development tools, featuring integrated 10/100 Ethernet and CAN internetworking; the EKT-LM3S6965 Stellaris LM3S6965 evaluation kit with Code Suite development tools, featuring integrated 10/100 Ethernet networking; the EKT-LM3S2965 Stellaris LM3S2965 evaluation kit with Code Suite development tools, featuring integrated CAN communications; the EKT-LM3S1968 Stellaris LM3S1968 evaluation kit with Code Suite development tools; and the EKT-LM3S811 Stellaris LM3S811 evaluation Kit with Code Suite development tools.
A full licence to Code Suite development tools with all the power, functionality, reliability and ease of use of far more expensive products is available through an online upgrade of the evaluation kits from the Code Red Technologies website for US $999.
No additional hardware is required, and the evaluation board can serve as an emulator for customer target boards.
• Luminary Micro: contact details and other news
• Email this article to a colleague
• Register for the free Electronicstalk email newsletter
• Electronicstalk Home Page
Search the Pro-Talk network of sites
