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ARM DS-5 supports testing of Cortex microcontrollers for running RToS

Date: 28/10/2013
Are you looking for a tool to check your processor performance to run a RTOS, ARM has announced the availability of ARM DS-5 Development Studio version 5.16 supporting code generation, debug and performance analysis for any ARM Cortex processor, including the latest ARM Cortex-A50 series running bare metal, RTOS or Linux-based software stacks. This kind of tool was only available earlier for application processors running Linux or Android OS systems in the hands of RTOS users, the new DS-5 Streamline performance analyzer can be now used for RTOS development using ARM Cortex based microcontrollers .

DS-5 uses standard trace technology available in nearly all Cortex-M3 and Cortex-M4 processor-based microcontrollers to collect RTOS task activity, hardware performance counters, software events and samples of the program counter.

Results are then presented as a set of reports that enable developers to quickly understand the relationships and dependencies between their software and the underlying hardware.

For instance, Streamline makes it easy to analyze which peripherals generate interrupts and which conditions cause spikes in exception handling time. Additionally, its software profiling capability highlights areas of the code that dominate processor cycles, known as hotspots.

The DS-5 Debugger has been extended to include operating system awareness beyond Linux and Android, covering a range of popular RTOS that include Keil RTX, FreeRTOS, Freescale MQX, Micrium uC/OS-III and Express Logic ThreadX. Developed in collaboration with our RTOS partners, DS-5 built-in OS awareness simplifies and accelerates the software development cycle by providing great visibility into tasks and kernel structures. The DS-5 Debugger can be used for RTOS development on virtual platforms based around ARM Fast Models, and on hardware when connected to the ARM DSTREAM debug and trace unit or the ARM Keil ULINKpro family.

ARM is going to demonstrate this tool at TechCon on October 30th and 31st at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, booth #300.

DS-5 Debugger and DS-5 Streamline, including Streamline for MCU beta, are components of DS-5 Professional Edition version 5.16. A free, fully featured 30-day evaluation is available for download from http://ds.arm.com.

Until December 31st customers purchasing DS-5 Professional Edition are entitled to 50% discount on the new ULINKpro D debug unit.