Hitex announces support of Philips’ ARM7-based embedded controller

Karlsruhe, Germany - Hitex announced March 13 that it will support Philips' newly announced ARM7-based embedded controller architecture with Tanto, a modular and configurable development and debugging tool dedicated to support 16/32-bit architectures with on-chip debug support.

By Control Engineering Staff April 19, 2002

Karlsruhe, Germany – Hitex announced March 13 that it will support Philips’ newly announced ARM7-based embedded controller architecture with Tanto, a modular and configurable development and debugging tool dedicated to support 16/32-bit architectures with on-chip debug support.

The nerve center of the entire Tanto system is the Base, a high performance debugging system, fitted with several high-speed communication interfaces (USB, Ethernet and RS232 are standard) and a high performance 32-bit microcontroller. Additional programmable hardware is included for the high-speed serialization of JTAG or BDM commands.

When used together with HiTOP user interface, Tanto Base is a tool to examine embedded applications in high-level language mode in real-time. All parameters associated with the microcontroller, application, and peripherals (e.g. functions, variables, data) are exposed, and allowing the developer to ensure the application does what it should.

Tanto Base is a universal hardware that can be used with a great deal of microcontroller types, and corresponding HiTOP versions are provided for each of them. “Hitex is pleased to work with Philips, a leading supplier of standard embedded controllers,” said Peter Santel, ceo and president, Hitex. “With its long standing expertise in high-end real-time in-circuit emulation and our new test and analysis tool Tanto, Hitex is committed to supporting Philips in delivering its powerful new ARM7-based embedded controller architecture to the market.”

“Philips welcomes Hitex’s support for its new ARM7-based embedded controller architecture,” said Eric McLeod, vice president and general manager, Microcontroller Business Line in the semiconductors division of Philips. “With the support of experienced tool vendors such as Hitex, customers will benefit with an innovative, low risk environment for product development.”

Tanto Base can be expanded by the Tanto PT (Port Trace) to a debugger with port trace. The Tanto base can also be used as the base for an emulation system with full adaptation. Stepping through code and examining data is one thing, but observing the application in real-time and tracing program flow and data accesses reveals a lot more about an application’s behavior. Tanto Port Trace records all trace information transmitted by a microcontroller’s On-Chip Debugging Support (like the Embedded Trace Macrocell on the ARM7TDMI). This normally includes details about branches, accesses to selected variables and sometimes information on task switching in real-time operating systems. It’s even possible to trigger on the occurrence of particular events in real-time. The HiTOP user interface transforms this raw information into symbolic high-level language representation.

Control Engineering Daily News DeskGary A. Mintchell, senior editor gmintchell@cahners.com