Crossware Enhances ARM Suite to Speed
Application Development on Atmel AT91SAM Chips
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Crossware extends Workspace Creation Technology to support Atmel’s Softpack
examples for SAM7 and SAM9 microcontrollers
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ARM suite immediately imports, builds and runs the examples without modification
and downloads and runs the applications across the JTAG debugger interface

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CAMBRIDGE, UK, April 9, 2009, - Crossware (www.crossware.com), a leading embedded
software tools developer, has enhanced its ARM® Development Suite to radically
improve the speed of application development across Atmel’s family of AT91SAM chips.
These enhancements are made possible by Crossware extending its Workspace Creation
Technology, developed originally for the ColdFire MCF5249, to support the wide range
of applications examples (Softpacks) available from Atmel to support developers
using its SAM7 and SAM9 ARM-based microcontrollers.
Alan Harry, Crossware’s CEO, said: "As a result of the built-in intelligence
within our Workspace Creation Technology, application developers using the Atmel
AT91SAM Softpacks can now have their applications up and running in minutes - rather
than hours, days or weeks - by simply using our enhanced ARM Development Suite."
A wide range of application examples have been developed by Atmel to demonstrate
the features of its SAM7 and SAM9 ARM-based microcontrollers. These are available
as Softpacks with each Softpack containing a range of examples for a specific SAM7
or SAM9 variant. Unzipping an application from a Softpack creates a complex set
of sub-directories containing a makefile, source code for the application, source
code to configure and drive the on-chip peripherals, linker scripts for the different
build configurations and so on.
The Crossware ARM suite is able to completely import such an application and arrange
it as a set of libraries and a main application. The application can then
be immediately built and run on the appropriate Atmel evaluation board. This gives
the developer user friendly access to a wide range of pre-written programs.
One such application is lwIP (lightweight IP), the TCP/IP stack developed
by the Swedish Institute of Computer Science. A version of the stack is available
for Atmel’s AT91SAM9263 evaluation board. Once the application is unzipped,
it takes about 30 seconds for the import process to complete, 50 seconds to build
the 15 libraries created, and 5 seconds to build and link the final application.
The Crossware Workspace Creation Technology will have automatically created
a download script to configure the SDRAM of the AT91SAM9263-EK and so the download
process, which takes less than 10 seconds using the Jaguar USB JTAG debugger
interface, can commence immediately. It is therefore possible to have an example
web server application running on the AT91SAM9263-EK within 2 minutes of it being
unzipped.
Navigating the source code for the complete application is simplified due to its
arrangement into a set of libraries and a main application. Source code browsing
across the complete application is also possible and adds to the ease with which
the source code may be studied.
Crossware’s Workspace Creation technology was originally developed to import
Freescale’s MP3 applications for the ColdFire MCF5249 audio microcontroller
and later extended to support Freescale’s dBug debug monitors.
Crossware’s enhanced ARM Development Suite, with its advanced C/C++ compiler,
libraries, wizards, simulator and debugger, provides a complete and extremely
user friendly development environment for the Atmel ARM9 family of microcontrollers
as well as ARM7 microcontrollers from Atmel, NXP and STMicroelectronics.
About Crossware (www.crossware.com)
Crossware is a leading developer of programmer-friendly C/C++ cross compilers and
other development tools for embedded systems based on the 8051, ColdFire, ARM, 68000,
CPU32 and other chip families. Host environments include Windows 9x, Windows NT,
Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Vista. The company, founded by Alan Harry in 1984, is
headquartered in the UK at Litlington on the outskirts of Cambridge. Crossware’s
products are used throughout the world by professional developers, educational
establishments and hobbyists.
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