Embedded Systems articles from April 2002

Embedded Systems archives from April 2002

Lynxos 4.0 adds Linux binary compatibility. (Operating Systems).
April 1, 2002... A major revision of Lynux-Works' LynxOS real-time operating system (RTOS) adds Linux binary compatibility and enhancements in networking, porting support, and performance. LynxOS 4.0 is available as a stand-alone solution with a selection of...

Survey gives boost to embedded community. (In the News).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... A survey carried out in the US by CMP, publishers of this magazine, show an increase in activity in both new designs and revisions to existing embedded designs. While designers focussed on hardware are primarily concerned with component...

OCPA reaches 60. (In Brief).(Open Contents Platform Association)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... The Open Contents Platform Association (OCPA), the standards body formed six months ago to promote the global standardization of Tao's intent media platform, has succeeded in attracting more than 60 consumer electronics manufacturers, content...

PERC for Nucleus. (In Brief).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... NewMonics, a supplier of advanced embedded Java solutions for complex embedded systems, says the latest release of its PERC Java virtual machine (JVM) will support Accelerated Technology's Nucleus real-time operating systems. T

MontaVista backing. (In Brief).(Montavista Software)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... MontaVista Software has received an equity investment from Matsushita Electric Industrial (MEI) through its subsidiary, Panasonic Digital Concepts Center (PDCC). MEI joins a list of investors, including IBM, Sony, US Venture Partners and...

Additional license. (In Brief).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... RF Engines (RFEL), which is based on the Isle of Wight has granted another evaluation license to a department of the UK Ministry of Defence for its Pipelined Frequency Transform (PFT) technology. This follows two successful deals with...

Accelerated and Mentor 'to blend'. (Acquisition).(Accelerated Technology)(Mentor Graphics Inc.)
April 1, 2002... Accelerated Technology (ATI), which has become the Embedded Systems Division of Mentor Graphics, is committed to working with Mentor's existing VRTX and XRAY product lines alongside its present Nucleus software and codellab Embedded Developer...

Qtopia provides multi-platform mobile application environment. (Software).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... Trolltech, a producer of multi-platform development frameworks, has introduced Qtopia, a Linux-based application environment that alms to bring the power of desktop computing to mobile embedded devices. Trolltech, which is headquartered in...

Xtreme design kit moves to a second level. (Development).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... Xilinx in collaboration with The Math Works, Mentor Graphics and Synplicity, has released its second generation XtremeDSP development kit for enabling TeraMAc/s applications using Xilinx Virtex-II and Spartan-II FPGAs. The first generation...

PROFIBUS test spec. (In Brief).(Profibus International)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... PROFIBUS International has released a test specification for PROFInet Certification. This guideline will help machine and plant builders, integrators and manufacturers ensure that their products and systems comply with the PROFInet...

RTOs growth. (In Brief).(real-time operating systems)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... According to a study by market researchers' Venture Development Corporation (VDC), Green Hills Software achieved the greatest market share growth in 2001 among embedded RTOSes addressing 'hard real-time requirements'. According to the VDC...

Alliance links design and test. (Strategic).
April 1, 2002... The STMicroelectronics and Cadence Design Systems joint venture, Accent, and SABER (Schiumberger Advanced Business Engineering Resources), a business unit of Schiumberger that provides test engineering outsourcing services for the semiconductor...

Fresco browser integrated with Intent platform. (Consumer).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... In a strategic partnership, ANT and Tao have integrated ANT's Fresco browser to Tao's Intent platform product, which runs on a range of devices including set top boxes (STBs), interactive digital TVs (iDTVs), personal digital assistants (PDA's)...

University boost for embedded lab. (Education).(Aston University)
April 1, 2002... Collaboration between Infineon Technologies and Hitex (UK) is helping to create an embedded systems hardware and software laboratory at Aston University, Birmingham, one of the UK's leading educational centres for electronic engineering. ...

SBS buys infiniband expertise. (Acquisition).(SBS Technologies Inc., Essential Communications)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... SBS Technologies has acquired some assets of Essential Communications, a division of Intrusion Inc., which develops and is currently delivering early stage InfiniBand products. SBS, which paid $1 million for the assets, will use...

Altera IP cores at VCX. (In Brief).
April 1, 2002... Altera has joined the Virtual Component Exchange (VCX) making its portfolio of 65 intellectual property (IP) MegaCore functions available on The VCX TradeFloor. Altera and the VCX are also working on an open licensing agreement that will...

Esterel gives software. (In Brief).(universities join Esterel Technologies' Esterel Studio academic program at no charge)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... Twenty universities have joined Esterel Technologies academic program bring the value of donations by the company to more than $20million. Participating universities are able to license up 1020 seats of Esterel Studio at no charge. The software...

OSEK/VDX certification. (In Brief).(LiveDevices Ltd., Realogy Real-Time Architect certified)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... Realogy Real-Time Architect (RTA) from LiveDevices has received OSEK/VDX OS certification. RTA provides the ability to model, build and analyze OSEK-compatible systems deployed on the Motorola Power PC MPC5XX port which is used in the...

1394 looks to Europe. (In Brief).(1394 Trade Association, membership recruitment campaign in Europe)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... The 1394 Trade Association, which has over 170 members, is conducting a recruitment drive in Europe and is to hold one of its quarterly meetings in Barcelona in May. For the first time it is opening a meeting up to non-member companies. Dr...

AMBA design kit. (In Brief).(Advanced RISC Machines Ltd. signs design licencees )(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... ARM has signed 35 design licensees for the AMBA design kit since its release last year. The kit provides a generic, stand-alone environment to enable the rapid creation of AMBA technology-based components and SoC designs. The kit contains a set...

Tensilica for Blue Logic. (In Brief).(International Business Machines' Blue Logic Iternet Protocol Collaboration Program)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... Tensilica, a supplier of configurable and extensible processor IP is the first member of the IBM Blue Logic IP Collaboration Program. The companies Xtensa processor core has already been proven on IBM'S Blue Logic ASIC design methodology for...

IDT joins Wind River. (In Brief).(Integrated Device Technology Inc.)(Wind River Systems Inc.)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... IDT has joined the Wind River MIPS Center of Excellence semiconductor partner program. A multi-year agreement will see Wind River's embedded software products and development tools distributed across IDT's current integrated communications...

Equator embeds Linux. (In Brief).(Equator Technologies)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... Equator Technologies, a supplier of video streaming and processing engines and platforms, has announced Embedded Linux support for its BSP chip family. Customers will be able to take advantage of Linux applications to create broadband...

Design MSc degree goes online. (Education).(Institute for System Level Integration offers Master of Science in Computing degree)
April 1, 2002... The Institute for System Level Integration (ISLI) has launched an online MSc degree in system level integration. Based at the Alba Centre in Livingston, Scotland, ISLI was also the first to provide a full-time postgraduate qualification in this...

Benchmarks extend to cover 8 and 16bit MCUs. (Microcontrollers).(End Embedded Microprocessor Benchmarking Consortium's benchmarks for 8 and 16bit embedded microcontrollers)
April 1, 2002... The Embedded Microprocessor Benchmark Consortium (EEMBC) has developed a suite of benchmarks tailored for 8 and 16bit embedded microcontrollers. Until now the EEMBC benchmarking standards were best suited for DSPs and 32 or 64bit devices....

Infineon. (EEMBC Scores).(End Embedded Microprocessor Benchmarking Consortium )(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... The 170MHz Carmel DSP, tested against EEMBCs Telecomm benchmark suite, scored 4.8 Telemarks. Infineon used its Infineon IC3 compiler to produce EEMBC out-of-the-box benchmark scores. It used its IC3 compiler to produce EEMBC out-of-the-box...

ARC Tangent. (EEMBC Scores).(End Embedded Microprocessor Benchmarking Consortium)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... Tested against EEMBC's consumer benchmark suite, the ARCtangent-A4 software simulator received a consolidated Consumermark out-of-the-box score of 0.0558/MHz and a 'full-fury' optimized score of 1.0621/MHz. The consumer benchmark suite...

LSI Logic. (EEMBC Scores).(End Embedded Microprocessor Benchmarking Consortium )(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... Tested against EEMBCs telecomm benchmarks, the LSI402ZX achieved an out-of-the-box Telemark score of 3.3 using the LSI Logic ZSP SDK 3.2 compiler. Under optimized conditions, the device received an aggregate Telemark score of 40.3.

Motorola. (EEMBC Scores).(End Embedded Microprocessor Benchmarking Consortium )(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... Tested against 46 EEMBC benchmark 'kernels', each representing a different workload and stressing a different processor capability, the MPC7455 was tested and certified across all five application areas targeted by the EEMBC benchmarks.

Platforms ready for VoIP media gateways. (Technology).(Motorola Computer Group)(voice over Internet protocol )
April 1, 2002... The converged or next generation network will have instead of distinct networks for voice, video and data these merged and managed into a single packet-based network. This should mean that a combined network is easier to manage and build. ...

USB On-The-Go gains momentum. (Technology).(universal serial bus )
April 1, 2002... The USB On-The-Go specification allows direct interconnectivity between computer peripherals and mobile devices using the popular USB standard. The specification was released as a supplement to the USB 2.0 specification at the end of last...

Phrase translator helps in Afghanistan. (Technology).
April 1, 2002... Phraselator is a wireless phrase recognition device developed for Voxtec by integrator, Applied Data Systems (ADS) and is being used to help medical and military personnel in Afghanistan. Applied Data Systems integrated the Phraselator,...

Stratix PLDs raise integration levels. (Technology).(programmable logic devices)
April 1, 2002... The Stratix family of programmable logic devices (PLD) have a die size 35% smaller than previous architectures and provides up to 10Mbits of RAM and up to 114,140 logic elements. Altera says its latest generation provides more than a 40%...

FPSCs increase functionality. (Technology).(field programmable systems-on-chip)
April 1, 2002... Peter Trott and Fred Koons of Lattice Semiconductor explain the development of field programmable systems-on-chip and how they provided an inflection point in the programmable logic industry. Programmable logic has now been available to...

ZOTS technology brings GHz performance to Virtex-II FPGA. (Technology).(Zero Overhead Task Switch)
April 1, 2002... Xyron Semiconductor, has released its Edison development board which uses Xilinx VirtexII Platform field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) to showcase Xyrons patented Zero Overhead Task Switch (ZOTS) technology, which places system task...

Evaluation board for eCOG1 controller. (Technology).
April 1, 2002... An evaluation board and free software development tools is available for the Cyan Technology's eCOG1 communications engine. The software tools run on Windows 9x/NT/2000. The eCOG1 evaluation board augments this integrated platform,...

Contactless probes expand possibilities for logic analysis. (Focus: Debug & Test).
April 1, 2002... Tektronix is using silicon germanium in six logic analyser modules and has developed a revolutionary probing system to provide simultaneous analog and digital measurements. When troubleshooting and debugging a digital system, one of the...

High-speed bus architectures bring new challenges. (Focus: Debug & Test).
April 1, 2002... Tektronix has had to re-think the approach to logic analysis and probe design as in digital systems of all kinds, IC components have led the charge toward higher speeds and functionalities. Within their tightly-controlled silicon structures,...

Ashling seeks multi-core co-operation. (Focus: Debug & Test).(Ashling Microsystems)
April 1, 2002... At the Embedded Systems Conference in San Francisco last month, Ashling Microsystems launched a Multi-core Debugging Initiative which it hopes will result in the creation of an industry forum to develop standards for debug of multi-core based...

Tools ease design-in of Philips ARM7-based architecture. (Focus: Debug & Test).
April 1, 2002... Ashling Microsystems is to provide a set of development and debug tools for use with the Philips' recently announced ARM7-based embedded controller architecture, under a new agreement with the company's semiconductors division. It will...

NEXUS-standard debugging for Motorola MPC565 processor. (Focus: Debug & Test).
April 1, 2002... Ashling Microsystems has released a set of development and debug tools, based on the NEXUS interface standard, for Motorola's MPC565 PowerPC embedded processor. The MPC565 device is part of Motorola's MPC500 family, targeted at automobile...

LeCroy extends WaveMaster to 3GHz. (Focus: Debug & Test).
April 1, 2002... Following on from the introduction in January of the WaveMaster Series, LeCroy has added a 3GHz bandwidth model to the series. As Waveshapes are becoming faster and more complex the successful use of an oscilloscope depends on the ability to...

ACE opens CoSy compiler interfaces. (Focus: Debug & Test).(Asscociated Compiler Experts)
April 1, 2002... In keeping with its commitment to provide a complete solution to compiler developers, Amsterdam-based Associated Compiler Experts (ACE) is offering its DWARF extensions for DSP-C debugging to the public free of charge. ACE has been...

Applied Microsystems adds PowerTAP toolset for IBM 440GP. (Focus: Debug & Test).
April 1, 2002... Applied Microsystems' PowerTAP PowerPC-specific developer toolset is to support IBM 440GP microprocessor based systems. PowerTAP for 440GP speeds the critical integration, emulation and test of complex low-level embedded software, and is...

Can arbitrary waveform generators match function generators? Alun Jones, technical director of Tecstar Electronics, examines the design requirements. (Focus: Debug & Test).
April 1, 2002... Arbitrary waveform generators are essentially function generators where the function (waveform) is defined by the user rather than being predefined and fixed. (usually sine, triangle and square waves). Arbitrary generators can produce any...

Using BDM/JTAG emulators for functional diagnosis and test: Charles Swingler of International Test Technologies, explains as consumer devices continue to shrink developers will rely more on BDM/JTAG emulators. (Focus: Debug & Test).
April 1, 2002... Continuing component miniaturization and ever-increasing board densities are good news for consumers. The latest electronic commodities bristle with features, gobble less real estate, operate at mind-numbing speeds and run up smaller bank...

FieldPoint 2000 family continues to grow for intelligent networks. (Focus: Industrial Systems).
April 1, 2002... National Instruments' LabVIEW-based distributed I/O system for measurement and control uses a variety of nodes and the family continues to expand as Colin Holland discovers. The latest modules added to the FieldPoint 2000 range are the...

Solution for Profibus-DP. (Focus: Industrial Systems).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... The ApplicomIO is an industrial communication solution for the Profibus-DP network and is designed for use with control and command automation applications. An interface card and a complete set of software tools completes the ApplicomIO...

Dual processor board is Pentium III based. (Focus: Industrial Systems).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... The CPCI-786 dual-processor CompactPCI board-level embedded computing platform from Force Computers is based on dual low-voltage Intel Pentium III processors. As a PICMG 2.16-compliant system-slot board platform, the CPCI-786 server blade...

Data transfer via Ethernet or Internet. (Focus: Industrial Systems).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... Zendex Corporation has developed the ZXE-x86 embedded controller with as much as 1GB+ of flash, EPROM or RAM which can be accessed via Ethernet or the Internet. The ZXE-x86 can perform real time control of an operation while allowing data to be...

IndustryPack I/O module has FPGA. (Focus: Industrial Systems).(field programmable gate-array)
April 1, 2002... A mezzanine module from Acromag allows users to develop and store their own instruction sets in the Altera EP1K100 FPGA for interfacing to VMEbus, CompactPCI, and PCI computer systems. The IP-1K100 series provides a user-customizable FPGA...

Operator interface/SBC with optional Ethernet. (Focus: Industrial Systems).(Brief Article)
April 1, 2002... Z-Worlds 0P6800 MiniCom is a low-cost, C-programmable operator interface and singleboard computer that gives OEM designers Ethernet connectivity, industrialized I/O, and a graphic LCD/keypad. It measures 112 x 91mm Available in both...

SmartModules expand platform. (Focus: Industrial Systems).
April 1, 2002... Certified Integrator BFAD is enhancing its GETembedded! Platform by the addition of Digital-Logics smartModules. Using the GETembedded! Platform, BFAD develops and manufactures application-oriented products for industrial applications for...

How to choose an in-circuit emulator: Jonathan Hector, Direct Insight's engineering manager for embedded tools, provides a guide of what to look for when choosing an in-circuit emulator. (Emulation).(Buyers Guide)
April 1, 2002... An in-circuit emulator (ICE) is an invaluable tool for software and hardware developers alike: and for anyone about to develop a microcontroller-based embedded system the ability to run and debug code, line byline if need be, is a great bonus....

INTEGRITY RTOS uses the XScale MMU to increase reliability. (System Protection).(real-time operating systems)(memory management unit)
April 1, 2002... John Carbone of Green Hills Software explains how a real-time operating system can use the memory management unit in the XScale processor to provide protection from bugs and hackers. My cell phone can play games, surf My the web, remember...

Build or buy?--standard CPUs for customized embedded computers. (Build or Buy?).
April 1, 2002... Matthias Huber, product manager at JUMPtec Industrielle Computertechnik, examines a way in which off-the-shelf standard products can be better than designing your own. Due to the fact that only a limited number of modular CPU boards have...

Capturing requirements for real-time and embedded systems. (Requirements Capture).(ROPES process, universal markup language used to capture essentials)
April 1, 2002... Requirements are too often co-mingled with design elements. Bruce Powel Douglass of I-Logix explains a way to focus on capturing only the essentials, with UML. Many developers regard requirements capture with a disdain normally reserved...