Virtual platform technology comes to Linux

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Apr. 18, 2005

Virtio is now shipping a version of its chip and circuit board simulation technology that supports Linux. The Virtio Virtual Platform is intended to allow embedded software teams to begin exercising code prior to availability of custom microprocessors, SoCs (system-on-chips), and/or single-board computers, the company says.

Virtio's Virtual Platform technology

Virtio says its Virtual Platform technology provides a complete behavioral model of processor cores, memory, and peripherals, replicating the full functionality of development boards and SoC designs. Virtual Platforms can connect to real-world peripherals such as camera interfaces and LCDs, can execute targeted binaries or operating systems, and can work with compatible debuggers, such as Metrowerks CodeWarrior or ARM RealView, Virtio says.

Additionally, Virtio says its Virtual Platforms technology provides benefits after hardware becomes available, since it avails developers of access to internal registers that cannot be reached in hardware implementations.

Supported platforms include the the MIPS Malta wireless access point design, the Freescale Dragonball i.MX1/i.MXL development board for smartphones and wireless handhelds, and the Texas Instruments (TI) OMAP2420 system-on-chip (SoC) development platform for 3G mobile phones, as well as ARM's Integrator/AP board, Intel's DBPXA250 XScale and Wireless MMX development board, LSI Logic's ARM926EJ-S Processor System, and TI's Innovator kit for the OMAP1510.

Linux support

Virtio says that in order to support Linux users, it replaced the use of Microsoft ATL and ActiveX with Trolltech's Qt, a C++ development framework that enables binaries for multiple operating systems to be compiled from the same source tree. In the future, the company plans to release new platforms for both Windows and Linux "as customer demands dictates," it says. "The models themselves are OS-independent," explains CTO Filip Thoen, "So once we develop a platform, it will run under both OSes."

Virtio says that by adding Linux support, it has "opened the door" to closer integration between hardware and software development efforts, because hardware design tools typically run under Linux. Thoen explains, "Integration issues are driving the synchronization of hardware and software development down to the RTL level, but typically EDA tools run under the Linux OS. This introduction marks the first time that functional models are available to the Linux community, allowing software and hardware developers to collaborate and use the same workstations."

Availability

Virtual Platform technology is available now for Linux hosting, priced at $3,990 for a single-user license.

Virtual platform tools supporting Linux, Solaris, and Windows are also available from DoubleWide Software, which partnered with Linux provider MontaVista on Linux support. However, DoubleWide's designer configuration tool supported only Windows users, as of a year ago.

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