[Updated Mar. 13, 2002] San Francisco; Embedded Systems Conference –(press release excerpt) — Microtronix announced today that they will support the creation of customized embedded Linux kernels in the Altera SOPC Builder automated system development tool. Customers will be able to combine the Nios soft-core processor development flow with embedded Linux development, providing great flexibility… and speed to the design process.

Microtronix also introduced a board support package (BSP) for the Altera ARM-based Excalibur development kit, targeted at developers of high performance, multi-processor systems. This new BSP dramatically simplifies the development of multi-processor based systems that combine the ARM-based Excalibur hard-core stripe with one or more Nios soft-core embedded processors in the programmable logic portion of the device.

“Up to this point, when building a custom Nios processor core, a developer would have to tailor their operating system kernel to the custom processor and peripheral support, which could be quite time consuming,” said Mike Esch, Manager of Software Engineering at Microtronix. “Now with the integration of Linux into the SOPC Builder development tool, a developer can choose to make the Linux kernel generation process part of the SOPC development procedure, and a completely customized Linux kernel is ready for download to the development board.”

The Linux kernel building software module will be available free of charge to all customers of Altera and Microtronix who have purchased the Nios Linux Development Kit (NLDK), also available from Microtronix. The NLDK includes a full port of Linux to the Nios processor, a C-Library, three hardware modules, and over seventy ported applications. It is available for $2495 through Microtronix directly, or any Altera sales representative.

The board support package includes a multi-processing mezzanine board with multiple expansion headers to support Ethernet and display adapter cards. The included reference design provides processor trace dumps on an external monitor using the Ethernet adapter. The design includes two Nios soft core processor controlling the peripheral devices, while the ARM922T processor provides control and output functions. Communication between processors is facilitated using the large dual port RAM on the hard-core stripe of the ARM-based Excalibur device.

In keeping with the Microtronix dedication to embedded Linux, this will also be the first demonstration of embedded Linux running on the Excalibur EPXA10 Development Board. The board support package, which includes the multiprocessing board, will be available in May 2002.

 
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