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Avocet Systems, Inc. : The Complete Solution for Embedded Systems
Development Tools
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Embedded Update
Why Windows?
A recent EDN survey of development environments showed a tremendous drop in
sales of workstation compilers and assemblers. The president of one compiler
vendor was quoted as saying their workstation product sales fell 70% in one
year while sales of PC-based products rose by a similar amount.
The article concluded that two factors are driving this:
486-class processors that rival workstations now can be had for $2000 or so.
Windows has brought the same level of sophisticated memory management and GUI
presentation to the PC that workstation users have long been used to.
It's clear that Windows is the development environment of the future. Consider
the following:
In the embedded world, all of the emulators and source debuggers for the newest
processors are available only under Windows (examples: 68HC16 and 683xx support
from Intermetrics, Nohau, Microtek, and others is Windows-only).
Borland's and Microsoft's new compilers are all Windows based. All of Microsoft's
documentation is Windows hosted now through CD-ROM kits.
DOS cannot run on multiple platforms. Windows NT already does. If your PC in
1996 is based on the PowerPC, the tools will still run.
Technically, Windows offers several features that DOS-based products have only
clunky or no solutions to:
Memory - Windows gives the source level debugger access to essentially an infinite
amount of RAM. You have no symbol table limits, nor limitations on the amount
of source information that can be loaded.
Data Exchange - Windows supports an unprecedented level of data exchange between
applications. The better of today's debuggers can communicate with applications
written in any Microsoft language - even Visual Basic. You can, for example,
write trivial Basic or C code to drive the emulator, requesting data, registers,
and the like. You might set up reliability tests that make complex decisions
and log the results to files (like, "at a breakpoint, if the sum of an
array is zero and the temperature input exceeds 70 log the machine's context
to disk").
Help files - the graphics interface makes on-line help more accessible and more
useful than ever before. For example, graphics, pictures of screens and diagrams
are all available to help you stay productive. Many of these devices just are
not possible in DOS help files.
All of Microsoft's efforts are directed at Windows-API improvements. For example,
Windows applications can automatically add a Network button to all File menus
when running on a compatible network (like Windows for Workgroups). These features
come for "free" - there is not a single line of code in the application
to add the button - it's part of the API! Other features becoming important
are OBDC for standardized interface to databases, and OLE 2.0. DOS will never
support a 32 bit environment! DOS cripples your PC, running it like a decade-old
286. Windows 95 supports 32 bit applications.
Though DOS debuggers are mature, they clearly are a technology dead-end. Why
buy tools that will soon be obsolete? When buying new tools, consider their
probable lifetime before becoming obsolete.
Now that Windows 95 has actually hit the market, lets hear what you think of
it. Send your comments, compliments, and complaints about the new Windows to
doug@softaid.net. I cannot do anything to fix the complaints (sorry about that),
but I am curious to know what people think of it.
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