ARM compiler

On 28 Maj, 16:25, David Brown <da...@westcontrol.removethisbit.com>
wrote:
> On 28/05/13 15:39, Ulf Samuelsson wrote:
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> > On 2013-05-28 05:43, Robert Wessel wrote:
> >> On Mon, 27 May 2013 17:07:31 -0500, "TonyStarkPE"
> >> <95197@embeddedrelated> wrote:
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> >>> I'm trying to recreate a simple ARM compatible processor in a
> >>> FPGA. I did one similar to the 68HC11 in my Digital Design course
> >>> in school. But when we did the assembly language we had to hand
> >>> assemble it as well and change the instructions to machine code
> >>> ex. LDAA --> 0x43 (not a real opcode) Then we made all our
> >>> instructions and data in hex into a file that represented a
> >>> memory with Altera's Quartus II.
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> >>> What I need is to skip the hand assembly if possible and better
> >>> yet be able to write in C. Compiling down to an ARM instruction
> >>> set. Are there any free tools that can help me with this? As I
> >>> just want to concentrate on creating the ARM processor and
> >>> writing simple bare metal software.
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> >> There's lots of FOSS support for ARM. &#4294967295;Not least, as Przemek
> >> Klosowski mentioned 13 times, a GCC port (plus all the related
> >> stuff, like GAS). There are also a number of Linux ports, as well
> >> as other OSs. &#4294967295;There are also many non-free tools.
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> >> I'm not sure what your motivations are, but there are a number of
> >> FOSS ARM cores out there, including several projects on
> >> opencores.org. While not all of those are complete, several are
> >> under active development, and would probably welcome additional
> >> developers.
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> >> But one comment: ARM has been fairly protective of their IP, I'd
> >> do some research on the legal issues if you wanted to use your own
> >> ARM implementation commercially.
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> > The ARM7DI datasheet was released in 1994. IIRC Patents are valid for
> > 20 years, so then it is not too far away.
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> > BR Ulf Samuelsson
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> I can't imagine that patents are the main issue here - I would expect
> most of ARM's patents to cover the implementation rather than the ISA.
> But they will have copyrights on the instruction set, and they will have
> trademarks on ARM and many related terms that make it difficult to talk
> about "ARM compatible cpu" without their permission.
>
> Patents run out, unless they are extended by devious means, copyrights
> last forever (due to USA's Mikey Mouse laws), and trademarks last as
> long as the owner defends them.
>
> I can only guess what ARM's attitude to these sorts of soft cpus is -
> since such cores exist on opencores.org, I assume they tolerate them for
> learning or academic exercises, but I'd imagine anything commercial
> would provoke a reaction.

for learning or academic exercises probably ok for commercial use
almost certainly not and it doesn't really matter if they are right or
wrong, they
have an almost infinite supply of money and lawyers to protect their
golden egg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lexra

-Lasse

Mel Wilson <mwilson@the-wire.com> writes:

> There's an abbreviated write-up at 
> <http://fsoss.senecac.on.ca/2012/node/150>, but since the speaker is 
> releasing his hardware design for others to use, there must be a real write-
> up somewhere else.

I didn't find a better writeup or the presentation, but the project's on
GitHub, https://github.com/atgreen/moxiedev

Links to a blog and wiki are there too.

On 2013-05-28, Theo Markettos <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> wrote:
>
> Then you get all the frontends for free (want
> to run Ada on your microcontroller? No problem!).
>

Just a little digression on your Ada comment in case anyone wants to play
with Ada on microcontrollers.

To run full blown Ada on a target requires adding support for the target
to the Ada runtime as full Ada functionality requires a runtime to support
it, so just altering the compiler itself isn't enough.

However, gcc Ada also has a zero runtime footprint mode which can make it
easier to get a subset of Ada functionality running on a new target. The
gcc Ada port for the AVR at http://sourceforge.net/p/avr-ada/wiki/Home/
uses this option. Comments on the AVR runtime support are here:

http://sourceforge.net/p/avr-ada/wiki/InstallRunTimeSystem/

BTW, if you want more general Ada support on microcontrollers, the RTEMS
RTOS has support for writing programs in Ada.

Simon.

-- 
Simon Clubley, clubley@remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP
Microsoft: Bringing you 1980s technology to a 21st century world