Retargetable tools for embedded software

Today, the advent of the multi-million transistor chip offers the opportunity to provide more integrated functionalities into a single silicon die. This is both a clear advantage to improve existing products and a hard challenge to cope with. Unfortunately, today´s available design methodologies and tools are not sufficiently advanced to exploit the full potential of such large silicon flexibility. On one hand, the design of complex system-on-chip requires new tools for the analysis and optimization of embedded software, which should extend the standard tool chain consisting of complier, debugger and simulator. On the other hand, the development of such tool chain for a new microprocessor requires a substantial time effort which is no more compatible with actual market dynamics. In STMicroelectronics, we developed a technology which tries to tackle such a double-face problem by adding several retargetability features to a standard tool chain and by providing new tools for code analysis.