Embedded Systems Software Design

• Reviewing the basics of Vitis tool use
• Customizing board support packages (BSPs) for resource access and management of the Xilinx Standalone library
• Utilizing device drivers effectively
• Developing software applications for the Arm® Cortex™-A9 processors
• Debugging and integrating user applications
• Employing best practices to enable good design decisions

Who Should Attend?

Prerequisites

• C or C++ programming experience, including general debugging techniques
• Conceptual understanding of embedded processing systems including device drivers, interrupt routines, writing / modifying scripts, user applications, and boot loader operation.

Skills gained

• Implement an effective software design environment for a Xilinx embedded system using the Xilinx software development tools
• Write a basic user application (under Standalone or Linux) using the Vitis unified software platform and run it on an embedded system
• Use Xilinx debugger tools to troubleshoot user applications
• Apply software techniques to improve operability
• Maintain and update software projects with changing hardware

Course Outline

• Overview of Embedded Software Development - Overview of the process for building a user application. {Lecture}
• Embedded UltraFast Design Methodology - Outlines the different elements that comprise the Embedded Design Methodology. {Lecture, Demo}
• Zynq-7000 SoC Architecture Overview - Overview of the Zynq-7000 SoC architecture. {Lecture, Lab, Demo}
• Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC Architecture Overview - Overview of the Zynq UltraScale+™ MPSoC architecture {Lecture, Lab, Demo}
• Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC Software Environments - Describes the software development environments for Zynq UltraScale+™ MPSoCs. {Lecture}
• Driving the Vitis Software Development Tool - Introduces the basic behaviors required to drive the Vitis tool to generate a debuggable C/C++ application. {Lecture, Demo, Lab}
• System Debugger - Describes the basics of actually running a debugger and illustrates the most commonly used debugging commands. {Lecture, Lab}
• Standalone Software Platform Development and Coding Support - Covers the various software components, or layers, supplied by Xilinx that aid in the creation of low-level software and includes a discussion on drivers, domains, operating systems, and libraries. Also covers the basic services (libraries) available when coding in the Standalone environment. {Lecture, Lab, Demo}
• FAT File System for Standalone - Introduces the FAT file system (FFS) from the Standalone/Bare-metal library. The FFS provides drivers and utilities for effectively converting a region of memory into a file system {Lecture, Lab}
• Using Linker Scripts - Overview of the purpose and typical use of a linker script. {Lecture, Lab}
• Migrating from SDK to the Vitis Platform - Overview of migrating existing Xilinx SDK projects to Vitis software development projects. {Lecture, Demo}
• Introduction to Interrupts - Introduces the concept of interrupts, basic terminology, and generic implementation. {Lecture}
• Software Interrupts: Writing - Describes many of the considerations that a software coder must take into account when supporting interrupts. {Lecture, Lab}
• Operating Systems: Introduction and Concepts - Introduces the concept of the operating system and provides a simplified view into the generic way that operating systems work. {Lecture}
• Linux: A High-Level Introduction - Introduces the Linux operating system, a brief history, and how to use it. {Lecture}
• Linux Software Application Development Overview - Highlights important parts of the underlying Linux system as it pertains to applications. {Lecture, Demo, Lab}
• Driving the PetaLinux Tool - Introduces the basic concepts required to build an application using the PetaLinux tool. {Lab}
• Building a Linux Application in the Vitis IDE - Provides an introduction to using the Xilinx Vitis IDE tool for Linux software development. {Lecture, Demo}
• Booting Overview - Describes the main points to how booting a processor is handled for Zynq SoC devices and MicroBlaze processors. {Lecture, Lab}
• Software Profiling Overview - Introduces the purpose and techniques for profiling a user application {Lecture, Lab, Demo}
• Understanding Device Drivers - Explains the concept of a device driver and how it is used by embedded systems. {Lecture, Demo}
• Custom Device Drivers - Describes how to successfully write a custom device driver. {Lecture, Lab}