Packages, Tools and Resources

Important

This documentation is not recommended for new RISC-V projects. New RISC-V projects should reference the newest version of the documentation. Users targeting Arm devices can still use this documentation as their reference.

The newest version of the documentation can be found here: https://mi-v-ecosystem.github.io/SoftConsole-Documentation/

Related Tools and Resources

Libero SoC/Firmware Catalog

Use Libero SoC v2021.3 or later to create hardware designs and to export firmware drivers and example projects. The Firmware Catalog v2021.3 can be used to generate firmware drivers and example projects for use in SoftConsole v2021.3.

Firmware drivers

Hardware Abstraction Layers

The following firmware cores (or later versions if available) must be used and can be generated from Libero SoC or from the Firmware Catalog.

• PolarFire SoC MPFS_HAL 1.5.107

• RISC-V Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) 3.0.105

Warning

If earlier versions of these firmware cores are used then there will be problems compiling, linking, running and/or debugging the software.

Peripheral firmware drivers

Use Libero SoC or the Firmware Catalog to generate the latest available peripheral drivers for the target system.

Matching firmware to the target hardware

The firmware used in a SoftConsole project must match the target hardware. For SmartFusion and SmartFusion2 projects Libero SoC generates specific firmware files that must be used for the SoftConsole project to match and be compatible with the target hardware.

The most convenient way to avoid mismatch problems is to ensure that Libero SoC is configured to use the appropriate firmware repositories and the Libero project is configured to use the latest versions of all firmware drivers (including CMSIS/HAL). Then export the firmware from Libero and import/copy the generated files into the SoftConsole project.

In some cases, the firmware project will define target specific details such as clock speeds, UART baud divisors etc. that must match the target hardware for proper functionality.

Refer to the Libero SoC and Firmware Catalog documentation for more information about the firmware flows supported by these tools.

Warning

• Before importing/copying Libero SoC or Firmware Catalog generated firmware files into a SoftConsole project it is advisable to manually delete all CMSIS, hal, drivers, riscv_hal, pse_hal and drivers_config folders from the SoftConsole project leaving only the project specific custom source files.

• For SmartFusion and SmartFusion2 projects the drivers_config folder must be generated/exported from Libero SoC and copied/imported into the SoftConsole project every time that the Libero project is modified to ensure that the SoftConsole project matches the target hardware.

• SoftConsole v3.4 workspaces or projects generated by Libero SoC or the Firmware Catalog are not compatible with SoftConsole v5.1 or later and should not be used.

• SoftConsole v5.1 RISC-V projects are not compatible with SoftConsole v5.2 or later and must be recreated using the same source files and equivalent project settings for use in SoftConsole v5.2 or later.

FlashPro JTAG programmer

SoftConsole includes OpenOCD which uses a FlashPro JTAG programmer for debug access to the target platform/CPU.

The table below summarizes SoftConsole’s support for FlashPro variants, OSs and target devices.

	Standalone FlashPro6	Embedded FlashPro6 Rev B	Embedded FlashPro6 Rev A	Standalone & Embedded FlashPro5	Standalone & Embedded FlashPro4	Standalone & Embedded FlashPro3/LCPS
Windows	Yes	Yes		Yes	Yes	Yes
Linux	Yes	Yes		Yes
Virtual Machine
Docker on Linux	Yes	Yes		Yes
Debug PolarFire SoC MSS Core Complex	Yes	Yes		Yes	Yes	Yes
PolarFire SoC UltraSoC trace/debug
Debug Mi-V RV32 RISCV soft core via CoreJTAGDebug/UJTAG				Yes	Yes	Yes
Debug Mi-V RV32 RISCV soft core via JTAG signals on I/O pins	Yes			Yes	Yes	Yes
Debug Cortex-M1 soft core via CoreJTAGDebug/UJTAG				Yes	Yes	Yes
Debug Cortex-M1 soft core via JTAG signals on I/O pins	Yes			Yes	Yes	Yes

Note

Refer to the Libero SoC v2021.3 or Program Debug Tools v2021.3 (or later) release notes for details of how to upgrade the Embedded FlashPro6 from Rev A to Rev B.

Note

Empty cells mean there is no support.

On Windows the FlashPro3/4/5/6 programmers are supported, and the relevant drivers must be installed.

On Linux, the FlashPro5/6 programmers are supported and the post-install configuration steps must be carried out to allow access to the programmer by non-root users (see Post Installation Steps section).

Microchip GitHub repositories

• Mi-V Ecosystem

• PolarFire SoC

  • PolarFire SoC Embedded Software Collection of various repositories:

    • Bare Metal drivers and SoftConsole examples

    • Hart Software Services

    • Documentation

    • Linux repositories (buildroot and Yocto)

    • Icicle’s Libero reference design

• Softcore RISC-V resources:

  • RISCV on Microsemi FPGA legacy Microsemi Mi-V ecosystem resource.

Note

The bundled examples with SoftConsole v2021.3 are tested and are working with SoftConsole v2021.3 correctly, therefore are recommended as the primary reference before importing other projects.

Important

Import examples from the Bare Metal drivers and SoftConsole examples GitHub to get most up to date examples and HAL.

Other resources

Other useful Documentation:

• RISC-V specifications

• Renode’s documentation

• Mi-V Renode webinar series

• Erich Styger’s “MCU on Eclipse” blog. Useful tips and tricks for using Eclipse/CDT, GNU ARM Eclipse, GNU Tools for ARM Embedded Processors, OpenOCD etc. The Compendium page is a good place to find posts/articles relevant to Eclipse, OpenOCD etc.

• The websites and documentation links for the various open-source components used in SoftConsole are also useful references (these are listed in the section below).

Used packages

SoftConsole v2021.3 uses several, mostly free and/or open source, packages. Microchip acknowledges and thanks those organization, communities and individual developers who work on these projects and make them available to others for reuse under the relevant license conditions.

Eclipse and additional packages

Java

Eclipse/CDT

GNU MCU Eclipse Plugins

OpenOCD

Version:

OpenJDK 13.0.1

Home page:

https://openjdk.java.net/

Documentation:

https://openjdk.java.net/faq/

License:

GPL v2 with the Classpath Exception https://openjdk.java.net/legal/

Notes:

OpenJDK provides the base Java platform on which Eclipse/CDT and other Eclipse plugins run.

Credit/thanks to Oracle and the OpenJDK open source development community.

Version:

Eclipse 4.15 2020-03 (SimRel) + CDT 9.11

Home page:

https://www.eclipse.org/downloads/packages/release/2020-03/r

https://projects.eclipse.org/projects/tools.cdt/releases/9.11.0

Documentation:

https://help.eclipse.org/2020-03/index.jsp

License:

License Eclipse Public License v2.0

https://www.eclipse.org/legal/epl-2.0/

Notes:

Eclipse/CDT - in conjunction with the GNU MCU Eclipse plugins - provide the main SoftConsole GUI/IDE (Graphical User Interface/Integrated Development Environment). The Windows Eclipse/CDT starter.exe has been modified by Microchip to allow for graceful termination of OpenOCD or other external executables launched from Eclipse. SoftConsole builds from the Eclipse Platform Runtime Binary (PRB) package and only adds those plugins that are absolutely necessary for Microchip target development/debug to avoid unnecessary bloat. Users can still install any additional plugins that they see fit. Credit/thanks to the Eclipse/CDT developer community

Version:

v4.7.1-201911052135

https://gnu-mcu-eclipse.github.io/blog/2019/11/06/plugins-v4.7.1-201911052135-released/

Home page:

https://gnu-mcu-eclipse.github.io/

Documentation:

https://gnu-mcu-eclipse.github.io/

License:

Eclipse Public License v1.0

https://gnu-mcu-eclipse.github.io/licenses/plug-ins/#eclipse-public-license

The copyright owner for all the GNU MCU Eclipse plug-ins is Liviu Ionescu and all rights are reserved.

Notes:

Only the following GNU MCU Eclipse plugins are used:

GNU MCU C/C++ RISC-V Cross Compiler: provides specific support for RISCV targets by way of custom project properties pages and integration with the back end RISC-V GNU Toolchain.

GNU MCU C/C++ OpenOCD Debugging: provides specific support for debugging Arm and RISC-V targets using OpenOCD from within the Eclipse environment.

Credit/thanks to Liviu Ionescu and the GNU MCU Eclipse project and development community

Version:

v0.10.0+dev based on the SiFive fork of OpenOCD with additional SoftConsole mods

Home page:

http://openocd.org/

Documentation:

http://openocd.org/documentation/

License:

License GNU General Public License v2

https://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.en.html

Notes:

OpenOCD sits between GDB and the target hardware (JTAG debug probe, target board and CPU) to allow for program download and debug using real hardware. When debugging Eclipse launches GDB and then uses GDB’s GDB/MI (Machine Interface) to communicate with the debugger. Meanwhile GDB communicates with OpenOCD using OpenOCD’s Remote Serial Protocol interface. GDB debug operations are translated into JTAG operations by OpenOCD which communicates with the target hardware/CPU using JTAG via the relevant JTAG debug probe. OpenOCD also has knowledge of specific CPU target debug frameworks (e.g. Arm CoreSight, RISC-V Debug Modules v0.11 and v0.13 – https://github.com/riscv/riscv-debug-spec) so that it can communicate with and debug supported RISC-V CPUs.

SoftConsole’s version of OpenOCD is built using slightly modified versions of the xPack OpenOCD (https://xpack.github.io/openocd/) build scripts.

Credit/thanks to the OpenOCD development community, SiFive and Liviu Ionescu and the xPack and GNU MCU Eclipse projects and development communities.

Complementary tools for building projects

GNU MCU Eclipse Build Tools

Python

Version:

v2.12-20190422

https://gnu-mcu-eclipse.github.io/windows-build-tools/releases/

Home page:

https://gnu-mcu-eclipse.github.io/windows-build-tools/

Documentation:

https://gnu-mcu-eclipse.github.io/windows-build-tools/

License:

https://gnu-mcu-eclipse.github.io/licenses/tools/

make:

GNU General Public License v3

http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html

BusyBox:

GNU General Public License v2

https://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.en.html

Notes:

Provides common Unix style utilities such as cp, echo, make etc. for Windows and busybox for Windows and Linux.

Credit/thanks to Liviu Ionescu and the GNU MCU Eclipse project and development community

Version:

v3.8.2

Home page:

https://www.python.org/

Documentation:

https://docs.python.org/3/

License:

License Python Software Foundation License

https://docs.python.org/3/license.html

Notes:

The shipped version is built statically, therefore is limited what libraries it can import and can’t be used with pip.

Also note there might be slight differences between Windows and Linux python therefore the scripts should be tested on both platforms to make sure they work correctly.

Credit/thanks to the Python development community.

Toolchains

GNU RISC-V Embedded GCC Toolchain

GNU Arm Embedded GCC Toolchain

Version:

xPack GNU RISC-V Embedded GCC toolchain v8.3.0-1.1 build with additional multilibs

Home Page:

https://xpack.github.io/riscv-none-embed-gcc/

Documentation:

https://xpack.github.io/riscv-none-embed-gcc/

License:

https://github.com/riscv/riscv-gnu-toolchain/blob/master/LICENSE

https://gnu-mcu-eclipse.github.io/licenses/plug-ins/#eclipse-public-license

The copyright owner for all the GNU MCU Eclipse plug-ins is Liviu Ionescu and all rights are reserved.

Notes:

The riscv64-unknown-elf prefixed tools support 32-bit and 64-bit targets and multilibs for all architectures (“native” ABI only) excluding any E architectures. Slightly modified versions of the xPack GNU RISC-V Embedded GCC build scripts (https://xpack.github.io/riscv-none-embed-gcc/) are used to build the SoftConsole GNU RISC-V Embedded GCC Toolchain. Multilibs are provided for the following RISC-V arch (architecture) and ABI tuples:

Supported Architecture / ABI combinations:

This is a full list of supported multilibs. Arch/ABI tuples not listed (such as RV32E) are not supported.

march	mabi
rv32i	ilp32
rv32ia	ilp32
rv32iac	ilp32
rv32iaf	ilp32f
rv32iafc	ilp32f
rv32ic	ilp32
rv32if	ilp32f
rv32ifc	ilp32f
rv32im	ilp32
rv32ima	ilp32
rv32imac	ilp32
rv32imaf	ilp32f
rv32imafc	ilp32f
rv32imc	ilp32
rv32imf	ilp32f
rv32imfc	ilp32f
rv64i	lp64
rv64ia	lp64
rv64iac	lp64
rv64iaf	lp64f
rv64iafc	lp64f
rv64iafd	lp64d
rv64iafdc	lp64d
rv64ic	lp64
rv64if	lp64f
rv64ifc	lp64f
rv64ifd	lp64d
rv64ifdc	lp64d
rv64im	lp64
rv64ima	lp64
rv64imac	lp64
rv64imaf	lp64f
rv64imafc	lp64f
rv64imafd	lp64d
rv64imafdc	lp64d
rv64imc	lp64
rv64imf	lp64f
rv64imfc	lp64f
rv64imfd	lp64d
rv64imfdc	lp64d

Note

This suite of multilibs supports the “natural” ABI for each architecture. If an RV64G (rv64imafd or more specifically rv64imafdZicsr_Zifencei) architecture is chosen, but not the natural ABI lp64f (natural would be in this case lp64d), then the resulting multilib is not supported. However, choosing the rv64imaf with its natural ABI lp64f will work. Instead of selecting architecture and then ABI a reversed approach might be better. Select an ABI to fulfil application’s requirements and then the select the minimal architecture that can handle that given ABI.

The “default/native” mode of the tools is RV64GC in the absence of any -march/-mabi flags being passed to the tools. Credit/thanks to the RISC-V development community and Liviu Ionescu and the xPack and GNU MCU Eclipse projects and development communities.

Version:

xPack GNU Arm Embedded GCC toolchain v10.3.1-2.1 build based on GNU

Arm Embedded Toolchain 10.3-2021.10

Home Page:

https://xpack.github.io/arm-none-eabi-gcc/

Documentation:

https://developer.arm.com/open-source/gnu-toolchain/gnu-rm

License:

https://launchpad.net/gcc-arm-embedded/5.0/5-2016-q3-update/+download/license.txt

Notes:

Provides GCC, GDB, binutils, newlib (including newlib-nano) etc. development/debug tools for Arm targets (in particular Cortex-M targets).

Details of the specific versions of the individual tools in each release package can be found on the Arm Developer website.

SoftConsole bundles the xPack GNU Arm Embedded GCC build of the GNU Arm Embedded Toolchain because it offers more cross platform (especially Linux) portability than the Arm build of the same tools and also Windows 64-bit builds (Arm currently provide only 32-bit builds for Windows).

Credit/thanks to Arm and the GNU Arm Embedded Toolchain development community and Liviu Ionescu and the xPack and GNU MCU Eclipse projects and development communities.

Previous SoftConsole releases could be run in a headless mode on old unsupported OSs such as RHEL 6.x. However, from SoftConsole 2021.3 the Arm toolchain will need GLIBC_2.14 or higher and will not run on old OSs.

Emulation and trace

Antmicro Renode

UltraSoC UltraDevelop

Version:

v1.11.0.8104 (fc14a2fe-202102120426)

Home page:

https://github.com/renode

https://renode.io/

Documentation:

https://renode.readthedocs.io/en/latest/

License:

License MIT License:

https://github.com/renode/renode/blob/master/LICENSE

Notes:

Notes Renode can emulate physical hardware systems - including the CPU, peripherals, sensors, environment, and wireless medium between nodes.

Credit/thanks to Antmicro and the Renode development community.

Warning

UltraSoC and UltraDevelop components are not supported in SoftConsole v2021.3 and later.

Static code analysis

Cppcheck

Cppcheclipse

Version:

v1.83

Home page:

http://cppcheck.sourceforge.net/

Documentation:

https://sourceforge.net/p/cppcheck/wiki/Home/

License:

License GNU Public License v3

http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html

Notes:

Cppcheck is a static analysis tool for C/C++ code. It detects the types of bugs that the compilers normally fail to detect. The goal is no false positives.

Credit/thanks to Daniel Marjamäki and the cppcheck development community.

Version:

v1.1.1-20180105 – build based from commit 7bae5b2

Home page:

https://github.com/kwin/cppcheclipse

Documentation:

https://github.com/kwin/cppcheclipse/wiki

License:

License Apache 2.0 https://github.com/kwin/cppcheclipse/blob/master/LICENSE

Notes:

Cppcheclipse is an Eclipse plugin which integrates cppcheck with a CDT project.

Cppcheclipse can run/configure cppcheck from the Eclipse UI.

Credit/thanks to the Cppcheck development community.

Deployment

VMware InstallBuilder

Version:

v20.12.0

Home page:

https://installbuilder.com/

Documentation:

https://clients.bitrock.com/installbuilder/docs/installbuilder-userguide/index.html

License:

Commercial: https://installbuilder.com/purchase.html

VMware/BitRock have kindly provided an open source license

https://support.bitrock.com/hc/en-us/community/posts/115002024525 allowing

InstallBuilder to be used to create the SoftConsole installers for Windows and Linux.

Notes:

Credit/thanks to VMware (formerly BitRock).