| Update on MicroMonitor open source boot firmware |
Jan. 11, 2001
Ed Sutter of Bell Labs has issued a status update on MicroMonitor, an embedded system boot/monitor utility (written by Sutter) which has been released by Bell Labs as open source software. A brief description of MicroMonitor is provided following the update information.
MicroMonitor Status Update
Hello,
I just wanted to let you know that the monitor package located at Lucent's Research Software Distribution Web Site has been updated. Assume that all future versions will be at this location. Aside from the update of the package, retrieval of the package from this new site puts a much less (almost zero!) restrictive license agreement on use of the monitor.
This update includes a few cleanups of code and some files that folks let me know were missing from the previous package. Plus, there are now ports to a few new CPUs. Note that each of the ports have been verified using the specified hardware platform and GNU toolsets. The only portion of the monitor that is not tested much is the debugging stuff (single stepping and breakpoints). For most of the ports, this isn't even included. Following is a list of the ports and some target-specific comments.- Motorola Coldfire 5206 Evaluation board:
This port does not include the ethernet driver.
- IBM PPC405 "Walnut" evaluation platform: I no longer have access to this hardware platform (had to give it back to IBM), so a few of the recent changes made to the common code have not been tested on this platform. Should not matter since nothing has changed in the target-specific stuff.
- Hitachi SH2 evaluation board: No change from the original, except to note that the directory this is in is called "target_dirname" and the 29f040 flash drivers for this platform is called "flash_dirname" in the distributed tar file. This is a result of a goof in my packaging script and will be fixed in the next release.
- PPC860 platform: This is a partial port. I could not include some of the files, but most of the missing stuff should be retrievable from Motorola's website. This is a subset of a working and tested platform, so what is there has been tested.
- PPA68K platform: This is a 68EN302 platform. The hardware this was used on is a discontinued project I was on a few years ago; but, since the bulk of the code is 68EN302-specific, it should be easily ported to other 68EN302 platforms.
Now some miscellaneous comments . . .- First of all, I generate this mailing list based on the folks who have either sent me email or requested to be an SSG Insider. If for any reason, you want your name taken off this list, just let me know.
- Because of its generic nature, I thought this would be an interesting platform for other embedded system folks to hack around with. My intent is that you share with me your thoughts (what's good and what's bad about it) and if enough interest is there, perhaps, you will want to make contributions to improve/expand it.
- The package includes tens of thousands of lines of code. Some written for the embedded platform, some for UNIX and some for WIN32. Much of this distribution could/should have been cleaned up a bit, and if I had decided to do that prior to releasing it for public consumption, the public release would have probably never happened. Bottom line... yup, it could be neater and better organized, and over time, it will evolve if folks are interested. For now, consider it a large block of working source code that forms what I consider to be a very useful embedded system boot platform.
- Please note that supporting this is not my job at Lucent. This is my first attempt at supporting/distributing a package like this outside of Lucent. I welcome and encourage comments and suggestions, but I ask you to realize that the time I spend on this is competing with coaching my son's basketball team, helping him with homework, house repairs, and the occasional movie with my wife!
Enjoy!
Ed
A brief description of MicroMonitor
MicroMonitor a package of source code, descriptive html pages and tools that provide an embedded system developer with a firmware platform that can be used on a wide variety of different architectures. The majority of the code is CPU and platform independent and has been used with a variety of different embedded operating systems.
MicroMonitor provides many of the usual features found on CPU evaluation platforms, but in addition includes a Flash File System (FFS), TFTP client/server, XMODEM, DHCP/BOOTP, and several other valuable features for today's intelligent interconnected embedded devices. In addition, files can be compressed, there's an onboard ascii file editor, and it provides support for automatic power-safe Flash defragmentation.
MicroMonitor is released by Bell Labs as open source software under the terms of the Lucent Public License and is available for public download on Lucent Technologies' Research Software Distribution Web Site.
Related stories:
MicroMonitor -- open source embedded system boot platform
Lucent releases device boot software as open source
RedBoot -- an open source boot/debug environment
The Linux BIOS Project
EtherBoot diskless boot support
PPCBOOT: the Embedded PowerPC Linux Boot Project
(Click here for further information)
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