Useful design patterns for building embedded multicore systems

By Anderson MacKay, Green Hills Software
February 26, 2008 -- dspdesignline.com

Consolidation is a long-standing trend within the embedded world. It enables more capable, higher-performance embedded devices using fewer components, at lower cost and power budgets.

The latest round of this trend is the proliferation of multicore embedded microprocessors, offering multiple processor cores in a single package " with lower power consumption and cost than an equivalent single-core processor.

Taking advantage of multiple processor cores will require more system-level design cooperation between software and hardware teams. In that spirit, here are high-level overviews of three simple models for multicore systems which are straightforward to implement with today's tools and hardware.

These multicore design patterns are not intended to be rigid models for exactly specifying a system. Rather, they are starting points for thinking and talking about the high-level picture of what your system does, and provide a common terminology so that hardware and software teams can hash out a multicore system structure.

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