Android hardware-software design using virtual prototypes - Part 2: Building a sensor subsystem

Achim Nohl, Synopsys
Embedded.com, November 7, 2012

Editor’s Note: In the second of a three-part series of articles on virtual prototyping, Achim Nohl explains how to use the Synopsys Virtualizer Development Kit (VDK) and describes the hardware/software integration flow for a sensor subsystem for use in an Android mobile device. For the remainder of this series, we will illustrate virtual prototyping usage and early software development by means of a brief case study. The case study is centered on a multi-function sensor controller subsystem which supports an accelerometer, magnetic field, orientation, gyroscope, light, pressure, temperature, and proximity.

The subsystem embeds an ARM Cortex- M3 microcontroller along with generic peripherals such as an interrupt controller, memories, GPIOs, and I2C. The sensor subsystem runs dedicated firmware to proxy the requested sensor data into a shared memory mailbox for communication with the main CPU. The main CPU, an ARM Cortex-A series CPU, runs Linux and Android.

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