Toshiba announces availability of free and low-cost development tools for ARM microcontroller families

Atollic TrueSTUDIO® development environment options reduce cost and speed implementation of embedded systems based on Toshiba ARM926EJ-S™ and ARM Cortex™-M3 families

Düsseldorf, Germany -- September 14, 2009 – Toshiba Electronics Europe (TEE) has announced that the TrueSTUDIO® development environment from Swedish embedded systems specialist Atollic (www.atollic.com) is now available for the company’s range of ARM926EJ-S™ and ARM Cortex™-M3 microcontrollers. Two versions of the environment can be supplied: Atollic TrueSTUDIO Lite, which, while completely free-of-charge, delivers high levels of functionality; and the low-cost Atollic TrueSTUDIO Professional, which provides further development capabilities. Both are available for download from www.atollic.com.

TrueSTUDIO is based on the commonly used ECLIPSE™ IDE framework and is mainly intended for embedded systems developers using the C/C++ and assembler languages, True STUDIO also introduces UML for graphical modelling. A state-of-the-art C/C++ editor plus advanced assembler and makefile editors all offer colour-coded syntax and other features such as expand/collapse of code blocks to speed application development. In addition, a GNU C/C++ compiler and debugger allows engineers to start developing their software on a PC platform in advance of target availability.

Through TrueSTUDIO it is possible to build embedded systems based on Toshiba’s ARM9 products, such as the TMPA910CRBXBG, TMPA911CRXBG, TMPA912CMXBG, TMPA913CHXBG and TMPA900CRXBG - which offer varying levels of HMI-related functionality - and the new Toshiba Cortex M3 family members. Using the tools, developers can manage a large number of key development tasks including compiling and assembling source code and linking object files and runtime libraries.

TrueSTUDIO features an easy-to-use project wizard feature as well as an intuitive project explorer that can be used to manage the project and all of its properties. The wizard gathers target-specific information such as which EVB-board or Toshiba microcontroller derivative to use, and other basic settings. The development environment also contains a powerful debugger. It can debug software running on a target system using JTAG dongles or in a CPU simulator on the engineer’s PC. The debugger contains standard execution control features including ‘run’, ‘run-to-cursor’, ‘single-step’, ‘step-in’, and ‘step-out’.

Developers choosing the Atollic development tools also have access to functions designed to facilitate better team cooperation, work structure and development methodologies. A version control facility keeps track of each user’s source code, ensuring that previous versions of all files can be recreated later on; and changes can be traced. It keeps a record of what changes have been made, when these occurred, who made them and for what reason. It allows developers to check-in and check-out files, branch/merge them, browse the server repository, and view file histories.

TrueSTUDIO also offers a context-aware task management system that keeps track of bugs, to-do items and other issues. If work on a task is paused until some other time – which may be weeks later – TrueSTUDIO automatically reloads the task context (i.e. open files and their cursor positions) that was active the last time.

About Toshiba

Toshiba Electronics Europe (TEE) is the European Headquarters for the electronic components business of Toshiba Corporation, which is the world's fourth largest semiconductor vendor according to estimates by Dataquest.

Providing design, manufacturing, marketing and sales, TEE was formed in 1973 in Neuss, Germany. The company now has headquarters in Düsseldorf, Germany and subsidiaries in France, Italy, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Company president is Mr. Hitoshi Otsuka and the total number of personnel in Europe is around 400.

Toshiba Electronics Europe offers one of the industry's broadest IC and discrete product lines including high-end memory, microcontrollers, ASICs, ASSPs and display products for automotive, multimedia, consumer, telecoms and networking applications. The company also has a wide range of power semiconductor solutions. Toshiba Corporation is a leader in information and communications systems, electronic components, consumer products and power systems. The company’s integration of these wide-ranging capabilities assures its position as an innovator in advanced components, products and systems. Toshiba operates a global network of more than 740 companies, with 198,000 employees worldwide and annual sales surpassing US$76 billion. For more company information visit Toshiba's web site at www.toshiba-components.com

About Atollic

Atollic is a privately held software design specialist providing software development tools and consulting services to embedded system developers around the world. The company has offices in Sweden and offers a range of products that are innovative, interoperable, cross-platform and easy to use. For more information visit Atollic’s web site at www.atollic.com