Microsemi Corporation, a leading provider of semiconductor solutions, has announced the release of its SoftConsole version 5.1. It’s the world’s first available Windows-hosted Eclipse integrated development environment (IDE) for designs utilizing RISC-V open instruction set architectures (ISAs) like RV321.

 

SoftConsole is Microsemi’s free software development environment that enables rapid production of C and C++ programming language designs for its field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs). It will be showcased at the Design Automation Conference (DAC) in a presentation highlighting its open architecture, low power and development capabilities using RISC-V soft central processing unit (CPU) cores.

 

SoftConsole v5.1, a GNU compiler collection (GCC), now supports both Windows and Linux for RISC-V designs and can be used for RV321 implementations including extensions to the baseline RV321 architecture such as M, A, F, D, G, and C. It offers low power, low architecture, and supports Microsemi’s PolarFire™, RTG4™, SmartFusion™2 and IGLOO™2 FPGA-based RISC-V soft CPUs as well as the HiFive1 Arduino kit from SiFive, a fabless semiconductor company that produces computer chips based on the RISC-V ISA.

 

Moving on to the applications, it is ideally suitable for a wide range of fields like the aerospace and defense, communications, data center and industrial markets. As a free software development environment supporting a quick development of C and C++ executables for Microsemi’s FPGAs using RISC-V soft CPU cores, SoftConsole v5.1 provides a flexible and easy-to-use graphical interface for managing embedded software development projects. 

 

Customers can quickly develop and debug software programs and implement them in Microsemi FPGAs, with a fully integrated debugger offering easy access to memory contents, registers, and single-step execution. SoftConsole also enables users to configure project settings and organize files, provides simultaneous access to multiple tool windows, and delivers the ability to quickly switch editing and debug views. 

 

 

Microsemi’s SoftConsole v5.1 is available now.

 

 

Microsemi Corporation offers a comprehensive portfolio of semiconductor and system solutions for aerospace & defense, communications, data center and industrial markets. Products include high-performance and radiation-hardened analog mixed-signal integrated circuits, FPGAs, SoCs and ASICs; power management products; timing and synchronization devices and precise time solutions, setting the world’s standard for time; voice processing devices; RF solutions; discrete components; enterprise storage and communication solutions, security technologies and scalable anti-tamper products; Ethernet solutions; Power-over-Ethernet ICs and midspans; as well as custom design capabilities and services.