Arm® Debugger & Trace

OVERVIEW

Total Arm® Debug and Trace

Arm® IP is used worldwide in almost every conceivable embedded design. The RISC based instruction set lends itself to low power, low heat generation, and lower silicon costs than traditional architectures, making them ideally suited for mobile or battery powered applications. Featuring comprehensive debug cores, high speed trace interfaces, numerous interconnects, and design flexibility, it’s no wonder they have become the de-facto choice for System on Chip (SoC) and System on Module (SoM) designs.

TRACE32 provides a complete suite of tools for Arm®-based micro-processors, from the low cost µTrace for Cortex-M debug and trace, all the way up to the flagship PowerTrace III and PowerTrace Serial family of tools for capturing high speed off-chip parallel TPIU or serial HSSTP trace. All of these provide unparalleled levels of debug capabilities, allowing you to get the best out of your Arm® based embedded design.

Supported Sub-Architectures

Arm®v9/v8/v7/v6, Cortex®-M/R/A/X, ARM7/9/11, SecurCore®, Neoverse™, Kryo™

DEBUG HIGHLIGHTS

Understand Your High-Speed SoC in More Detail

Capture the program flow, data accesses, and task switches of multiple cores and other system sources simultaneously in exquisite detail. With the fast bit rate of up to 100 GBit/s and large data buffers, PowerTrace Serial allows you to explore the operation of your device from the top-level module interactions to the timing of individual instructions.

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Multi-core Debugging

Superior multi-core debug support of all Arm® cores (in any format including big.LITTLE) and most additional cores of an SoC. SMP debugging of up to 1024 cores from a single instance of TRACE32. Connect multiple instances of TRACE32 to form AMP or iAMP debugging, where each core or cluster can have its resources independently displayed. Each core or cluster can be be controlled separately or as a group, with full synchronization.

Advanced Debug Port

TRACE32 has been used to debug every generation of Arm® processor from the ARM7TDMI to the latest Cortex-X and Neoverse cores. All major debug and trace components are fully supported providing you with non-intrusive, real-time views into your application code.

Unrivalled Breakpoint Support

Support for all on-chip breakpoint types as well as unlimited number of software breakpoints; even adding software breakpoints to areas of FLASH memory.

Innovative Cache Analysis

Display memory, code, and variables in a cache aware format. Sections can be highlighted to indicate caching level. TRACE32 can display cached or non-cached values as well as provide in-depth cache analysis showing valid bits, dirty bits, and LRU information for each cache line.

AUTOSAR Aware Debugging

TRACE32 seamlessly integrates into the AUTOSAR development methodology for both the classic and adaptive platforms. System information is extracted from the ORTI/ARTI file and TRACE32 is fully aware of all aspects such as ISRs, Runnables, Tasks, etc.

OS Aware Debugging

Extend the reach of your debug tool to include support for your embedded operating system (OS). Display operating system objects such as tasks, message queues, semaphores, etc. in real-time and non-intrusively without any target instrumentation required.

Hypervisor Aware Debugging

Take control and have full visibility of all levels of your hypervisor enabled embedded system. TRACE32’s hypervisor aware debug and trace tools let you debug every level of the system: from the hypervisor, through multiple guest operating systems and into application code running in those guest OSes.

Which ARM core do you want to use?
Check out our catalogue of predefined solutions and find the ideal toolset for your project.

Locate your chip

TRACE FEATURES

Powerful Trace Tools

Many Arm® processors include some kind of trace interface, providing program flow and optional data trace can be generated non-intrusively at run-time and either stored in dedicated on-chip memory or spooled off-chip via a trace port, typically TPIU or HSSTP. Options also exist for instrumented trace, allowing you to log only the event that matter to enhance your debug workflow. Many cores that are associated with SoCs are capable of generating trace data and inserting it into the trace stream, effectively allowing all cores to share a physical trace connection. This trace information is timestamped and provides incredible levels of detail for analysis of all aspects of your target system.

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Multi-Core Trace

Trace all cores in an SoC with correlated program flow allowing you to monitor interactions between software on each device.

On-Chip Trace

Trace program flow and optional data accesses non-intrusively. This data can be stored in dedicated on-chip trace memory for read out via the debug interface. Comprehensive on-chip filtering resources can be programmed to zero in on the required information.

Off-Chip Trace

You can sample that same generated trace data for longer periods using the larger buffers provided by using an off-chip trace tool. The data is whisked off-chip and stored in tools with up to 8GBytes of trace buffer memory.

Trace Streaming

Using the off-chip trace tools as a large FIFO, trace data can be streamed to your host PC for almost unlimited trace sampling. Store hours, days, or even weeks of trace for later analysis.

AUTOSAR Aware Profiling

Easily capture data from your AUTOSAR classic platform, allowing you to profile every aspect of the application. Excellent cross-tool support for both ORTI and ARTI standards ensures your trace data can be exported to a number of third-party analysis tools for specific requirements.

Complex Trigger Language (CTL)

Create precisely targeted triggers and filters to narrow down the focus of your trace: focus in on the areas that matter the most to you; create complex scenarios for when and what to trace. The Complex Trigger Language (CTL) provides a much finer control over what is traced and under what circumstances than the standard start/stop/this/not-this triggering usually associated with a trace.

Code Coverage for Functional Safety

Simplify your safety certification with code coverage reports, showing a variety of metrics from object coverage to full MC/DC. With our Tool Qualification Support Kit (TQSK), TRACE32 can become a ‘trusted tool’ in your environment, with full traceability back to our TÜV Nord certification.

µTrace® All-In-One Solution for Arm Cortex-M Cores

Leverage the power of a full debug and trace system that’s geared towards your Arm Cortex-M based embedded design.

Discover µTrace®

Which ARM core do you want to use?
Check out our catalogue of predefined solutions and find the ideal toolset for your project.

Locate your chip

VIRTUAL TARGETS

Debugging Virtual Targets

Application code and algorithms can be tested and refined using a variety of Arm® based virtual targets. TRACE32 allows you to work on your virtual targets with the same familiar set of tools and user interface as your real-world hardware. This reduces the need for extra training and means you can get up to speed immediately and be productive from day one.

Work with any virtual target that supports the Multi-Core Debug API (MCD) for both debug and trace or GDB for debug. Full support for Arm’s fast models and IRIS interface is provided.

Debug Synopsis Virtualizer Models

Connect TRACE32 directly to any virtual target via the MCD interface. This is perfect for early development with an accurate processor model for all Arm cores.

Multi-Core Debug API

Debug multiple heterogenous or homogenous Arm cores on any virtual platform supporting standard APIs, like MCD or Arm Fast Model and IRIS

Perfect Module and Regression Tests

Prepare your test environment using TRACE32’s Instruction set Simulator. Customize the simulator with peripheral models of your own hardware.

Test Your Debug Solutions

Connect to your target via GDB to verify its responses. Communicate over Ethernet, RS232, or many other protocols to your device’s gdbserver or gdbstub.

TOOLCHAIN SUPPORT

3rd Party Tools Supported for ARM

The following features are available for all architectures supported by TRACE32. Please contact us if your device or tool is not listed here; support is often already on its way.

Host OS

Our debug software runs on all major operating systems.

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Flash Devices

We support the programming of a large variety of flash devices. NOR, NAND, SPI, QSPI, EMMC and more.

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3rd Party Integrations

Integrations allow you to easily use TRACE32 with other tools.

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Arm® Debugger & Trace