Title: Programming model and tools for embedded multicore systems

Authors: Chung-Wen Huang, Wen-Li Shih, Chung-Ju Wu, Jia-Jhe Li, Jenq Kuen Lee

Addresses: Department of Computer Science, National Tsing Hua University, No. 101, Section 2, Kuang-Fu Road, Hsinchu 30013, Taiwan. ' Department of Computer Science, National Tsing Hua University, No. 101, Section 2, Kuang-Fu Road, Hsinchu 30013, Taiwan. ' Department of Computer Science, National Tsing Hua University, No. 101, Section 2, Kuang-Fu Road, Hsinchu 30013, Taiwan. ' Department of Computer Science, National Tsing Hua University, No. 101, Section 2, Kuang-Fu Road, Hsinchu 30013, Taiwan. ' Department of Computer Science, National Tsing Hua University, No. 101, Section 2, Kuang-Fu Road, Hsinchu 30013, Taiwan

Abstract: Multicore programming is more difficult than single-core programming, and developing applications on a complex multicore system without using an appropriate development environment is difficult, with the results being highly prone to error. A useful development environment for an embedded application design should contain programming models and development tools. The programming model provides a higher abstract level to control the communication and execution of multicore hardware, while the development tools help developers to debug applications and measure the performance of applications. In this paper, we propose a development environment for embedded multicore systems that includes a heterogeneous multicore simulation platform, customised compiler tools for a VLIW DSP, and a multicore programming model, streaming RPC. The experimental results demonstrate the high performance of the multicore simulation and compiler optimisations. The performance of compiled MiBench with O2 optimisation was 70% relative to no optimisation.

Keywords: multicore programming; programming models; VLIW; compiler; development tool; embedded systems; simulation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJES.2010.039029

International Journal of Embedded Systems, 2010 Vol.4 No.3/4, pp.259 - 269

Published online: 11 Mar 2011 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article