OE-9.5 Debugging Tools & Application Case Studies
You can select among logic analyzers, simulators, emulators, in-circuit emulators and IDEs for a given fault, and outline embedded designs for GSM/GPRS, CAN and Zigbee applications.
Embedded debugging is hard because the usual crutch is gone - there is often no console to print to, and adding one changes the timing you are trying to observe. Each tool sees a different layer: a simulator is fast and unfaithful, an in-circuit emulator is faithful and intrusive, a logic analyzer sees only the pins but sees them truthfully. The case studies matter because CAN and Zigbee are protocols you will actually meet in automotive and IoT work.
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Integration and testing of embedded hardware
Putting the software on the real board and finding out what is different. It is always different, and this topic is about finding out why efficiently.
Testing methods and debugging techniques
How you look inside a system with no screen. The methods here are the practical skill that separates working embedded engineers from the rest.
Logic analyzer
Watching many digital signals at once over time. It is the instrument for problems that are about sequence and timing rather than values.
Simulator and emulator
Running the code without the hardware, and running it with a stand-in for the processor. Knowing which questions each can answer saves a great deal of time.
In-circuit emulator (ICE) and the IDE
Debugging on the real device while it runs, and the environment that ties the tools together. It is the closest embedded work gets to an ordinary debugger.
Case study: embedded design for GSM/GPRS communications
A worked example on a communication system, showing the constraints in a real product. Case studies are here to make the abstract requirements concrete.
Case study: CAN in automotive applications
A worked example from vehicles, where the network protocol is the interesting part. Reliability requirements here are unlike anything in consumer products.
Case study: Zigbee
A worked example on a low-power radio standard. It closes the course on the constraint that dominates modern embedded design, which is energy.
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