Nios® II Embedded Design Suite (EDS)
Support for Embedded Development Tools, Processors (SoCs and Nios® II processor), Embedded Development Suites (EDSs), Boot and Configuration, Operating Systems, C and C++
Announcements
The Intel sign-in experience has changed to support enhanced security controls. If you sign in, click here for more information.

nios ii dynamic code analysis

JOSC
Beginner
529 Views

Dear fellow nios ii developers,

 

due to a functional-safety-related project, we are required to use dynamic code analysis in the development of the safety-related software (C-code). So far, i have come accross the LDRA tool which seems to offer a good native support of the nios ii softcores (as far as someone can judge from a website ...) . Does anybody have any experience with this tool? I am also very open to alternative suggestions.

 

Best regards,

JOSC

0 Kudos
3 Replies
ShengN_Intel
Employee
461 Views

Hi JOSC,


Don't have much experience on that tool. You may search for some resources from LDRA website here https://resources.ldra.com/course/intel-quartus-nios-ii-eds/

May also check on this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sq_BMr_O0l0 for more informations


Best regards,

Sheng


JOSC
Beginner
440 Views

Hi Sheng,

 

thanks for the suggestion. LDRA offers a trial version, so we should be able to evaluate this tool with the nios 2 eds. Lets see how this plays out.

 

Still, it would be interesting what tools generally could be used for this job. Interestingly, the gcc compiler offers the ability to profile code-coverage (i think by using the -fprofile-arcs -ftest-coverage flags) together with the gcov tool. This tool is also included in the nios2-eds (nios2-elf-gcov and nios2-elf-gcov-tool). As the necessary .gcda files are created on the target system (i.e. the embedded nios 2 system), this approach does not work out-of-the-box. Is there some way those files can be stored in some kind of embedded file-system (maybe on the connected EPCQ-flash), and then be transferred after the program is run on the target system? 

 

Best regards,

JOSC

ShengN_Intel
Employee
422 Views

Hi JOSC,


I search for some LDRA Tool alternatives but seems like only LDRA supported Intel Nios II Embedded the best.

After going through this manual https://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/gcc-11.2.0/gcc.pdf, I don't see there is any way to store those .gcda data files in the embedded file-system you mentioned above.

Hopefully answering your questions.


Thanks,

Best regards,

Sheng


Reply