Tasking Strengthens Ties With Siemens, Motorola

Electronic News, August 31, 1998

dedham, mass. -- The close ties between real-time OS vendors and digital signal processor (DSP) providers are strengthening. For example, RTOS and development tool provider Tasking, based here, will today announce it is rolling out a comprehensive programming package for Siemens Semiconductor's TriCore DSP architecture, as well as for Motorola's 56000 DSP architecture.

The work with Motorola is part of a larger migration of Motorola DSP users to Tasking software.

Tasking's new toolset consists of the Nucleus Plus real-time kernel, ANSI C and C compilers, macro assembler, linker/locator and CrossView Pro debugger. All elements are integrated into Tasking's Embedded Development Environment (EDE), which provides a Windows-based project environment to create, edit, compile and debug TriCore or Motorola applications.

Significantly, Motorola has worked extensively with Tasking on these tools for the 56000 DSPs because the company wanted a benefit to come to users as they migrated away from Motorola's proprietary GNU tools. Tasking and Motorola believe users will see a 25 percent reduction in code size with the new development tools.

Marco Nieuwenhuize, Tasking's DSP product marketing manager, noted that, "Code size and efficiency are important in any embedded system but they are even more important for a DSP application." His largest task was ensuring compatibility and an easy migration path for Motorola users.

As well, certain enhancements together with the Tasking C compiler work together to make C a viable language to use when programming the DSP56xxx, the company said.

"The Tasking TriCore toolset is the result of our ongoing relations including the C166 microcontroller and toolset," said Dieter Stengl, director of tools and applications, for Siemens Semi in Munich. He said Siemens worked with Tasking from the beginning of the chip's design. He added that "This toolset is representative of the marriage between RISC and DSP, areas in which Tasking has extensive experience."

A beta version of the tools is available now with production release slated for January 1999. Pricing for the TriCore or 56xxx compiler package will start at $2,990, and the complete toolset runs on Windows 95/NT and Sun SPARC/Solaris.