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Introduction
The iC5000 BlueBox On-Chip Analyzer is a hardware and software platform designed for
debugging and testing a wide range of embedded microcontroller platforms that are based on
a variety of processor architectures.
Functionality can be further extended with the addition of the I/O Module, enabling the
synchronous capture of analog and digital signals in parallel to trace information. Such
capability is used for advanced debugging of complex applications together with our winIDEA
Integrated Development Environment (IDE), as well as for thorough testing in conjunction with
our testing environment testIDEA.
Complementing the hardware is a range of software which target three key areas of embedded
development: debugging, timing-analysis and testing.
winIDEA –The winIDEA Integration Development Environment (IDE) delivers the visual insights
required to debug your embedded application. At the simplest level, winIDEA provides all the
usual functionality of an IDE, such as breakpoints, stepping and device programming. When
supported by a target microcontroller, winIDEA can also visualize the timing and code coverage
of the application via the trace interface, as well as combine data captured by the IOM6
accessories. Various third-parties also provide software tools to perform advanced worst-time-
execution analysis based upon the data winIDEA can export. When a Real-Time Operating
System (RTOS) is in use, the state of the RTOS and its tasks can also be visualized.
testIDEA –The testIDEA environment simplifies the development of unit tests for embedded
applications. By making use of the winIDEA environment, this application makes it easy to
locate source code functions and generate test cases for them. Tests are then executed using
the Original Binary Code (OBC) method, testing the object code running on the target
microcontroller. The tests, which are stored as YAML files, can easily be added to a project,
maintained in a repository, and then automatically executed together with Continuous
Integration (CI) tools such as Jenkins.
isystem.connect –There are times when it is more efficient to write a script to execute a task
that requires many clicks within a visual development environment. This is where our Software
Development Kit (SDK) isystem.connect comes in. The well-documented interface provides
access to Python, Java, C++ and other languages so that any action available within winIDEA
and testIDEA can be scripted. Scripts can also be executed directly from within winIDEA,
thereby allowing the developer to extend its functionality.
iSYSTEM BlueBox solutions best run under iSYSTEM winIDEATM IDE or within the Eclipse IDE
environment through a plug-in. winIDEATM is a native Microsoft® Windows® application and as
such best performs on Windows 7 and Windows 10 platforms. It also runs on Linux operating
system with help of Wine. All our software can be downloaded from the Downloads page at
http://www.isystem.com.