Intel® Simics® Simulator for Intel® FPGAs: User Guide

ID 784383
Date 4/01/2024
Public
Document Table of Contents

6.5.1.1. Remote Debugging With Intel® Simics® Simulation and RiscFree* IDE on the Same System

Using remote debugging capabilities with Intel® Simics® Simulation and RiscFree* IDE on the same system is useful when you have already started a simulation and want to start debugging without restarting the simulation.

This section describes the setup required in the RiscFree* IDE to set up a remote connection to an Intel® Simics® session running on the same system so that you can perform any debug activity.

  1. Complete the initial setup on the system that runs the Intel® Simics® simulation:
    1. Start an Intel® Simics® simulation session either using simics or simics-gui commands as described in Starting the Simulation.
    2. From the Intel® Simics® CLI console, run the start-eclipse-backend. This command enables Intel® Simics® simulator to accept a remote connection form a debugger. By default, it enables a TCP connection with the Simics name. The command returns the URL path for the connection.
      #Intel Simics simulator CLI 
      simics> start-eclipse-backend
      Starting TCF on:
       TCP:localhost:1534
       TCP:10.116.92.41:1534

      In this example, the remote connection must use either the localhost:1534 path from the same host system or the 10.116.92.41:1534 path from a remote system.

  2. On the same system, start the RiscFree* IDE from your RiscFree* IDE installation directory (that is, do not use the simic-riscfree command):
    #Linux terminal session
    $ <riscfree_installdir>/RiscFree/RiscFree
    You are prompted to choose (or create) a workspace.
  3. Create a new debug configuration as follows:
    1. In the RiscFree* IDE, select Run > Debug Configuration.
    2. Double-click Simics Attach to Session.
    When you create a new debug configuration, you see a window like the one shown in the figure that follows. By default, the name of the new configuration is New_configuration. You can rename the configuration. Under the Main tab, you must see the connection to the Intel® Simics® session created earlier.
  4. In the Debug Configurations view, click Debug to start your debug session.
    You might be prompted to switch to the Debug perspective.

In the Debug perspective, you can control your Intel® Simics® simulation through the RiscFree* IDE. After the debug session starts, you can perform typical debugging operation such as setting breakpoints. You can also progress through the simulation directly from the RiscFree* IDE.