Micriµm: Middleware and Stacks Overview

Although Micriµm is best known for µC/OS-II and µC/OS-III, the company is not solely a kernel provider. Micriµm actually offers a full portfolio of RTOS components, including a file system module, a GUI package, and a number of protocol stacks.

Where Micriµm differs from many other RTOS vendors is in the way these components are packaged. Rather than selling all of the components together, Micriµm offers each separately. For the countless embedded systems developers whose projects don’t necessitate all of the services provided by a conventional RTOS, this model is ideal. A developer who requires only a kernel and a USB stack, for example, can purchase this combination from Micriµm. This developer would not be forced to pay for superfluous components.

uC/TCP-IP is a compact, reliable, high-performance TCP/IP protocol stack, optimized for embedded systems. Built from the ground up with Micrium quality, scalability and reliability, μC/TCP-IP enables the rapid configuration of required network options to minimize time-to-market. μC/TCP-IP allows for adjustment of the memory footprint based upon design requirements and can be configured to include only those network components necessary to the system. When a component is not used, it is not included in the build, saving valuable memory space. μC/TCP-IP requires the presence of an RTOS for task scheduling and mutual exclusion. To meet this requirement, Micrium provides source code to allow network applications to readily accommodate μC/OS-II and μC/OS-III. Based on the component’s extensible Kernel interface, other Kernels can also be adapted to μC/TCP-IP.

The USB communication protocol is on one hand the most popular to integrate, and on the other, one of the most difficult communications interfaces to embed. While the USB controller is an important consideration, the largest portion of the USB design rests on implementation in software. µC/USB (Host, Device, and On-the-Go) is designed to provide a low cost serial interface to any device, including mobile phones, handhelds and PDAs, digital cameras, and portable media players.

μC/USB Host is a real-time USB host software stack designed for embedded systems equipped with a USB host or OTG controller. μC/ USB Host is a full-featured, high performance, small footprint USB host software stack. Kernel independent, μC/USB Host includes API, class drivers (MSC, HID, and CDC ACM) and framework for developing custom class drivers. The stack can run with or without an RTOS.

μC/USB Device is a USB device stack designed for embedded systems equipped with a USB device controller. Designers can easily port μC/USB-Device to any new USB device controllers by simply modifying existing hardware access routines. Drivers for several common device classes (Mass Storage, CDC, HID, PHDC) are offered. A framework for developing vendor-specific class drivers is also provided.

μC/CAN is a CAN protocol framework that enables easy and clean implementation of CAN communication paths. μC/CAN is a source code library optimized for speed, flexibility and size and built with high portability and clean documentation in mind. μC/CAN reduces development efforts to embed CAN. Developers need only an understanding of signals, messages and bus configurations. Different abstraction layers can be used independently. μC/CAN can communicate via one or more CAN buses simultaneously. The bus management layer organizes the CAN buses and distributes messages to different device drivers. The device driver layer buffers the CAN messages to be sent and received. All hardware dependencies are capsulated in this layer. An embedded target can also have multiple, different CAN controllers.

µC/Modbus module enables an embedded system to communicate to other devices via the MODBUS protocol. The Modbus protocol consists of the reception and transmission of data, in predefined packets, referred to as “frames.” The Modbus protocol operates with two types of frames: an ASCII frame, and a Remote Terminal Unit (RTU) frame. The ASCII frame is a frame based on ASCII hexadecimal characters, while the RTU frame is strictly a binary implementation. With μC/Modbus, you can use either mode.μC/Modbus supports any number of communications channels. The ASCII or RTU mode of operation is selectable on a per ‘channel’ basis. μC/Modbus-S is a Modbus Slave (server) software component enabling an embedded system to communicate to a Modbus Master (client). μC/Modbus-M is a Modbus Master (client) component that enables communication to a Modbus Slave.

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Features

• Small footprint
• High performance
• ROMable and scalable to contain only the features required by the application
• Able to be ported to nearly any real-time kernel available
• Outstanding documentation and ANSI C source code included

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All Micriµm protocol stacks are provided in source form for FREE for educational use or for peaceful research. If you plan on using those products in a commercial product you can evaluate them for FREE for 45 days and within that period, need to purchase a proper license to use in your product.

• Single Product License
  A Single Product License enables the user to embed a Micriµm software component into one end customer product. This license is perpetual for the life of the customer's product and is without limitation in production quantity. This license is specific to the processor used AND the specific name and model of the customer end product.
• Product Line License (Product Family License)
  A Product Line License allows the user to embed a Micriµm component into any number of end products within a product family and manufacture an unlimited number of units of each of these products for the life of the end product within the product family.
• CPU-Type License (Platform License)
  A CPU-Type License allows the user to embed a Micriµm component into any number of end products using a single and specific processor type. The license holder may manufacture an unlimited number of units of each of these products for the life of the end product.
• Site License
  A Site License allows the user to embed a Micriµm component into any end product that uses any CPU as long as the products are designed from a single site. The user is able to manufacture an unlimited number of units from any location worldwide.

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	µC/TCP-IP	μC/USB Host	μC/USB Device	μC/CAN	μC/Modbus
Actel	Cortex-M3	--	--	--	Portable to any processor architecture, 8-, 16-, 32-, 64-bits, and DSPs
Atmel	SAM9(ARM9), AVR 32	SAM9(ARM9), AVR 32	SAM3S (Cortex-M3), SAM9(ARM9), AVR 32	--
Renesas	H8, SH, RX62	RX62	H8, SH, RX62	--
Freescale	Coldfire, PowerPC, i.MX	--	--	PowerPC
Microchip	PIC32	--	--	--
NXP	ARM7, ARM9, Cortex-M3	ARM7, ARM9, Cortex-M3	ARM7, ARM9, Cortex-M3	ARM7,  SJA1000
ST	STR9 (ARM9), STM32 (Cortex-M3)	--	STM32 (Cortex-M3)	STR9 (ARM9), STM32 (Cortex-M3)
TI	Cortex-M3	Cortex-A8	--	--
Xilinx	Spartan-6	--	--	--
Toshiba	--	Cortex-M3	Cortex-M3	--

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