[February 23, 2015] |
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Express Logic Launches ViewX™ System Analyzer to Speed Optimization of IoT Applications
Express Logic, Inc., the worldwide leader in royalty-free real-time
operating systems (RTOSes), has introduced ViewX™, a real-time
performance monitoring tool for IoT systems where optimization of highly
networked activity is critical for the success of the system. ViewX can
be used to optimize IoT systems using Express Logic ThreadX
RTOS and NetX
TCP/IP protocol stack on most 32-bit architectures with dynamic data
capture easily defined by the user. With such analytical capabilities,
ViewX gives developers system transparency into the complex workings of
a highly networked IoT application.
ViewX, a host PC-based application, tracks target system events and
provides visibility into those events in graphical or spreadsheet
format. Users control the types of data collected and displayed, the
format of display, and the frequency of data capture and collection.
Data is collected by an agent thread that transfers snapshots of
activities to the host via WiFi (News - Alert), Ethernet, USB, UART, or JTAG. The
snapshot capture, upload, and display can be periodic, at user-specified
intervals, on demand or can be archived on the host for subsequent
analysis.
"It's hard, if not impossible, to optimize a system that can't be seen,"
commented William E. Lamie, President of Express Logic. "Prior to ViewX,
device developers needed to manually instrument their application, a
painstaking and time-consuming process that takes months to accomplish.
ViewX provides complete system transparency into the inner operations of
the system in a fraction of the time."
ViewX captures three categories of data, giving the user many ways to
optimize a system:
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CPU Utlization-With insight into CPU activity, ViewX shows
developers which threads are using most of the CPU cycles and which
threads might not be getting enough CPU time to complete their
activities. For example, a ViewX user would be able to see a thread
that was running too long or at too high a priority, resulting in the
starvation of other threads. The developer can then optimize the
priority of the most significant cycle consumers, rather than blindly
try to optimize the entire system.
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Memory Utilization-ViewX shows each thread's stack usage,
enabling optimization of memory use by thread stacks. Allocating too
much memory for a thread's stack wastes memory, while allocating too
little can lead to stack overflow.
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Network Performance-ViewX captures metrics that show network
throughput, packets sent/received/re-transmitted, or dropped, and
packet pool use. If the packet pool is exhausted, network transfers
can be impacted while waiting for memory to be returned to the pool.
This is particularly helpful for IoT as many small IoT devices don't
have the luxury of large memory and deep queues for re-transmission.
When a packet is queued for re-transmission, that means one less
packet is available for a new reception or transmission. Hence,
inefficient packet use in small devices can lead to a few packets
dropped/delayed, or collapse of the entire system. ViewX helps solve
this problem by making resource utilization and throughput completely
visible at all levels of communication/system load.
Designed to be flexible, ViewX can analyze and show the behavior of
systems running on over 20 architectures, including ARM (News - Alert) architectures,
MIPS, Tensilica, ARC, along with many more. As well, the agent thread
retrieves only that data specified by the user through the ViewX
interface, but its ANSI C code enables it to be easily customized to
dynamically include or exclude information.
ViewX also can capture trace buffers for analysis by Express Logic
TraceX™ event viewer. It gathers kernel awareness data similar to that
gathered by a debugger, but is capable of displaying findings in
real-time. ViewX enables data browsing, searching, and display, either
within a single snapshot, as an animated sequence, or within a set of
snapshots saved over a period of time.
Price and Availability ViewX will be available in Q2, 2015,
and will be licensed at prices starting at $5,000 for three developer
seats. Please consult Express Logic for further information.
About Express Logic Headquartered in San Diego, CA (News - Alert), Express
Logic offers the most advanced run-time solution for deeply embedded
applications, including the popular ThreadX® RTOS, the
high-performance NetX™ TCP/IP stack, the FileX® embedded
FAT-compatible file system, the USBX™ Host/Device USB protocol stack,
and the GUIX™ graphical user interface development toolkit. Most
products from Express Logic include full source code and all have no
run-time royalties. For more information about Express Logic solutions,
please visit the Web site at www.expresslogic.com,
call 1-858-613-6640, or e-mail inquiries to [email protected].
ThreadX, TraceX, and FileX are registered trademarks and X-Ware,
ThreadX-Lite, Certification Pack, NetX, CANX, USBX, StackX, ViewX, GUIX,
GUIX Studio, preemption-threshold, picokernel, and UDP (News - Alert) fast path are
trademarks of Express Logic, Inc. All other brands or product names are
the property of their respective holders.
This release can be downloaded at Express
Logic's Press Center on HughesCom's website.
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