Re: [ECOS] having ecos working with third-party development environment?

[Andrew Lunn <andrew dot lunn at ascom dot ch>]

What's your definition of an IDE? To me Unix is an IDE? All commands
talk to each other using pipes. Its not a GUI, but who actually wants
a GUI? I don't. Some people claim that emacs is an IDE. You can edit
text, compile from it, goto next error, run greps, use gdb from within
it, etc..... 

I guess the important question is, what do you gain from an IDE which
you don't already have?

eCos uses some gcc extensions. This makes it hard to use anything else
than gcc. Constructor ordering is one of them. This makes 1) a lot of
work. You have to find if its possible to do this in the IDE native
tool chain. 2) is a possibility, if you can make your IDE use gcc. A
lot depends on what your IDE is, but you should be able to tell it to
use a different tool chain than the default one. 

I've always used 3. gdb does all i want. It does more, but i've not
learnt everything thats in the manual. If you want a user unfriendly
GUI use Insight or DDD etc. gdb can talk to jtag if you want it to get
closer to the hardware.

       Andrew

> Choice 1. move ecos into the third-party IDE. 
> 
>   This not only involves analyzing makefiles of ecos and moving
>   the sources into 3rd-party IDE; also involves using 3rd-party
>   cross compiler. Is this doable? How tightly coupled is ecos
>   with the GNU based cross-compilers/debuggers? Is it easy to just
>   take ecos source code into another IDE? Possibility of potential
>   problems? How much support there might be from ecos community
>   in that case?
> 
> Choice 2. Use ecos as library and have it built under GNU tools,
>           write applications in 3rd-party IDE. 
> 
>   The issue here seems to be that ecos uses GNU corss-compilers,
>   and the application is developed using another set of cross-
>   compilers/debugger.   
>   
> Choice 3. Write the application in ecos environment (without 
>   3rd-party IDE at all)
> 
>   My question in general here is that how powerful is Gnu GDB
>   in the areas of debugging ARM/home-grown hardware/software, etc.?
> 
> I know these are generic questions however any recommendation/advice
> of what/what not to do is appreiciated, plus any sharing of 
> experiences that you might have had in similar situations.
> Thanks in advance.

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