QNX Momentics development suite offers a complete toolset to help boot and interact with target hardware. The tools include a system builder that allows quick customization of target images, and a unique, extensible target agent architecture that supports multiple target tool service interactions, such as launching debugging, profiling, and information gathering.

System builder

The system builder can save countless hours when creating boot images and custom flash file system images for targets. For every image created, the system builder will:

• automate the creation of new BSP projects within the IDE
  
• let developers import a pre-built target file from a BSP or create a new file from scratch
  
• provide an image browser to help quickly select binaries, DLLs, and libraries for the image
  
• track library dependencies and a prompt for any missing components
  
• ensure that the image contains the latest build of C/C++ projects
  
• help reduce the memory footprint of applications by allowing removal of unnecessary functionality from shared libraries
  

To download the image to the target, the system builder has a built-in serial terminal that can talk to remote ROM monitors. It can also transfer the image via TFTP or BOOTP. Once the target is up and running, additional development and file transfers can be done using any number of mechanisms. For instance, use the IDE's file browser to directly edit and update files on the target.

System builder screenshot

Target agent

The target agent provides the IDE with an extensible mechanism for communicating with one or many targets. Each tool in the IDE can communicate through the target agent and have a corresponding module that's loaded on the target when the service is activated by the host system. If a service is no longer required, the corresponding module can be unloaded, thus reducing the target's overall footprint. As with any other QNX driver, the target agent itself can be dynamically started and stopped as needed.

Target navigator view

The target navigator view allows all tools in the IDE to access target systems in a consistent way. Use the target navigator view to define new targets and connect to these targets. Also, associate a default project (e.g. system image) with a particular target system. In addition, the target navigator view can be used to visualize the accessibility of all your target boards or devices.

Once a target system has been defined, use the target navigator view to choose a specific target for further action — such as launching a telnet session. Also launch a Photon view to locally display the graphical applications running on the target.

New tools can use the target as an extension point to add their own actions to the target system context menu. Such actions may include generating a signal for a process on the target system, or attaching the debugger to a running process.

Target system information tool

The target system information tool provides a wealth of system and process-state information for a chosen target — live or postmortem. Selecting a new target will update the target system information tool with a wide variety of information about what's happening on that target device. Start off with a high-level overview, allowing you to see which processes are active and the process arguments involved. Also view CPU and memory usage, both for the system at large and per process. Drill down further, using tools that examine thread attributes (e.g. state, scheduling policy, CPU usage, stack size), signal states, program memory maps, file descriptors, and so on. The target system information tool:

• watches for high resource usage (e.g. memory consumption,CPU utilization, number of file connections)through live monitoring of processes and threads
  
• detects potential deadlock situations by examining a graphical representation of the blocking relationships among processes
  
• manipulates files on remote target system as if they were residing on a local host
  
• easily transfers new files to the remote target and then edit them directly from within the IDE
  
• extends the program launcher, to launch executables on the target with a simple double-click
  

Target system information tool screenshots