Functional Debug Techniques for Embedded Systems

Some problems in a new chip design or its embedded software show up only when a silicon prototype of the chip is placed in its intended target environment and the embedded software is executed. Traditionally, embedded-system debug is very difficult and time-consuming because of the intrinsic lack of internal system observability in the target environment. Design for debug (DFD) is the act of adding debug support to a chip's design in the realization that not every silicon chip or embedded-software application is right the first time. In the past few years, functional debug has made significant progress. This article describes the most common structured approaches available for silicon debug of embedded systems.