Sign Up
News and New Products
FROM EDN EUROPE: Control-chip design made easy
by Graham Prophet -- EDN Europe, 5/12/2005
PSoC Express is an extension software package for Cypress' flash-based, mixed-signal microcontroller chips, the base package being the "Designer" option. PSoC chips contain a proprietary microcontroller core, configurable peripherals, and programmable logic and linear function cells. The configuration technology for the chips is flash memory. With the Designer package, users configure the chips for tasks such as signal acquisition, signal conditioning, control functions and so on. The new software package adds a "layer of abstraction" for the user who is familiar with the details of the functions he wants to build—a measurement and control loop, for example—but not with the process or programming either FPGAs or microcontrollers (Picture).
The Express software allows a designer to set up the chips using a drag-and-drop interface; he selects basic functions from a library, places them on a work sheet, sets appropriate parameters for the peripheral functions he is using, sets pin-outs if his external connections are already defined, and the software takes over. It produces a configuration file for the PSoC chip and also outputs a data sheet for the part it has just "created". Wiring and logic is configured in the flash memory; peripherals (which are pre-defined on the chip) are set up with registers. Using software, the user can change the peripheral register values during operation if required. The family is based on a fast 8-bit core, with peripherals that range up to 14-bit ADCs, programmable gain amplifiers and other analogue functions such comparators and filters; and digital functions such as I/O peripherals and timer/counters. The user can specify control loop behaviour in "black-box" terms and include hysteresis.
Cypress is candid in saying that if the user already has a grasp of coding microcontrollers, then this is probably not the appropriate product, as an engineer with that expertise can obtain a more detailed implementation by conventional development and coding using the PSoC Designer tool. (The Express tool is in effect a script generator for the Designer tool.) Nevertheless, although aimed at users without coding expertise, Cypress believes that Express may appeal to current microcontroller users who may require a quick and simple solution to a specific problem. The software is available for download at the web site below, and a development kit costs $499.
Cypress Semiconductor, +44 1279 873160, www.cypress.com
