GDC Studio Tool

Multi-functional tool for register debugging, memory editting/dumping and managing images/fonts

Description

GDC Studio is a very versatile and powerful tool which can be used for register debugging, sequentially writing to registers, managing images and fonts for an application and for inspecting, dumping and editting RAM and flash memory. A flash programmer is integrated in GDC Studio to round off the picture. The tool is currently only available for MB88F332 'Indigo', but future graphic display controllers will also be supported. In it's current version, GDC Studio access the chip via the SPI or USB interfaces.

An installation setup wizard ensures simple installation of the tool and an extensive User Manual is provided as an online help, installed with the tool. Release Notes for GDC Studio will be made available online, on this webpage.

The Register Debugger module of the GDC Studio tool makes detailled hardware information visible for an IP, address block, register or register field, as selected in the GUI. Depending on the type of register selected, various intuitive controls are activated. The tool handles registers according to the Read, Read-Write etc. properties of the register. pop-up descriptions of the selected register fields are displayed in the GUI. The status of each access is reported in the 'Error' column in the GUI. using a connect/disconnect button, which can be used at any time, the user can use GDC Studio with a parallel target application.

The Register Sequencer module allows a user to define and create new register sequences. Register sequences can be saved, loaded seperately, renamed, editted, started and stopped etc.

The Image Manager module can be used to extract information from an image for application development. Automatic 'C' source code generation of image information is possible and pixel data can be extracted in a specified array organization for further use. A color palette page in the module is available to visualize the colors of indexed format pictures and to create the corresponding color-lookup-tables (CLUTs). In addition, the Image Manager can read images from various image/file formats and can convert images between different formats. File types currently supported are: BMP, PNG, TIF, JPG and GIF. Various bit-per-pixel (BPP) formats are supported too. Any changes made are immediately reflected in the 'Picture Box' pane off the GUI.

The Font Manager is used to easily generate attractive characters, numbers or texts. Using a system font as a starting point, the properties of a font and its look and feel can be altered (again, this is immediately visible in the 'Picture Box'). Anti-aliasing rendering modes and various formats for the output image are available.

The RAM Memory Editor and Flash Memory modules visualize the contents of the corresponding memory. Furthermore, memory contents can be dumped, e.g. to check the correct loading of sprites. Data can be manipulated after reading out sectors or memory blocks and then saved back into memory. The Flash Memory Editor can also be used to flash sectors and to erase the flash memory.

GDC Studio runs on Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Vista (depending on support provided by the 'Aardvark' driver, provided by a third party company (not a part of the delivery scope of GDC Studio). For details about the 'Aardvark' hardware and corresponding driver, please refer to the website of the TOTALPHASE Inc..

Hardware is not included with GDC Studio and not included in the licensing model, which is based on a per-PC locking scheme. Floating licenses are not available for GDC Studio, but volume licenses can be obtained on request to your Fujitsu sales partner.

Download

Please note that an evaluation version of the GDC Studio tool is not available.

A PowerPoint presentation about GDC Studio is available for download PDF here (26 slides, 800KB).

A new free tool (GDC Flasher) is provided on an as-is basis for Indigo. This tool, which has a GUI similar to that of GDC-Studio, can be used to load GDC Studio format files into the Indigo device's flash memory.