Datalight BIOS for AMD SC400/410 Microprocessor Rounds Out Embedded PC Offering.SAN JOSE San Jose, city, United States San Jose (sănəzā`, săn hōzā`), city (1990 pop. 782,248), seat of Santa Clara co., W central Calif.; founded 1777, inc. 1850. , Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 3, 1998--Datalight, a provider of embedded system Any electronic system that uses a CPU chip, but that is not a general-purpose workstation, desktop or laptop computer. Such systems generally use microprocessors, or they may use custom-designed chips or both. software, today announced an easily configured BIOS for the Advanced Micro Devices Elan SC400 microprocessor. Datalight's BIOS is the first to the market as a complete development environment with Borland Turbo Assembler The Turbo Assembler (TASM) mainly PC-targeted assembler package was Borland's offering in the x86 assembler programming tool market. As one would expect, TASM worked well with Borland's high-level language compilers for the PC, such as Turbo C, Turbo Pascal and Turbo Basic. and Paradigm DEBUG To correct a problem in hardware or software. Debugging software means locating the errors in the source code (the program logic). Debugging hardware means finding errors in the circuit design (logical circuits) or in the physical interconnections of the circuits. . The BIOS is Year 2000 compliant a. 1. (Computers) having dates fully and properly represented, and not susceptible to failure due to the year 2000 bug. , written in Solid Assembly Code, 100% compatible with desktop standards and scaleable to as small as 4KB. The Datalight(R) BIOS joins the family of system software products which include ROM-DOS(tm), a compatible DOS; FlashFX(tm), a flash file system; WinLight(tm), a Windows work-alike, and Datalight(R) Sockets, a TCP/IP stack An implementation of the TCP/IP communications protocol. Network architectures designed in layers, such as TCP/IP, OSI and SNA, are called "stacks." See TCP/IP, OSI model and protocol stack. for DOS or WinLight. Because Datalight now provides all system software components, original equipment manufacturers can avoid conflicts, lower costs, get to market faster and reduce bureaucratic paperwork. Although the Datalight BIOS is being formally announced today, several equipment manufacturers have already designed it into their systems. The Dialogic(R)(NASDAQ NASDAQ in full National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations U.S. market for over-the-counter securities. Established in 1971 by the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD), NASDAQ is an automated quotation system that reports on :DLGC) VoiceBrick(tm), a stand-alone solid-state analog voice processing platform, includes the Datalight BIOS as well as Datalight's ROM-DOS for the operating system. The Dialogic VoiceBrick, designed for small and medium businesses, will be marketed with voice messaging applications by leading call processing and voice messaging companies, including such companies as CTL See control key. 1. CTL - Checkout Test language. 2. CTL - Compiler Target Language. 3. CTL - Computational Tree Logic (Communication Technology Leaders) of Shelton, CT. Clientec(R) and Keytronic(R) have partnered to provide ClienTerm(tm), a Thin Client Keyboard for Citrix(R) WinFrame. Datalight provides the BIOS, DOS, and TCP/IP TCP/IP in full Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol Standard Internet communications protocols that allow digital computers to communicate over long distances. for ClienTerm. "It was the logical choice for us," remarked Hans Junker, Vice President of Engineering for Clientec. "A single source for all three products saved us money, helped us get to market faster." A Complete Development Environment Because Datalight provides the assembler with the BIOS, developers are not plagued with the usual assembler porting problems, avoiding the anomalies that often occur when using a brand or version of the assembler that is different from that used for design and testing. Paradigm DEBUG is based on the familiar Borland Turbo Debugger but has extended features which allow remote debugging of the BIOS in place on the target hardware, and with full source and full symbolic information. Since it uses the same interface as the Borland Turbo Debugger, programmers experienced with the Borland tools may never need to open the manual. "This is without a doubt, the best environment for debugging at the BIOS level. I would rather use Paradigm DEBUG than an in-circuit emulator for most problems," explained Drew Gislason, Datalight Chief Engineer. Solid Assembly Coding The Datalight BIOS is written in 100% Solid Assembly Code. Based on concepts from the book Writing Solid Code by Mark McGuire, Solid Assembly Coding is a programming and debugging standard used by all Datalight programmers. The result is error free code in well-documented, clearly defined routines that are easily understood by the assembly programmer. Every line of code and all conditionals can be stepped through with the debugger. "When you focus on writing bug-free code, rather than smaller, more flexible or faster code, the other pieces just fall into place as a part of the process," commented Greg Abbott, Vice President of Engineering at Datalight. Modular Design The first version of the Datalight BIOS has more than 100 options, all well documented and easily understood. Modular in design, the Datalight BIOS allows developers to include only the portions of the BIOS required by the target system. While the minimum configuration is only 4KB, the full configuration is only 24KB. Datalight eliminated legacy code for peripherals no longer used in today's market, such as 360KB floppy disks, MFM (Modified Frequency Modulation) The magnetic disk encoding method used on most floppy disks and most earlier hard disks under 40MB. MFM has twice the capacity of the previous FM method, transfers data at 625 Kbytes per second and uses the ST506 interface. or RLL (Run Length Limited) An encoding method commonly used on magnetic disks, including RLL, IDE, SCSI, ESDI, SMD and IPI interfaces. The actual number of bits recorded on the disk is greater than the data bits. hard drives. Price and Availability The Datalight BIOS Development Kit is now available from Datalight for $5,000. Included are full source code, a Developer's Guide, the Borland Turbo Assembler and Paradigm DEBUG. Run-time license fees are $5 each in quantities of 500 units and $3 each in quantities of 5,000. Datalight has a reputation for providing high quality, cost-effective system software and uncompromising customer support and satisfaction. |
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