News & Press

Santa Barbara, CA. February 26, 2001 - Green Hills Software today announced that it will be providing the software development tools and real-time operating system (RTOS) for selected Hewlett-Packard Company inkjet printers and all-in-one devices. Specifically, Green Hills will provide a bundled solution comprising the MULTI® 2000 Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and Express Logic's ThreadX® RTOS.

"We are extremely pleased that the ThreadX RTOS and MULTI IDE will be included in HP's new inkjet printers and all-in-one devices," said John Carbone, vice president of marketing at Green Hills Software. "MULTI's easy-to-use development facilities, coupled with ThreadX's small size, fast response, and low cost provide an ideal solution for consumer and business products like HP's printers and all-in-one devices."

"We selected the MULTI IDE and ThreadX RTOS because the solution supports multiple CPUs and host environments," said Phil McCoog, engineer scientist, HP's Vancouver Division. "Additionally, the MULTI IDE provides advanced debug capabilities that greatly simplify the development process."

ThreadX is the most technically advanced real-time multitasking solution for deeply embedded applications on the market today. Utilizing a picokernel™ design with fast timers and a high-speed preemption-threshold mechanism, ThreadX delivers sub-microsecond context switching and occupies just five kbytes for a minimum footprint. ThreadX also features a simple, intuitive API with low-overhead services that make it easy and efficient to port code originally developed for other RTOSs. ThreadX is available royalty-free with source code.

The MULTI IDE, together with Green Hills Software's family of optimizing C, C++, and EC++ compilers, automates all aspects of software development for 32-bit and 64-bit processors. Available for Windows and Unix host platforms, the MULTI IDE features a colorizing, auto-formatting editor, source-level debugger, graphical program builder, run-time error checker, version control system, performance profiler, and RTOS EventAnalyzer. MULTI also features an instruction set simulator that allows programmers to develop and test code on their host platform, without the need for target hardware.

The heart of the MULTI environment is its source-level debugger, which features incremental debug capability and supports both process- and system-level debug. The debugger provides a separate window for each process, supports mixed assembly and high-level language formats, includes a language-sensitive expression evaluator, and provides special support for C++ (such as a Class Browser, object display and template debug capability).

Express Logic and Green Hills Software joined forces to integrate ThreadX support directly into the MULTI IDE, enabling it to provide comprehensive task- and kernel-aware debugging. The ThreadX-aware MULTI IDE can display multiple tasks ("threads") graphically, including the thread roster, system objects, stack usage, semaphore usage and status, and a variety of other thread- and system-specific information.

MULTI's EventAnalyzer builds on the debugger's real-time capabilities, graphically displaying system and application events on an expandable timeline in real time. Operating like a "Software Logic Analyzer," the EventAnalyzer GUI displays all context switches, ThreadX API calls, and interrupts in a time-relative manner using intuitive icons.

The MULTI IDE features the industry's most advanced optimizing compilers. The scaleable C/C++ compiler enables programmers to select any subset of C++ they want, from bare bones C, to full-blown ANSI/ISO C++. The compiler also supports Embedded C++ (EC++), a dialect of C++ optimized for resource-constrained embedded applications that achieves the efficiency of C while preserving many of the best object-oriented features of C++.

More On Express Logic

Headquartered in San Diego, CA, Express Logic provides embedded developers with the most advanced run-time solutions for deeply embedded applications, including the popular ThreadX RTOS. All products from Express Logic are offered with full source-code and without any run-time royalties. For more information about Express Logic solutions, please browse www.expresslogic.com.

More On Green Hills Software

Incorporated in 1982, Green Hills Software, Inc., is a leading supplier of royalty-free real-time operating systems and software development tools for 32- and 64-bit embedded systems. Green Hills solutions include the royalty-free ThreadX® real-time operating system, fully integrated with its market leading compilers and MULTI® Integrated Development Environment, and provide a total development and run-time solution that addresses both deeply embedded and maximum reliability applications. Green Hills Software is headquartered in Santa Barbara, CA, with European headquarters in the United Kingdom. For more information on Green Hills Software products, please call 1-805-965-6044 or email inquiries to sales@ghs.com. http://www.ghs.com.

Green Hills Software and MULTI are registered trademarks of Green Hills Software, Inc., ThreadX is a registered trademark of Express Logic, Inc.