Exposing non-standard architectures to embedded software using compile-time virtualisation

Abstract

The architectures of embedded systems are often application-specific, containing multiple heterogenous cores, non-uniform memory, on-chip networks and custom hardware elements (e.g. DSP cores). Standard programming languages do not use these many of these features natively because they assume a traditional single processor and a single logical address space abstraction that hides these architectural details. This paper describes Compile-Time Virtualisation, a technique which uses a virtualisation layer to map software onto the target architecture whilst allowing the programmer to control the virtualisation mappings in order to effectively exploit custom architectures.