User manual

STice features UM0036
258/385 Doc ID 7705 Rev 11
9 STice features
The STice advanced emulation tool used in conjunction with STVD supports all of the
features supported by the EMU3 emulator, except advanced breakpoints and performance
analysis. Instead of performance analysis, it offers support for a comprehensive set of
coverage and profiling features.
In the STice features, there is a trace recording section dedicated to STM8 which is not
supported by EMU3.
For other emulator features, refer to the corresponding part in Section 10: EMU3 emulator
features:
● Section 10.7: Read/write on the fly
● Section 10.8: Performing automatic firmware updates
9.1 Trace recording
The STice advanced emulation system can hold 131072 hardware cycle records in a
physical memory module called the trace buffer. STVD’s Trace window allows you to view
recorded hardware cycles that have occurred during the execution of your application.
You can open the Trace window either by clicking on (the Trace window icon) in the View
toolbar, or from the main menu by selecting View > Trace.
Trace recording is activated from the Trace contextual menu. When activated, the Run,
Continue and Step commands prompt the trace buffer to save trace information until a
breakpoint is reached.
Only information obtained up until the occurrence of the last breakpoint is visible in the
Trace window.
The following sections provide information about:
● Trace buffer fields
● The commands in the Trace contextual menu
● Emulator commands
9.1.1 Trace buffer fields
The Trace window presents a table of 19 fields (plus the Symbol Bar) which together form a
single trace record.
At the left is the Symbol Bar (which has no column heading) followed in default order by
Record / PC / Instr event (instruction event) / Irq (interrupt request) / Hexa code
(hexadecimal code) / Disassembly / Symb Disass (symbolic disassembly) / R addr (read
address) / R value (read value) / R event (read event) / W addr (write address) / W value
(write value) / W event (write event) / Time (timestamp) / Time event (timestamp event) /
Trace event / Trig (trigger input) / AI (analyzer input) / BEM events.
Each is described individually hereafter.