ICEShield + Virtual Breadboard = Universal Shield

Created Mon, 04 Jun 2012 16:45:30 +0000 by Virtual Breadboard

Virtual Breadboard

Mon, 04 Jun 2012 16:45:30 +0000

Hi All,

I am pleased to introduce you to a new Shield we have just released called ICEShield.

ICEShield is an "In Circuit Emulator" of the Breadboard circuit.

Normally you might think of In-Circuit-Emulator as being an emulation of micro inside a real circuit. Well ICEShield sort of flips this around and instead creates an emulation of a breadboard circuit around a real micro. The circuit emulation executes in Virtual Breadboard but also the free VBBExpress and the real world interfacing is handled by the ICEShield.

The end result is a real micro and code running in a virtual circuit which makes ICEShield a kind of Universal Shield.

We have released an SDK for the Uno32 download here which contains the following examples

In addition the SDK contains a libraries folder containing 'VBB Aware' versions of ChipKit libraries and eventually other custom libraries to drive virtual parts.

You should Unzip the SDK folder into SketchBook location ( File->Preferences )

Each example contains a .pde file and .VBB file.

The .pde file you open with the mpide tool.

The .VBB File you can open with VBBExpress. You can download VBBExpress for free here.

You dont need to install VBBExpress, it is a stand-alone executable and should just run when you launch it ( it is a .NET Executable so you might need to install .net 2.0 runtime on older Xp machines). VBBExpress is also mono compatible so you can run it on linux/mac (but ICEShield only works on Windows so far ) if you have Mono installed.

Once you have started VBBExpress you should be able to open the .VBB files included with the Uno32SDK so you can preview them. To emulate the circuit you need the ICEShield and a Uno32 of course.

More info at [url]http://www.virtualbreadboard.com[/url]

ICEShield Product Overview

YouTube Demo of how it works ( Video shows Arduino but exact same idea)

As we add to the SDK I will update and maintain this post and try to answer any questions etc.

Regards, James Caska http://www.virtualbreadboard.com