20-4	Operating the Trace System from System Console	UG-VIPSUITE
			2015.01.23

Signal		Direction		Description
capturen_startofpacket		Input		capturen port Avalon-ST startofpacket signal.
				This signal marks the start of an Avalon-ST packet.
capturen_valid		Input		capturen port Avalon-ST valid signal. The IP core
				asserts this signal when it produces data.
controln_address		Output		controln slave port Avalon-MM address bus. This
				bus specifies a byte address in the Avalon-MM
				address space.
controln_burstcount		Output		controln slave port Avalon-MM burstcount signal.
				This signal specifies the number of transfers in each
				burst.
controln_byteenable		Output		controln slave port Avalon-MM byteenable bus.
controln_debugaccess		Output		controln slave port Avalon-MM debugaccess signal.
controln_read		Output		controln slave port Avalon-MM read signal. The IP
				core asserts this signal to indicate read requests from
				the master to the system interconnect fabric.
controln_readdata		Input		controln slave port Avalon-MM readdata bus.
				These input lines carry data for read transfers.
controln_readdatavalid		Input		controln slave port Avalon-MM readdatavalid
				signal. The system interconnect fabric asserts this
				signal when the requested read data has arrived.
controln_write		Output		controln slave port Avalon-MM write signal. The IP
				core asserts this signal to indicate write requests from
				the master to the system interconnect fabric.
controln_writedata		Output		controln slave port Avalon-MM write signal. The IP
				core uses these input lines for write transfers.
controln_waitrequest		Input		controln slave port Avalon-MM waitrequest signal.
				The system interconnect fabric asserts this signal to
				cause the master port to wait.

Operating the Trace System from System Console

System Console provides a GUI and a TCL-scripting API that you can use to control the trace system.

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Loading the Project and Connecting to the Hardware

20-5

To start System Console, do one of the following steps:

•Run system-console from the command line.

•In Qsys, on the Tools menu, select Systems Debugging Tools > System Console.

•In the Quartus II software, on the Tools menu, select Transceiver Toolkit. Note: Close the transceiver toolkit panes within System Console.

Loading the Project and Connecting to the Hardware

To connect to the Trace System, System Console needs access to the hardware and to the information about what the board does.

To enable access for System Console, follow these steps:

1.Connect to the host.

•Connect the On-Board USB-Blaster II to the host with the USB cable.

•Connect the JTAG pins to the host with a USB-Blaster, Ethernet Blaster, or a similar cable.

2.Start System Console and make sure that it detects your device.

The figure below shows the System Explorer pane with the connections and devices folders expanded, with an On-Board USB-Blaster II cable connected. The individual connections appear in the connections folder, in this case the JTAG connection and the direct USB connections provided by the USB-Blaster II. System Console discovers which connections go to the same device and creates a node in the devices folder for each unique device which visible at any time. If both connections go to the same device, then the device only appears once.

3. Load your design into System Console.

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	20-6	Trace Within System Console	UG-VIPSUITE
			2015.01.23

•In the System Console window, on the File menu, select Load Design. Open the Quartus II Project File (.qpf) for your design.

•From the System Console TCL shell, type the following command:

[design_load</path/to/project.qpf>]

You will get a full list of loaded designs by opening the designs’ node within the System Explorer pane on the System Console window, or by typing the following command on the System Console TCL shell:

[get_service_paths design]

4.After loading your design, link it to the devices detected by System Console.

•In the System Console window, right click on the device folder, and click Link device to. Then select your uploaded design. If your design has a JTAG USERCODE, System Console is able to match it to the device and automatically links it after design is loaded.

Note: To set a JTAG USERCODE, in the Quartus II software, under Device Assignments menu, click Device and Pin Options > General Category, and turn on Auto Usercode.

•From the System Console TCL shell, type the following command to manually link the design:

[design_link <design> <device>]

Note: Both <design> and <device> are System Console paths as returned by, for example:

[lindex [get_service_paths design] 0].

When the design is loaded and linked, the nodes representing the Trace System and the monitors are visible.

Trace Within System Console

When System Console detects a trace system, the Tools menu shows Trace Table View. Select this option to display the trace table view configuration dialogue box.

Each detected trace system contains an entry at the Select hardware drop down menu. Select one of them and the available settings for its monitors will display. Each type of monitor provides a different set of settings, which can be changed by clicking on the Value column.

Figure 20-2: Trace Control Bar Icons

The figure shows the trace control bar, which lets you control the acquisition of data through the trace system.

START

PAUSE

FILTER CONTROL

EXPORT

	SETTINGS		STOP	SAVE	FILTER
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Table 20-3: Functions of Trace Control Bar Icons

The table lists the trace control bar, which lets you control the acquisition of data through the trace system.

Icon		Function
Settings		Displays the configuration dialog box again.
Start		Tells the trace system to start acquiring data. Data is displayed in the
		table view as soon as possible after it is acquired.
Stop		Stops acquiring data.
Pause		Stops the display from updating data, but does not affect data acquisi
		tion. If you want to examine some data for a length of time, it good to
		pause so that your data is not aged out of the underlying database.
Save		Saves the raw captured data as a trace database file. You can reload this
		file using the Open file icon in the configuration dialogue.
Filter Control		Lets you filter the captured items to be displayed, but it does not affect
		acquisition. The filter accepts standard regular expression syntax—you
		can use filters such as blue/white to select either color.
Filter		Opens the filter settings dialogue, that allows you to select the parts of
		the captured data you want to display.
Export		Exports a text file containing the current contents of the trace table
		view. Filters affect the contents of this file.

TCL Shell Commands

You can control the Trace System IP core components from the TCL scripting interface using trace service.

Table 20-4: Trace System Commands

Command		Arguments		Function
get_service_paths		trace		Returns the System Console names for all the
				Trace System IP core components which are
				currently visible.
claim_service		trace		Opens a connection to the specified trace
				service so it can be used. Returns a new path
		<service_path>		to the opened service.
		<library_name>
close_service		trace		Closes the service so that its resources can be
		<open_service>		reused.
trace_get_monitors		<open_service>		Returns a list of monitor IDs—one for each
				monitor that is available on this trace system.

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	20-8	TCL Shell Commands	UG-VIPSUITE
			2015.01.23

Command		Arguments		Function
trace_get_monitor_info		<open_service>		Returns a serialized array containing
				information about the specified monitor. You
		<monitor_id>		can use the array set command to convert this
				into a TCL array.
trace_read_monitor		<open_service>		Reads a 32-bit value from configuration space
		<monitor_id>		within the specified monitor.
		<index>
trace_write_monitor		<open_service>		Writes a 32-bit value from configuration
		<monitor_id>		space within the specified monitor.
		<index>
		<value>
trace_get_max_db_size		<open_service>		Gets the maximum (in memory) trace
				database size set for this trace system. If the
				trace database size exceeds this value, then
				the oldest values are discarded.
trace_set_max_db_size		<open_service>		Returns the current maximum trace database
				size. Trace database sizes are approximate but
		<size>		can be used to prevent a high data rate
				monitor from using up all available memory.
trace_start		<open_service>		Starts capturing with the specified trace
		fifo		system in real time (FIFO) mode.
trace_stop		<open_service>		Stops capturing with the specified trace
				system.
trace_get_status		<open_service>		Returns the current status (idle or running)
				of the trace system. In future, new status
				values may be added.
trace_get_db_size		<open_service>		Returns the approximate size of the database
				for the specified trace system.
trace_save		<open_service>		Saves the trace database to disk.
		<filename>

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UG-VIPSUITE					TCL Shell Commands	20-9
2015.01.23
	Command		Arguments		Function
	trace_load		<filename>		Loads a trace database from disk. This returns
					a new service path, which can be viewed as if
					it is a trace system. However, at this point, the
					start, stop and other commands will
					obviously not work on a file-based node.
					If you load a new trace database with the
					trace_load command, the trace user
					interface becomes visible if it was previously
					hidden.

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