Hardware-Near Programming in the Common Language Infrastructure

Abstract

Virtual machine-based programming languages, such as Java and C # have made the programming of desktop computer systems simpler, less error-prone and more efficient. Embedded systems development rarely benefits from this advantages. This is because the disciplines special needs, such as direct hardware access and timelininess, are rarely considered in in these environments. In particular, virtual machines usually do not allow for accessing hardware directly, making it impossible to express substantial parts of embedded systems inside the virtual environment. By specifying additional rules, describing an implementation of a conforming compiler, and presenting examples, we show how the virtual machine defined by the ECMA standard 335 can be carefully extended to support hardware-near programming.

An Experimental Environment Validating the Suitability of CLI as an Effective Deployment Format for Embedded Systems

“…While we priviledged programming embedded systems in C, using CLI as an intermediate format, Richter et al [21] proposed to extend CLI with attributes to be able to express low-level concepts in C#. They encapsulate in CLI classes the notions of direct hardware access, interrupt handler and concurrency.…”