Announcing VeriStand 2021 R3

[Brian.D]

It is my pleasure to announce the release of VeriStand 2021 R3 and related ecosystem packages and utilities. 

Release Notes | New Features

The minor version release includes several notable new features, including:

External Mode support for debugging Simulink Models

From MathWorks Simulink® , users can now connect to a .vsmodel running in VeriStand via External Mode. This first release of External Mode within VeriStand supports connecting via TCP/IP, and allows users to visualize signals and tune parameters from Simulink.

Note that this release does not support a workflow of deploying from Simulink. The model must still be deployed with VeriStand, and then a user can connect from Simulink to debug. The 1.2 version of the VeriStand Model Generation Support toolbox supports this functionality, and relevant documentation is available in the toolbox. 

Other notable improvements for CPU Models generated from Simulink (.vsmodel)

• Supports MATLAB 2022b
• Build models that contain parameters with the same name in different workspaces
• Build a subsystem independently 
• Build a model with a protected reference model

HDL Coder Support Package for NI FPGA Hardware

Building off of the preliminary release of the IP to FPGA Conversion Utility, this toolbox enables users to remain within Simulink and the HDL Coder Workflow Advisor to generate a bitfile from a Simulink model. This first release specifically supports the PXIe-7867 and PXIe-7868. Users can now take HDL Coder compatible models and directly compile a bitfile while remaining within Simulink, including the ability to map model port I/O to board I/O and registers (to expose as VeriStand channels). The resultant bitfile can then be imported into VeriStand with the FPGA Addon Custom Device. For more details on this toolbox, refer to the github repo and release. Note that the toolbox is also directly available in MATLAB's Addon Manager, as is the VeriStand Model Generation Support toolbox. 

Custom Device Releases and Enhancements

• AIM MIL-STD-1553: many enhancements to round out the support (see Github link for full list)
• Ballard ARINC 429, AIM ARINC 429, Ballard MIL-STD-1553: Improved performance, configuration options for decimation and asynchronous Rx execution, and new timing channels to aid with benchmarking and debugging of performance
• XCP or CCP Master Custom Device: Now packaged in the VeriStand Custom Device Feed.