Generate Target Files

Audio Weaver can generate “Target Files” that can be used with your AWE Core integration. For example, you can compile your Audio Weaver layout to “.aws” which will be a list of all the Server commands that make up your design. You can also generate an “.awb” which is a compiled, binary version of your design that can be stored and executed on your target system.

To generate target files, first create a valid design and then select the ‘Tools → Generate Target Files’ menu item. A dialog box will appear and prompt you to choose which files you would like to generate, and where you would like to put them. The “Enable Audio” checkbox will append an audio_pump command to your .AWB and .AWS in case you want to load the design but start the audio processing with a separate server command (for example, start the audio when a button is pressed).

The .h and .c files are used by the target application to load and control the signal processing layout when operating in standalone mode. The .tsf file is used to connect AWE Designer to a target that is running in standalone mode. For more information about how to use these target files, please see the AWE Core 8 Integration Guide.

Attach to Running Target

In some cases, a target may be running a layout that was not loaded via Designer. This may occur, for example, in production hardware where the layout is loaded locally on the target hardware. Designer can still connect and manipulate the layout without interrupting the ongoing processing if a tuning interface is available, and if the .awd and .tsf file (generated via the Generate Target Files dialog described above) for the system are known. This can be extremely useful for troubleshooting.

To Attach to Running Target, load the .awd and generate the tuning symbol (.tsf) file using Designer’s “Tools/Generate Target File” menu item. Connect to the target using the Server’s “Target” menu. Then use Designer’s “Tools/Attach to Running Target” menu item to complete the process.

The layout on the target can now be tuned as if you had loaded it via Designer.

When you are done tuning, the target can be detached by selecting Designer’s “Tools/Detach from Target” menu item.

Module Testing

Module regression tests can be run by selecting the “Tools/Module Tests” menu item. If the ‘Test Modules Used in Layout’ option is selected, the module tests will be run with the exact module configurations used in the layout. This type of testing, called System Test, can be useful to validate that the layout will behave as expected on the attached target.

To run the standard module regression tests on the attached target, the ‘Select Module Group’ dropdown can be used to select which module pack or packs to test. Subsets of the module packs can be run by selecting and de-selecting specific modules in the generated list.

After selecting the “Start Test” button, the tests will execute and results will appear in the “Results” pane. Results can be saved to a .csv file using the ‘Save Results’ button.

Real-Time Profiling

When a layout is running, its computation and memory usage can be measured by selecting the ‘Tools 🡪 Profile Running Layout’ menu item. This will pop up a dialog displaying fine grained profiling information for the entire layout and for each module.

Manual Profiling

In addition to the real-time profiling offered by Profile Running Layout menu, Designer also provides the ‘Tools 🡪 Manual Profile Layout’ tool. The Manual Profiling tool  manually pumps each sublayout in a design with tuning commands, which does not rely on any real-time audio interrupts. Collecting data in this way allows for more accurate profiling in certain situations:

• Multi-rate Layouts (multiple clockdividers). Because each clockdivided sublayout is typically called in its own thread, the pre-emption of lower priority threads can introduce double-counting while profiling a multi-rate layouts in real time. This can lead to over-estimates of CPU load for sublayouts. Manual profiling pumps each sublayout independently so no pre-emption can occur.

• If a layout is exceeding 100% CPU load. Traditional profiling can be inaccurate in this case since audio frames are being missed and not counted towards overall cycles. Since there is no timing requirement when manually pumping layouts, manual profiling can provide accurate CPU loads greater than 100%.

• If real-time audio is not available on the connected target. This happens most often when the firmware for the target is still under development, but the CPU load required by a layout needs to be known. Only a tuning interface is required on the target for the Manual Profiling tool to measure CPU load.

Additionally, the Manual Profiling tool allows the user to input an audio file in order to profile the layout under specific scenarios. Both real-time and manual profiling results can be saved to file for later use using the ‘Export to File’ button. Results will be refreshed using the ‘Refresh’ button.

Show Unsaved Changes

To see all the changes since the last save, select ‘Tools Show Unsaved Changes’ for a display using the diff tool the you set in the ‘Global Preferences’ Dialog.

Compare Layouts

Two layouts can be compared by selecting the ‘Tools → Compare Layouts’ menu item and selecting the awd files associated with the layouts.

Diffing Systems

Audio Weaver layouts can also be compared using a ‘diffing’ capability. This can be useful for example to figure out changes between different versions of a layout during the design and tuning process. This functionality requires a Diff tool like WinMerge, to be installed. First specify your Diff tool under the ‘File → Global Preferences’ menu item, then use the menu item ‘File → Compare Systems’ to make the comparison between two different layouts.

Another way to diff systems is to save the layouts in .AWJ format. Because .AWJs are plaintext JSON representations of a layout, any diff tool or text editor can be used to spot the delta between systems.

Measurements

Many modules have associated frequency responses. The measurement dialog measures the composite frequency response between two points in your signal processing layout. To set up a measurement, first place marker modules at the beginning and end points of the desired measurement path in the layout.

Then select the ‘Tools Measurement New Measurement’ menu item to get to the measurement dialog.

Here you can select all the properties of the measurement display. When you push the OK button, an editable measurement graph will be displayed.

Tuning Interface Test

This function performs diagnostic measurements on the tuning interface that carries commands from the AWE Server to the target. This is handy to have when porting AWE Core to a new target. The functionality can be accessed via the ‘Tools Tuning Interface Test’ menu item. Test results indicate the interface speed under various conditions. For more information, see the DSP Concepts user forum.

Flash Manager Tool

The Flash Manager tool, which is delivered as part of the AWE Server, enables users to easily add and remove Audio Weaver Binary files (*.awb) on targets that support flash file systems. Once added to flash, the .awb file will be loaded by the AWE Core at boot-time and the target can run in stand-alone operation. See the next section ‘Using the Flash Manager’ for instructions on how to do this.

Note that another alternative for stand-alone operation is to store the .awb contents in a C array and compile it into an application directly. This method can be used on targets with or without a flash file system. For more information on this, see Standalone Operation.

Using the Flash Manager Tool

1. Generate an .awb file for your desired Audio Weaver design (.awd) in Designer by going to ‘Tools -> Generate Target Files’.

   

2. Select ‘AWB’ target file type and choose the directory to which the .awb file will be saved.  Change the ‘Save Basename’ field to a name that is less the 16 characters, then hit the “Generate” button.  It will then start compiling the system for creation of the .awb file. 

   

3. Once the .awb file has been successfully generated, the following window will appear:

   

4. In AWE Server, select ‘Target -> Change Connection’ and connect to your target with the appropriate option.

5. In AWE Server, select ‘Flash -> Flash Manager’.  Then press “Add File” button.

6. Browse to the previously-created .awb file and select it as the input file.  Ensure that the file type is “Compiled Script” and check the box next to “Boot file” to designate this file to be used at boot-up (attribute = 26). Click the “Add” button to load the file into memory.

   

7. Once the progress completes, click “OK”.

   

8. After the file has been added, it will show up in the list “Flash file system on target” in the Flash Manager window. When you reset your target hardware and reconnect AWE Server to it, you should see a non-zero CPU % and heap allocated in the AWE Server, which indicates that the layout is indeed running.

   

Overflow Detection

On certain targets, AWE Core will detect any overflow conditions while a layout is running and present this information in AWE Server. An “overflow” occurs when the previous pump is not completed before attempting to schedule the next pump. The overflow logic is capable of detecting overflows in any of the sublayouts in a multi-rate layout.

When an overflow is detected, the AWE server is notified through the tuning interface, and the following indicators are updated in AWE Server.

• The CPU usage progress bar will turn Red, indicating that the CPU usage has exceeded 100 %. If the overflow condition is transient in nature, it is possible that the cpu bar may not show this condition.

• The overflow detection LED (red dot) in the top right corner turns ON. The LED will stay ON until the Design is stopped, thus alerting the user of the overflow in the current run.

• The CPU overflows counter on the top right corner counts the number of overflows detected across the layout (including clock divided sublayouts) until the Design is stopped. This count indicates that one or more overflows happened since the last time AWE Server queried the target for profiling values (by default this is done at 10 Hz). In theory the server could have missed some overflow events occurring at the target between the last query and the current query. As a result, this counter may not reflect the exact number of overflows occurring on the target.

Processing Files Menu

The file processing tool can be used to send audio data through a layout and record the output. This feature is useful for batch processing audio files and for quickly testing the output of your audio system. This tool will process files as quickly as possible, so operations are typically faster than real-time. Even more processing speed can sometime be achieved by increasing the block size in your layout.