Earlier this year, Renesas announced their RH850 microcontroller series aimed at automotive applications. The system on the chip supports instrument clusters and also includes a warp engine for a head-up display (HUD). Now Luxoft (a Swiss based software developer) has announced a partnership with Renesas that bundles their Luxoft’s Populus™ Suite human-machine interface (HMI) design tool chain to the RH850/D1x series microprocessors.
As Renesas pointed out, “Luxoft’s Populus™ Suite reduces both the time and cost of producing full-featured HMI’s and takes full advantage of RH850/D1x microcontroller’s embedded flash and RAM.” While the software supports all types of instrument clusters from single gauges to fully programmable TFT LCDs and even HUDs, the key is the faster development of a human machine interface specific to the respective model.
Source: Luxoft
According to Luxoft the Populus environment is specifically designed for operation using a low memory footprint. By addressing the specific features of the MCU, the Populus™ runtime engine enables the combination of high performance of the developed HMI with the very low memory consumption. The software suite also allows the rapid HMI development for in-vehicle infotainment systems, including digital instrument clusters, head-up displays and entry level to mid-tier head units.
With the increasing use of displays in the interior of automobiles, the differentiation of models and brands becomes more and more a question of display layout. Instead of specific gauges that carry the brand image, it is the software and imagery displayed on the TFT display. The differentiation between models can also be carried through various options in the display layout and as a reflection of installed options. The Luxoft software package is said to make the development of such menus easier and faster.
The Luxoft’s Populus Suite for Renesas RH850/D1x MCUs is currently available for testing and deployment. For more information including pricing and licensing, contact [email protected]. – The human machine interface is becoming increasingly important for the functionality of automobiles. (NH)
