Debug descriptions allow silicon vendors to create tool-agnostic debug and trace configurations so that the development environment settings can be reduced to simple checkboxes for selecting for example either standard run/stop debugging or complex instruction tracing.

Concept

A set of standardized debug and trace methods are automatically executed by the debugger:

Setting breakpoints and watchpoints
Reading memory and registers
Starting and stopping trace

Implementation-specific steps can be described using an XML syntax:

Special hardware reset
Trace buffer setup
Patch silicon issues

Debug description elements

A complete debug description for a device consists of the following elements:

debug with the child element dbg_datapatch contains settings for the debug connection and for fixing silicon issues in software.
debugconfig provides the default debugger configuration for a target connection.
debugvars specifies global debug access variables. They can be used in addition to pre-defined variables in order to query settings from a debug access sequences.
debugport with the child elements dp_jtag, dp_swd, and dp_cjtag describes the debug port in detail.
sequences with the child elements sequence, seq_control, and seq_block creates a configuration for debug access sequences.
trace with the child elements trace_serialwire, trace_traceport, and trace_tracebuffer sets up the trace connection.

For more information, refer to the Debug access sequences.