ARM DS-5 Development Studio Extends Support for Functional Safety with LDRA’s MISRA Compliance Tools

ARM today announced the integration of industry-leading MISRA (Motor Industry Software Reliability Association) conformance tools into the ARM^® DS-5 Development Studio tool suite. The addition of a MISRA-checking capability to its TÜV-certified ARM Compiler and safety qualification kit makes DS-5 the ideal software development platform for ARM-based products in use in safety-critical markets such as automotive, healthcare and industrial automation.

LDRAlite™ for ARM DS-5 software is supplied by LDRA, a member of the MISRA Standards Committee. The company has been providing industry safety expertise for markets including avionics, automotive, medical, industrial, and rail for more than 40 years. The LDRAlite tool will be a key enabler for developers creating functional safety applications with the DS-5 Development Studio as it enables compliance with functional safety standards including ISO 26262 and IEC 61508. These standards, used widely in safety-critical applications in the automotive and industrial markets, recommend the use of the MISRA programming guidelines for C/C++ to improve software product quality, consistency, clarity, and maintainability.

To achieve MISRA compliance in these safety-critical markets cost-effectively, the LDRAlite MISRA checker automates the process of analyzing code to ensure adherence to the guidelines in the standard, saving time, energy and money compared with traditional manual inspection methods.

“The adoption of ARM technology in safety markets is growing strongly, supported by our expanding ecosystem of software and tools partners,” said Javier Orensanz, general manager, development solutions group, ARM. “The addition of LDRA technology to the ARM DS-5 Development Studio now offers an even more robust and integrated solution for safety-related development that spans static analysis, compilation and debug.”

LDRA’s MISRA conformance tools are TÜV-certified for safety-related software development according to IEC 61508, ISO 26262, IEC 62304, IEC 60880 and EN 50128. LDRAlite supports all current MISRA guidelines, including MISRA-C:1998/2004/2012 and auto-generated code from model-based design flows (MISRA-AC).

“Creating MISRA-compliant, high-quality software in an integrated design environment is crucial for safety-critical application development teams as it alleviates many common coding problems that could lead to system failure,” said Ian Hennell, operations director, LDRA. “Not only does LDRAlite provide unprecedented functional safety support for ARM’s DS-5 toolchain, it extends the implementation of the MISRA standard to a much broader set of applications and industries.”

LDRAlite strengthens the ARM-based functional safety qualification kit by augmenting the DS-5 TUV certified compiler and simplifying the end-product certification process. LDRAlite will be included with DS-5 starting from version 5.24 as a 30-day evaluation and can be converted to a full license through LDRA.