A new strategic alliance between Zeligsoft Inc. and Harris Corp. has resulted in a complete Software Communications Architecture (SCA)-based design and development environment for developers of software-defined radio (SDR). This is the first time a tools vendor has joined forces with a SCA core framework vendor to offer a complete SCA-aware development environment, according to the partners.

Under the agreement, Zeligsoft will distribute the Windows version of Harris' Domain Management ToolKit (dmTK) SCA core framework (CF), a proven SCA operating environment. Zeligsoft will also provide push-button code generation of SCA component implementations specific to the Harris operating environment, and the two companies will collaborate closely to offer a single, seamless procurement and technical support interface for customers.

Up until now, developers of SDR had to spend a significant amount of time at the beginning of a project procuring a hardware platform and analyzing the middleware they needed for their lab prototyping activities.Before even proving a design concept, designers had to evaluate and choose their CORBA (Common Object Request Broker Architecture) and their SCA core framework for both development and field deployment. sorting out these complex issues and making these decisions up-front unnecessarily complicated and delayed projects. The Zeligsoft-Harris product integration allows SDR development projects to safely defer this process by providing a complete middleware suite (Harris Core Framework + CORBA environment), coupled with comprehensive development tools, for rapid prototyping and test deployment of SDRs conforming to the SCA.

A key component of the Zeligsoft-Harris solution is the pre-integrated PC Core Framework-designed to save developers substantial amounts of time. This desktop development and testing environment closely matches the embedded target to allow for seamless evolution onto actual radio hardware. Upon completion of the development project, the radio application is easily ported to the embedded system CF of choice for field deployment.

"As an SCA-enabled COTS system vendor having established relationships with Zeligsoft and Harris, we anticipate that this new alliance will lead to an even better out-of-box experience for customers on our joint product offerings," said Rob Kraft, product manager, Spectrum Signal Processing. "One package provides the project team with a proven SCA development tool and a proven Core Framework. The solution is expected to accelerate application prototyping and help customers get from the lab to deployment much more quickly."

"The dmTK is the first Commercial-off-the-Shelf (COTS) Core Framework solution. The product runs on both embedded targets and development hosts, supporting Windows, Linux, Integrity and VxWorks operating systems," said Vince Kovarik, dmTK product manager, Harris Corporation's Government Communications Systems Division (GCSD).