Board 58: Work in Progress: Iron Coder: An Integrated Development Environment for Embedded Development in Rust

Carsten Monrad Thue-Bludworth; Jeremiah J Blanchard

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Conference: 2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: Portland, Oregon
Publication Date: June 23, 2024
Start Date: June 23, 2024
End Date: July 12, 2024
Conference Session: Computers in Education Division (COED) Poster Session
Tagged Division: Computers in Education Division (COED)
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/47055

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Paper Authors

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Carsten Monrad Thue-Bludworth University of Florida

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Carsten Thue-Bludworth is the Computer Engineering Lab Manager at the University of Florida. His interests and passions lie in the design and prototyping of cyber-physical systems, and how to develop effective tools for teaching computer engineering concepts.

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Jeremiah J Blanchard University of Florida orcid.org/0000-0003-2995-5102

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Jeremiah Blanchard is an Assistant Engineer at the University of Florida in the Computer & Information Science & Engineering Department, where he teaches and conducts research in computer science education. Previously, he served as Program Director of Gam

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Abstract

Iron Coder is an integrated development environment for the development of embedded firmware in the Rust programming language, designed with a focus on ease of use. Embedded devices can serve as hands-on platforms that engage those who use them, and thus play an important role in computing education; however, these same devices also pose a significant barrier to entry due to the wide variety of hardware options, complexity of the toolchains and libraries needed to program them, and enigmatic nature of documentation. Platforms such as Arduino, CircuitPython, and Raspberry Pi, among others, have redefined who is able to work with embedded systems by providing developers with an all-in-one hardware-software system that addresses these challenges. Iron Coder provides this approachability for the Rust language by allowing programmers to graphically define the hardware architecture of their system, assist in generating and validating the associated firmware, linking to related library crates, and providing example code and platform-specific tools for development. The tool’s design is oriented towards students and hobbyists, whose primary concerns are ease of use, community support, and a rewarding experience that builds intuition. By decreasing the barrier to entry for embedded Rust, our hope is to increase the language’s adoption in academia, industry, and hobby use, resulting in the fulfillment of the language’s promise as a safe, robust, and performant platform for embedded systems.

With its integration of hardware and software elements, Iron Coder enables the creation of a cohesive, streamlined experience for educators and students in computer engineering fields such as robotics, IoT, and autonomous systems. Beyond this, the platform has potential as a research tool to study the ways in which students learn computer engineering material, especially at the hardware-software interface.

Iron Coder is designed to target all major operating systems as well as WebAssembly, with smooth operation even on low-power devices such as single-board computers. Additionally, the tool is designed to continue to grow via community-driven support – the project is open-source and hosted on GitHub, open to public contributions, and will grow as community members add support for additional hardware platforms. Iron Coder development is ongoing, with involvement of undergraduate computer engineering students at the University of XXX. Features and documentation that will allow for further community engagement are underway, and the long-term goal of the project is to become a popular and useful tool among open-source development environments, especially in an educational setting.

Citation
Format

Thue-Bludworth, C. M., & Blanchard, J. J. (2024, June), Board 58: Work in Progress: Iron Coder: An Integrated Development Environment for Embedded Development in Rust Paper presented at 2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Portland, Oregon. https://peer.asee.org/47055

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - Iron Coder is an integrated development environment for the development of embedded firmware in the Rust programming language, designed with a focus on ease of use. Embedded devices can serve as hands-on platforms that engage those who use them, and thus play an important role in computing education; however, these same devices also pose a significant barrier to entry due to the wide variety of hardware options, complexity of the toolchains and libraries needed to program them, and enigmatic nature of documentation. Platforms such as Arduino, CircuitPython, and Raspberry Pi, among others, have redefined who is able to work with embedded systems by providing developers with an all-in-one hardware-software system that addresses these challenges. Iron Coder provides this approachability for the Rust language by allowing programmers to graphically define the hardware architecture of their system, assist in generating and validating the associated firmware, linking to related library crates, and providing example code and platform-specific tools for development. The tool’s design is oriented towards students and hobbyists, whose primary concerns are ease of use, community support, and a rewarding experience that builds intuition. By decreasing the barrier to entry for embedded Rust, our hope is to increase the language’s adoption in academia, industry, and hobby use, resulting in the fulfillment of the language’s promise as a safe, robust, and performant platform for embedded systems.

With its integration of hardware and software elements, Iron Coder enables the creation of a cohesive, streamlined experience for educators and students in computer engineering fields such as robotics, IoT, and autonomous systems. Beyond this, the platform has potential as a research tool to study the ways in which students learn computer engineering material, especially at the hardware-software interface.

Iron Coder is designed to target all major operating systems as well as WebAssembly, with smooth operation even on low-power devices such as single-board computers. Additionally, the tool is designed to continue to grow via community-driven support – the project is open-source and hosted on GitHub, open to public contributions, and will grow as community members add support for additional hardware platforms. Iron Coder development is ongoing, with involvement of undergraduate computer engineering students at the University of XXX. Features and documentation that will allow for further community engagement are underway, and the long-term goal of the project is to become a popular and useful tool among open-source development environments, especially in an educational setting.

AU  - Carsten Monrad Thue-Bludworth
AU  - Jeremiah J Blanchard
CY  - Portland, Oregon
DA  - 2024/06/23
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Board 58: Work in Progress: Iron Coder: An Integrated Development Environment for Embedded Development in Rust
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/47055
ER  -