Limerick City, Ireland – April 25th, 2025. Ashling, a leading provider of embedded development tools, today unveiled its latest enhancement to their RiscFree Software Development Kit (SDK) which now encompasses a Visual Studio (VS) Code Extension with comprehensive support for the Agilex™ 5 FPGA family from Altera®. This update represents a significant step forward in facilitating advanced software development and debugging for the Agilex™ 5 FPGA Arm-based hard processors and Nios® V RISC-V-based soft processors, marking another milestone in the partnership between Ashling and Altera.
Available for easy download and installation from the Microsoft Visual Studio Marketplace, this Ashling-developed extension leverages the capabilities of Visual Studio Code—one of today’s leading source-code editors—and provides a comprehensive suite of features tailored to simplify and accelerate the software development process. It offers seamless integration with the Altera Quartus® Prime Design Software, efficient project management and build tools, and robust multi-core debugging support for Agilex FPGA Arm Cortex and Nios V processor cores simultaneously.
The Altera Agilex 5 FPGA family with its dual-core A55 and dual-core A76 Arm processors is optimized for high performance with lower power consumption. It features enhanced DSP capabilities and an AI Tensor block, positioning it as a mid-range FPGA solution ideal for a wide range of applications. The inclusion of Ashling’s RiscFree tools within Altera’s Quartus Prime Design Software underscores a shared commitment to easing the development process for engineers.
Hugh O’Keeffe, CEO of Ashling, expressed enthusiasm about the ongoing collaboration: “As one of the premier Arm and RISC-V toolchain providers, we are delighted to extend our partnership with Altera by providing their end users with easy access to VS Code’s advanced building and debugging tools including Docker Container support, innovative AI-powered coding features found in GitHub Copilot, and secure cloud-based development environments provided by GitHub Codespaces. Our tools are designed to accelerate the deployment of embedded software for FPGA-based solutions, and we are confident that this update will enhance the development experience and time to market for Altera’s customers.”
Daniel Michek, Director of Software and AI Marketing at Altera, highlighted the benefits for Altera’s customer base: “Ashling’s addition of VS Code Extension support to their RiscFree SDK reflects their continued focus on usability and developer productivity. By seamlessly integrating into cloud-based platforms like GitHub Codespaces, Agilex 5 FPGA users can now leverage a modern and flexible embedded software development workflow, reducing their time-to-market.”
As the embedded tools market continues to evolve, Ashling’s RiscFree SDK and VS Code Extension stand out for their ease of use, broad functionality, and modular architecture. This latest update reaffirms Ashling’s position as a preferred choice for software development in the Arm and RISC-V domains. For more details on the Agilex 5 FPGAs, see here, and further details on RiscFree are here, including details on support for all Altera Agilex, Stratix, Arria, and Cyclone FPGA devices.
Ashling has been a leading provider of Embedded Development Tools and Services since 1982, with design centers in Limerick, Ireland, and Cochin, India, and sales and support offices in Europe, Asia Pacific, the Middle East, and America. Visit www.ashling.com or contact info@ashling.com for more details.
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