RISC-V Debug System Overview shows the main components of Debug Support. Blocks shown in dotted lines are optional.
The user interacts with the Debug Host (e.g. laptop), which is running a debugger (e.g. gdb). The debugger communicates with a Debug Translator (e.g. OpenOCD, which may include a hardware driver) to communicate with Debug Transport Hardware (e.g. Olimex USB-JTAG adapter). The Debug Transport Hardware connects the Debug Host to the hardware platform’s Debug Transport Module (DTM). The DTM provides access to one or more Debug Modules (DMs) using the Debug Module Interface (DMI).
Each hart in the hardware platform is controlled by exactly one DM. Harts may be heterogeneous. There is no further limit on the hart-DM mapping, but usually all harts in a single core are controlled by the same DM. In most hardware platforms there will only be one DM that controls all the harts in the hardware platform.
DMs provide run control of their harts in the hardware platform. Abstract commands provide access to GPRs. Additional registers are accessible through abstract commands or by writing programs to the optional Program Buffer.
The Program Buffer allows the debugger to execute arbitrary instructions on a hart. This mechanism can also be used to access memory. An optional system bus access block allows memory accesses without using a RISC-V hart to perform the access.
Each RISC-V hart may implement a Trigger Module. When trigger conditions are met, harts will halt and inform the debug module that they have halted.
