Chapter 3. C/C++ Development with Eclipse on Windows

So far we have set up our BeagleBoard and have been able to log in to it from the Windows 7 host PC. Now we can start building programs and applications using the BeagleBoard. Generally, we have two basic approaches for rapid prototyping:

• Textual programming using MATLAB: We develop our source code in MATLAB, generate C/C++ code, and compile them into the BeagleBoard-compatible executables. MATLAB does not provide the cross-compiler for BeagleBoard, so we need to manually set up an external cross-compiler (in this book, the Eclipse IDE and Sourcery CodeBench compiler).

• Graphical programming in Simulink: In this approach, we develop our program graphically in Simulink. The generated C/C++ code from Simulink are downloaded to and compiled natively on the BeagleBoard. Thus there is no need for an additional cross-compiler. Only the MATLAB/Simulink development environment is required.

If you are going for the graphical programming approach...