AWE uses Adacore development environment

This brings the high-level language benefits of Ada to the embedded systems community, which requires low-power and small-memory devices, easing the job of developing safety-critical and high-security embedded applications.

The first user of Gnat Pro for AVR will be the UK's Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE).

AWE is a long-standing Ada user and Gnat Pro's support for the AVR processor will enable AWE to extend its Ada usage to new projects.

Gnat Pro for AVR offers the features and functionalities of Gnat Pro's existing High Integrity Edition.

It comes with a zero footprint run-time library that is adapted to meet the small-memory constraints of the AVR microcontroller.

Gnat Pro for AVR demonstrates the suitability of the Ada programming language for safety-critical development for architectures ranging from 8-bit to 32-bit and 64-bit processors.

Atmel's AVR microcontroller handles demanding 8-bit applications.

With a single cycle instruction RISC CPU, Picopower technology and a rich feature set, the AVR architecture ensures fast code execution combined with low power consumption.

'Following an extensive evaluation, we decided to standardise on Ada as our development language of choice due to its early error detection and its support for our safety-critical, high-reliability requirements,' said a spokesperson for the UK Atomic Weapons Establishment.