We're porting a new operating system (Apache NuttX RTOS) to Pine64 PinePhone. And I wondered...
To make PinePhone testing easier...
Can we emulate Arm64 PinePhone with Unicorn Emulator?
Let's find out! We'll call the Unicorn Emulator in Rust (instead of C).
(Because I'm too old to write meticulous C... But I'm OK to get nagged by Rust Compiler if I miss something!)
We begin by emulating simple Arm64 Machine Code...
Suppose we wish to emulate some Arm64 Machine Code...
Here's our Rust Program that calls Unicorn Emulator to emulate the Arm64 Machine Code...
We add unicorn-engine to Cargo.toml...
And we run our Rust Program...
→ cargo run --verbose
Fresh cc v1.0.79
Fresh cmake v0.1.49
Fresh pkg-config v0.3.26
Fresh bitflags v1.3.2
Fresh libc v0.2.139
Fresh unicorn-engine v2.0.1
Fresh pinephone-emulator v0.1.0
Finished dev [unoptimized + debuginfo] target(s) in 0.08s
Running `target/debug/pinephone-emulator`
Our Rust Program works OK for emulating Arm64 Memory and Arm64 Registers.
Let's talk about Arm64 Memory-Mapped Input / Output...
How will we emulate Arm64 Memory-Mapped Input / Output?
Unicorn Emulator lets us attach hooks to Emulate Memory Access.
Here's a Hook Function for Memory Access...
Our Hook Function prints all Read / Write Access to Emulated Arm64 Memory.
This is how we attach the Hook Function to the Unicorn Emulator...
When we run our Rust Program, we see the Read and Write Memory Accesses made by our Emulated Arm64 Code...
hook_memory:
mem_type=WRITE,
address=0x10008,
size=4,
value=0x12345678
hook_memory:
mem_type=READ,
address=0x10008,
size=1,
value=0x0
This Memory Access Hook Function will be helpful when we emulate Memory-Mapped Input/Output on PinePhone.
(Like for the Allwinner A64 UART Controller)
Unicorn Emulator allows Code Execution Hooks too...
TODO: Call Unicorn Emulator to add Code Execution Hooks
TODO: Add hook
Output:
hook_code: address=0x10000, size=4
hook_code: address=0x10004, size=4
TODO: Emulate special Arm64 instructions
TODO: Call Unicorn Emulator to add Block Execution Hooks
TODO: Add hook
Output:
hook_block: address=0x10000, size=8
TODO: Trace the flow of Arm64 execution
TODO: Use Unicorn Emulation Hooks to emulate PinePhone's Allwinner A64 UART Controller
TODO: Emulate Apache NuttX NSH Shell on UART Controller
TODO: Emulate PinePhone's Allwinner A64 Display Engine. How to render the emulated graphics: Use Web Browser + WebAssembly + Unicorn.js? Will framebuffer emulation be slow?
TODO: Emulate Interrupts
TODO: Emulate Multiple CPUs
TODO: Emulate Memory Protection
TODO: What happens when we run Apache NuttX RTOS for PinePhone in Unicorn Emulator?
// Arm64 Memory Address where emulation starts
const ADDRESS: u64 = 0x40080000;
// Arm64 Machine Code for the above address
let arm64_code = include_bytes!("../nuttx/nuttx.bin");Here's the output...
hook_block: address=0x40080000, size=8
hook_code: address=0x40080000, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080004, size=4
hook_block: address=0x40080040, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080040, size=4
hook_block: address=0x40080044, size=12
hook_code: address=0x40080044, size=4
hook_memory: address=0x400801a8, size=8, mem_type=READ, value=0x0
hook_code: address=0x40080048, size=4
hook_memory: address=0x400801b0, size=8, mem_type=READ, value=0x0
hook_code: address=0x4008004c, size=4
hook_block: address=0x40080118, size=16
hook_code: address=0x40080118, size=4
hook_code: address=0x4008011c, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080120, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080124, size=4
hook_block: address=0x40080128, size=8
hook_code: address=0x40080128, size=4
hook_code: address=0x4008012c, size=4
hook_block: address=0x40080130, size=8
hook_code: address=0x40080130, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080134, size=4
hook_block: address=0x4008015c, size=12
hook_code: address=0x4008015c, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080160, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080164, size=4
hook_block: address=0x40080168, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080168, size=4
hook_block: address=0x4008016c, size=8
hook_code: address=0x4008016c, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080170, size=4
hook_block: address=0x40080174, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080174, size=4
hook_block: address=0x40080178, size=8
hook_code: address=0x40080178, size=4
hook_code: address=0x4008017c, size=4
hook_block: address=0x40080050, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080050, size=4
hook_block: address=0x400801e8, size=4
hook_code: address=0x400801e8, size=4
hook_block: address=0x40080054, size=12
hook_code: address=0x40080054, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080058, size=4
hook_memory: address=0x400801b8, size=8, mem_type=READ, value=0x0
hook_code: address=0x4008005c, size=4
hook_block: address=0x40080180, size=12
hook_code: address=0x40080180, size=4
hook_memory: address=0x400ab000, size=1, mem_type=READ, value=0x0
hook_code: address=0x40080184, size=4
hook_code: address=0x40080188, size=4
hook_block: address=0x4008018c, size=8
hook_code: address=0x4008018c, size=4
hook_memory: address=0x400c3ff0, size=8, mem_type=WRITE, value=0x0
hook_memory: address=0x400c3ff8, size=8, mem_type=WRITE, value=0x40080060
hook_code: address=0x40080190, size=4
hook_block: address=0x400801f0, size=16
hook_code: address=0x400801f0, size=4
hook_memory: address=0x40080208, size=8, mem_type=READ, value=0x0
hook_code: address=0x400801f4, size=4
hook_memory: address=0x01c28014, size=2, mem_type=READ_UNMAPPED, value=0x0
thread 'main' panicked at 'assertion failed: `(left == right)`
left: `Ok(29523968)`,
right: `Ok(120)`', src/main.rs:74:5