RISC-V Software Ecosystem Overview

This document captures the status of the RISC-V Software Ecosystem. Please add to the list and fix inaccuracies by making a Pull Request against the software list repository on GitHub.

• Simulators
• Object toolchain
• Debugging
• C compilers and libraries
• Boot loaders and monitors
• Hypervisor and related tools
• OS and OS kernels
• Compilers and runtimes for other languages
• IDEs
• Security
• Machine Learning / AI

We would like to enlist community help for the software ports in the Help Wanted section.

Simulators

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
DBT-RISE-RISCV	github	BSD 3-Clause	MINRES Technologies
FireSim	website, mailing list, github, ISCA 2018 Paper	BSD	Sagar Karandikar, Howard Mao, Donggyu Kim, David Biancolin, Alon Amid, Berkeley Architecture Research
gem5	SW-dev thread, repository	BSD-style	Alec Roelke (University of Virginia)
Imperas	website	Proprietary, models available under Apache 2.0	Imperas
riscvOVPsim	github	license	Imperas
OVPsim	website	Free for non commercial use, models available under Apache 2.0	Imperas
jor1k	website, github	BSD 2-Clause	Sebastian Macke
Jupiter	github	GPL-3.0	Andrés Castellanos
MARSS-RISCV	github	MIT	Gaurav N Kothari, Parikshit P Sarnaik, Gokturk Yuksek (State University of New York at Binghamton)
QEMU	upstream	GPL	Sagar Karandikar (University of California, Berkeley), Bastian Koppelmann (University of Paderborn), Alex Suykov, Stefan O'Rear and Michael Clark (SiFive)
RARS	github	MIT	Benjamin Landers
Renode	website, github	MIT	Antmicro
Ripes	github	MIT	Morten Borup Petersen
RISC-V Virtual Prototype	website, github	MIT	Vladimir Herdt (University of Bremen, AGRA)
TinyEMU	website	MIT	Fabrice Bellard
Spike	github	BSD 3-clause	Andrew Waterman & Yunsup Lee (SiFive)
Swerv-ISS	github	GPL - 3	Joseph Rahmeh (Western Digital)
VLAB	VLAB Works	Proprietary	ASTC
WebRISC-V	github	BSD 3-clause	Gianfranco Mariotti, Roberto Giorgi (University of Siena)
PQSE	website	Proprietary	PQShield
riscv-rust	website github	MIT	Takahiro Aoyagi
terminus	github	MIT	Yang Li

Object toolchain

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
Binutils	RISC-V repo, Upstream repos	GPLv2	Andrew Waterman (SiFive), Palmer Dabbelt (Google) & Jim Wilson (SiFive)
LLVM	GitHub mirror	Apache 2.0 with LLVM exception	Alex Bradbury (lowRISC)
Cranelift	GitHub	Apache 2.0	Cranelift core team

Debugging

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
GDB	Upstream	GPLv2	Andrew Burgess (Embecosm), Palmer Dabbelt (Google)
OpenOCD	Upstream repo, RISC-V repo	GPLv2	Tim Newsome, Megan Wachs, Palmer Dabbelt (Google)
GNU MCU Eclipse OpenOCD	Website, GitHub	GPLv2	Liviu Ionescu
TRACE32 JTAG Debugger	Website	TRACE32 license	Lauterbach
Ozone - the J-Link Debugger	Website	SEGGER commercial license (J-Link PLUS)	SEGGER
Ashling RiscFree Debugger	Website	Ashling commercial license	Ashling
Imperas Multi Processor Debugger	Website	Imperas Commercial License	Imperas
TCF Debugger	Website, GitHub	Eclipse Distribution License 1.0 (BSD) / Eclipse Public License 1.0	Sanimir Agovic
PlatformIO Unified Debugger	Docs	Apache 2.0	PlatformIO

C compilers and libraries

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
GCC	Upstream, RISC-V repository	GPLv3	Andrew Waterman (SiFive), Palmer Dabbelt (Google), Jim Wilson (SiFive), Kito Cheng (SiFive)
GNU MCU Eclipse RISC-V Embedded GCC (riscv-non-embed-gcc)	Web, Repository, Build, Binary package installer	Eclipse Public License	Liviu lonescu
Clang/LLVM	Upstream	Apache 2.0	Alex Bradbury (lowRISC)
CompCert	Upstream	INRIA Non-Commercial License Agreement	Xavier Leroy
Glibc	Upstream, RISC-V repository	GPLv2	Palmer Dabbelt (Google), Andrew Waterman (SiFive), DJ Delorie (Red Hat), Darius Rad(Bluespec)
Newlib	Upstream, RISC-V repository	GPLv2	Kito Cheng (SiFive)
SEGGER Runtime Library	Website	SEGGER commercial license	SEGGER
SEGGER Floating Point Library	Website	SEGGER commercial license	SEGGER
Musl	GitHub	MIT	-

Boot loaders and monitors

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
coreboot	Upstream	GPLv2	Ron Minnich (Google), Jonathan Neuschäfer
U-Boot	Upstream	GPLv2	Rick Chen (Andes)
Proxy Kernel/BBL	GitHub	BSD 3-clause	SiFive
OpenSBI	GitHub	BSD 2-clause	Anup Patel (Western Digital), Atish Patra (Western Digital)

Hypervisors and related tools

Name	Links	License	Brief	Maintainers
Xvisor	Website, Upstream, RISC-V Repo	GPLv2	Type-1 baremetal monolithic hypervisor	Anup Patel (Western Digital)
KVM	Website, RISC-V Repo, RISC-V Wiki	GPLv2	Type-2 hypervisor	Anup Patel (Western Digital), Atish Patra (Western Digital)
KVMTOOL	Upstream, RISC-V Repo	GPLv2	Userspace tool for the KVM hypervisor	Anup Patel (Western Digital), Atish Patra (Western Digital)

OS and OS kernels

Linux built from source

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
Linux Kernel	github, kernel.org	GPLv2	Andrew Waterman (SiFive), Albert Ou (SiFive), Palmer Dabbelt (Google)
Yocto Project/OpenEmbedded	github	MIT	Khem Raj
Buildroot	busybox.net		Mark Corbin (Embecosm)

Linux distributions

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
Fedora	fedoraproject.org		Richard WM Jones, Stefan O’Rear, David Abdurachmanov
Debian	debian wiki, mit.edu, riscv.org, Annc		Manuel A. Fernandez Montecelo
OpenMandriva	openmandriva.org, openmandriva.org		Bernhard "Bero" Rosenkränzer
openSUSE	opensuse.org		Andreas Schwab (SUSE)
Gentoo	github		Palmer Dabbelt (University of California, Berkeley)
Parabola GNU/Linux-libre	github, parabola.nu		Andreas Grapentin (University of Potsdam, HPI)
Ataraxia Linux	github		protonesso

Real-time Operating Systems

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
embOS	Website, RISC-V port	SEGGER commercial license, free for non-commercial use	SEGGER
RTEMS	rtems.org, docs.rtems.org		Hesham Almatary
FreeRTOS	sourceforge, freertos.org	MIT	AWS
Zephyr	github, docs	Apache 2.0	Karol Gugala (Antmicro), Peter Gielda (Antmicro), Nathaniel Graff (SiFive)
LiteOS	github, docs		Chaifangming (Huawei), Pengzhouhu (Huawei), Huerjia (Huawei)
NuttX	bitbucket.org, nuttx.org
Apache Mynewt	riscv.org	Apache 2.0	James Pace, Runtime
OpenWrt	github, binary repo		Zoltan Herpai
seL4	github, seL4.systems	GPLv2 (kernel and proofs), various open-source licenses (userland)	Trustworthy Systems group, Data61 CSIRO
RT-Thread	github, rt-thread.org	Apache 2.0	RT-Thread
PikeOS	Press release	Proprietary	SYSGO
VxWorks	Press release	Proprietary	Wind River

BSD distributions

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
FreeBSD	github, wiki.freebsd.org, presentation		Ruslan Bukin (FreeBSD)
NetBSD	netbsd.org, github		Matt Thomas (NetBSD), Reinoud Zandijk (NetBSD)

Compilers and runtimes for other languages

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
Go	Upstream, RISC-V repository, Stef's fork	BSD 3-clause	Benjamin Barenblat (Google), Michael Pratt (Google), Stef O'Rear
Ocaml	Upstream, RISC-V repository	LGPL	Nicolás Ojeda Bär
Maxine VM (Java Virtual Machine)	Upstream	GPLv2	Maxine team
Jikes RVM (Java Virtual Machine)	Upstream	Eclipse Public License (EPL)	Martin Maas (University of California, Berkeley)
OpenJDK/HotSpot (Java Virtual Machine)	?	?	Alexey Baturo, Michael Knysnek, Martin Maas
OpenJDK/OpenJ9 (Java Virtual Machine)	Upstream	Eclipse Public License 2.0 (EPLv2) with ClassPath Exception & Apache 2.0	Cheng Jin
Free Pascal	Upstream	?	Jeppe Johansen and others
Nim	Upstream	MIT	Andreas Rumpf and others
Ada (GNAT)	Upstream	GPLv3 with linking exception	AdaCore
Rust	Upstream	Apache and MIT	Rust Project
muForth	Upstream	?	David Frech
ibForth	Upstream	GPLv3	Lars Brinkhoff
Mecrisp-Quintis Forth kernel	Upstream	?	Matthias Koch
Mono	Initial support in upstream	MIT	Alex Rønne Petersen
Zen	Zen-Lang.org	Commercial, AGPLv3	connectFree Corporation

IDEs

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
GNU MCU Eclipse	Website, Repositories, Binary distribution	EPL-1.0 / various	Liviu Ionescu
Embedded Studio	Website, RISC-V spec	SEGGER commercial license, free for non-commercial use	SEGGER
IAR Embedded Workbench	Website	commercial	IAR Systems
PlatformIO	Website, IDE, Docs	Apache 2.0	PlatformIO
Freedom Studio	Website	EPL 1.0/various	SiFive
Ashling RiscFreeTM IDE	Website	Ashling commercial license	Ashling

Security

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
emCrypt	Website	Commercial, free for non-commercial use	SEGGER
CoreGuard	Website	Proprietary	Dover Microsystems, Inc.
MultiZone API	GitHub	ISC	Hex Five Security Inc.
Secure IoT Stack	GitHub	MIT, GPLv2, GPLv3, Evaluation license	Hex Five Security Inc.
MultiZone Security TEE & Enclave	SDK, Enclave	Evaluation license	Hex Five Security Inc.
Keystone Enclave	Website, Repositories	BSD 3-clause	Keystone Team
SecureRF	Website, SDK	Proprietary	SecureRF Corp.
IntrinsicID	Quiddikey	Proprietary	Intrinsic ID
Penglai Enclave	Website, GitHub	Mulan PSL v1	IPADS
PQSLIB / PQSoC	Website	Proprietary	PQShield

Machine Learning / AI

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
TF Lite	demo, blog note	Apache 2.0	Antmicro / Google TF Lite team

Board Support Packages (BSPs)

Name	Links	License	Maintainers
RT-Thread/HIFIVE1 BSP	github	Apache 2.0	tanek

Help Wanted

• V8
• Node.js
• Dart