Remote handler for off-chip microcontroller peripherals

Abstract

A system for controlling a peripheral function, comprises a control device (100) having a programmable processing unit (110) programmable to generate a control command to initiate and control a desired peripheral function remote to the control device (100) and a first handling unit (130) configured by hardware means to convert a control command from the programmable processing unit (110) into a set of control parameters, and a peripheral device (200) having a peripheral function unit (250) configured by hardware means to perform the desired peripheral function based on the set of control parameters and a second handling unit (230) connected to the first handling unit (130) via a communications link (140, 240) and configured by hardware means to receive and detect the set of control parameters from the first handling unit (230) and transmit the same to the peripheral function unit (250). The invention eliminates the necessity for a second CPU on the peripheral device (200) that controls remote peripheral functions. This reduces the overall system cost not only for the amount of hardware not required anymore but in even larger scale for savings in software design and maintenance.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.