Introduction to Freedom Metal
=============================

What is Freedom Metal?
----------------------

Freedom Metal enables portable, bare-metal application development for all of
SiFive's RISC-V IP, FPGA evaluation targets, and development boards.

Freedom Metal provides:
   - A bare-metal C application environment
   - An API for controlling CPU features and peripherals
   - The ability to retarget to any SiFive RISC-V product

This makes Freedom Metal suitable for:
   - Writing portable hardware tests
   - Bootstrapping bare metal application development
   - A RISC-V hardware abstraction layer
   - And more!


How Do I Use Freedom Metal?
---------------------------

The best way to get started writing applications with Freedom Metal is to use
the `SiFive Freedom E SDK`_ which bundles the build scripts and configuration
necessary to use Freedom Metal with SiFive's standard evaluation products.

If you prefer working with an Integrated Development Environment (IDE),
`SiFive Freedom Studio`_ comes packaged with a prebuilt toolchain and the same
Freedom Metal examples from Freedom E SDK.

.. _SiFive Freedom E SDK:
   https://github.com/sifive/freedom-e-sdk

.. _SiFive Freedom Studio:
   https://www.sifive.com/boards#software
