How can a program detect the uVision simulator?

When there is lack of room for a connector, it's still often possible to just get a few test points on the board and then you manually solder wires to get a debugging interface. With good solder skills, the test points can be made very small and very close together.

So in the end, I find it very strange to not be able to make the boards capable of JTAG-debugging.

But there is another, very easy, option - solder a JTAG interface directly on the processor pins. Spend 30 minutes and you have a board with JTAG debugging. Way better than simulation and you can finally debug real code without strange code stubs that you wouldn't want in a final release version.

When there is lack of room for a connector, it's still often possible to just get a few test points on the board and then you manually solder wires to get a debugging interface. With good solder skills, the test points can be made very small and very close together.

So in the end, I find it very strange to not be able to make the boards capable of JTAG-debugging.

But there is another, very easy, option - solder a JTAG interface directly on the processor pins. Spend 30 minutes and you have a board with JTAG debugging. Way better than simulation and you can finally debug real code without strange code stubs that you wouldn't want in a final release version.

By the way - never let hardware engineers run the show all by themselves. Always make sure that there are one or more skilled sw guys involved, and that it is 100% clear that the total quality of the product depends on the ability to test both the hardware and the software. And that a JTAG interface isn't just an optional method of programming the processors but an excellent way to validate the prototype hardware by allowing the pins to be wiggled etc.