Using the Freedom Board as SWD Programmer

I love the Freescale Freedom boards because they are low-cost, and I do not need a special debug device, as they have the on-board OpenSDA. It is using a small Kinetis-K20 which acts as JTAG SWD debugging probe. Why not using the Freedom board to program another board?

FRDM-KL25Z board programs another board

FRDM-KL25Z board programs another board

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Red Suite 5: Eclipse Juno, Processor Expert and unlimited FRDM-KL25Z

❗ UPDATE: Code Red Technologies have been acquired May 1st 2013 by NXP, see this press release. According to this, they will not continue to support non-NXP architectures after May 2014. 😦

You probably know this already: I’m a fan of Eclipse, Processor Expert and the Freedom board. As for tool chains I use CodeWarrior for MCU10.x (Eclipse based, 64 KByte free limit) and IAR (32 KByte limit) with the Processor Expert Driver Suite.

And I have added a new Eclipse based solution: Red Suite 5 from Code Red Technologies. They released a new Red Suite 5 (v5.2.2 build 2108) which caught my attention when reading the release notes:

  1. Eclipse Juno SR2: New Eclipse Look & Feel 🙂
  2. Added integration for Processor Expert 🙂 🙂
  3. Non-expiring 128k (!!!) limit when used with the Freescale FRDM boards 🙂 🙂 🙂
Red Suite 5 Eclipse Startup

Red Suite 5 Eclipse Startup

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Switching Processor Package in Processor Expert

When I create a new project for the KL05Z with Processor Expert, then it shows up as 48 pin LQFP package in the project:

48pin LQFP Package in Components View

48pin LQFP Package in Components View

However, when I look at my board, it has a KL05Z32 in a LQFP package with 32 pins:

FRDM-KL05Z Board

FRDM-KL05Z Board

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Debugging ARM Cortex-M0+ Hard Fault with MTB Trace

And here it is again: a Hard Fault exception raised by the ARM Cortex-M0+ on my Freedom board:

Hard Fault in Debug View

Hard Fault in Debug View

A reason for hard faults are for example dereferencing a NULL pointer. The issue with the ARM Cortex hard fault exception stack is: it is not easy to find out where in the code the problem is.I have created a Processor Expert component to help me to find the location of such an exception. With the Eclipse based CodeWarrior for MCU10.3 there is another way: Trace with the MTB (Micro Trace Buffer)!

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A new Freedom Board: FRDM-KL05Z

Christmas and New Year time is great: Gifts and time to work on my home projects. But this post is not about one gift I have organized for myself: a Raspberry Pi ;-)). No, this post is about a gift I have received from Freescale: a *new* Freedom board, the FRDM-KL05Z :-).

FRDM-KL05Z Board and Box

FRDM-KL05Z Board and Box

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