Selecting J-Link Debug Probe by Nickname

Posted on September 13, 2023 by Erich Styger

I have lots of hardware and debug probes on my desk, and I discussed using nicknames for debug probes to better identify them.

‘Green’ and ‘Yellow’ Robots and J-Link Probes

So far so good. At that time of the previous article, it was possible to assign nicknames to J-Link debug probes, but not to use the nickname instead of the USB serial number. Well, SEGGER was fast again, and responded with a new J-Link software pack version 7.92d which implements that features: I can now use the nickname to connect to a debug probe :-).

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MCUXpresso IDE 11.8.0

Posted on August 6, 2023 by Erich Styger

Don’t worry: despite all the things going on with VS Code, Eclipse is here to stay probably for many more years. The Eclipse foundation is pumping out releases, and so does NXP with their latest MCUXpresso IDE 11.8.0. Lets have a look…

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LinkServer for Microcontrollers

Posted on May 14, 2023 by Erich Styger

GDB is the de-facto debugging engine and debug connection for micro-controllers these days: it is versatile and with its client-server architecture very flexible and powerful, and pretty much every debug probe and vendor (PEMICRO, SEGGER, OpenOCD, pyOCD, …) offers it. But a GDB server or command line implementation was not available for the NXP LinkServer family of debug probes (LPC-Link, MCU-Link, MCU-Link Pro). This has changed now: LinkServer is available as command line tool and can be used as GDB Server:

With the new LinkServer package I do not only get a gdb server implementation: I have now a command line tool I can use for automation and all kind of different things: programming boards, erasing flash, and so on.

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Building a Triumvirate: From Eclipse CDT to CMake, CMD and Visual Studio Code

Posted on April 19, 2023 by Erich Styger

A Triumvirate is or Triarchy is built by three individuals which lead or rule something. In this article I want to rule a project with Eclipse CDT, Visual Studio Code and with building it from the command line for automated builds.

So what if I have an Eclipse project (say MCUXpresso IDE and SDK), and want to build it on a build server, and and I want to use the same time the project with Eclipse IDE and Visual Studio code?

Key to this is CMake: I’m keeping the Eclipse CDT features, adding CMake with Make and Ninja to the fix, and have it ‘ruled’ by three different ’emperor’: Eclipse, Visual Studio Code and from a shell console:

MCUXpresso SDK CDT project with CMake for Eclipse, Visual Studio Code and Command Line Building

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Using Semihosting the direct Way

Posted on March 9, 2023 by Erich Styger

Most embedded developers have probably used ‘semihosting’. And yes, it is generally seen as a bad thing. Maybe you have used it, without realizing what it really is and what it does. It is simple to add a printf() to the code (again: you should not use printf), and with the right standard library, it magically it shows up in a console view:

That looks great, but what is behind this, to make it happen? Actually, it is really amazing technology. And it can be used for better things than just printing text.

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NXP MCUXpresso IDE 11.7.0

Posted on January 25, 2023 by Erich Styger

It is the exam and grading time at the university, and the same time I’m preparing the lectures and labs for the new semester starting mid of February. I’m always heading for using the latest and greatest tools in my labs. A few days ago, NXP released the new version of the MCUXpresso IDE, version 11.7.0. Time to check it out…

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McuOnEclipse Components: 29-Dec-2022 Release

Posted on December 29, 2022 by Erich Styger

I’m pleased to announce a new release of the McuOnEclipse Processor Expert components, available on SourceForge.

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Fixing “REENT malloc succeeded” Assertion

Posted on December 18, 2022 by Erich Styger

One little nasty assertion in the GNU standard library appeared a few days ago, kind out of nowhere, reporting “REENT malloc succeeded”:

Obviously it was caused by the call to srand() which sets the ‘seed’ for the standard library (pseudo) random number generator. The assertion happens as well later for calling the rand() function.

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