The cool thing with Processor Expert is that it gives me guidance through the settings. And there is a nice (rather hidden feature) which proposes me values I can enter:
💡 First, switch to the non-Tabs (classic) view, as the classic view is using the screen real estate better, and shows you *all* the information needed, and does not hide some.
So if you have some values to correct because other settings have changed:
Values to Enter
I have received a bunch of Freescale FRDM boards to be used in an Embedded Systems programming crash course. There are multiple issues with the boards coming from the factory:
This post is a step-by-step instruction how to update Freescale FRDM boards (e.g. FRDM-KL25Z) to the latest firmware.
FRDM Board
Finally, the new Sumo robot is assembled, and up and moving :-):
Somo Robot Assembled
Unlike CodeWarrior, the Kinetis Design Studio (at least in V1.1.1) does not offer a choice between C and C++ projects. That makes sense with the GNU ARM Eclipse plugins, other than the CodeWarrior gcc integration, there is no need for setting up a special tool chain for C++ (see “Compiling C Files with GNU ARM G++“). While this is great, things are not perfect yet, so I’m providing in this post the information needed to properly setup a C++ project with Kinetis Design Studio V1.1.1.
Debug View of Startup Code Calling C++ Constructors
Sometimes I think that a problem should be solvable in a few minutes, and then it turns out that it lingers around for months. Very, very frustrating! Such a thing is getting the USB 4.1.1 stack running on the FRDM-K64F board. I have that board since April 2014, and it took me 7 months to get the FSL USB stack running on it :-(.
FRDM-K64F Board
Finally, after several weeks delay, the new PCBs for the Mini Sumo Robots (see “Zumo Robot with WiFi and GPS”) arrived, and best of all: first test are all running fine :-).
First PCB under Debug
When I started the McuOnEclipse project back in 2012, I did not expect that it would create that much of attention :-). So far I’m sharing the project files on GitHub (see “McuOnEclipse goes Git“). GitHub is excellent for sharing sources, but not a good way to share release (binary) files. It is somewhat ok for small/few files, and initially that worked well for the few Processor Expert files (see “Processor Expert Component *.PEupd Files on GitHub“). However, with the amount of components and binary releases, the GitHub repository gets bloated. So I’m performing some maintenance work, and so I’m moving binary releases to a new McuOnEclipse SourceForge site.
McuOnEclipse On SourceForge
How cool would it be to add WiFi support to any projects or IoT? Why not using WiFi with a microcontroller which has only few KBytes of RAM and FLASH. For less than US$5? Dreams came true, and intrigued by an article at Hack-A-Day, I searched a supplier for that ESP8266 module. And this evening I have found the four ESP8266 modules I have ordered for $4.50 each from ElectroDragon in my mailbox. Of course I did not want to wait for the week-end, so I hooked it up to my FRDM-KL25Z board.
ESP8266 Module for US$ 4.50
There are two basic strategies in teaching:
I usually do the first method. But there is a lot of value in the second method too!
When I asked all student groups to solder the headers on the Freescale FRDM-KL25Z board, I received one report that the board does not work any more. A quick inspection of the board showed this:
How NOT to Solder the FRDM Board Headers
Found an interesting behaviour with the Freescale FXOS8700CQ on the new Sumo Robots (see “Sensor and Communication Shield for Sumo Robot“): when enabling the accelerometer/magnetometer, it actually did not work:
Failed to Enable FXOS8700 Accelerometer
