MCU on Eclipse

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Installing MCUXpresso Installer in DevContainer

Posted on July 13, 2026 by Erich Styger

Setting up the correct tools for a development environment can be complex and time consuming. I’m using DevContainers with Docker for almost all of my projects. Because that way I get an isolated development environment. For this I spend time to craft dedicated docker files, to have everything installed correctly with the the right versions.

Outside a docker or DevContainer environment, I’m using the NXP MCUXpresso installer. It is a standalone application which can be used from VS Code to check and install all the necessary tools.

In this article, I show how to have the NXP MCUXpresso Installer installed in a DevContainer so it can be used with VS Code.

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Boost Windows 11 Dev Performance with Docker Volumes

Posted on October 22, 2025 by Erich Styger

I recently upgraded from Win10 to Win11. Windows 10 was not great for building performance compared to Linux. And I feel that with Windows 11 things got worse too.

Dev Container in VS Code uses docker-based environments. This enables me using a full-featured development environment, with isolated dependencies. This is especially very useful for development in the embedded systems space. There I have to use many different SDKs, toolchains and libraries. Using Dev Containers is super easy. But file I/O operations with building etc/is not that great.

The solution is to use a Docker Volume with VS Code and Dev Container:

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