installation of soft devices vs. example apps

[Boss]

I'm new to using Nordic products and am trying to understand the difference b/t the soft device and the application in the context of the examples I'm running. Most importantly, I'm trying to understand the logistics of installing soft devices vs. applications. It is my understanding that in the example, I'm installing an application (e.g. ble_app_hrs_pca10056_s140.hex) and not the soft device.

From reading the documentation, it sounds like the soft device has to be installed separately and that it is not combined with the .hex for the app. This is also implied by how the GUI of the nRFGo app is constructed.

If that is the case, then I'm confused by the following

1. I was able to get the HRM example working by simply dragging and dropping it on the drive under My Computer. I didn't have to install a soft device.

So I'm just trying to figure out whether I need to first install the soft device then install the app from the example. Also, if this is the case, then why in (1) above did it work?

Also, if it is a two-step process, can someone tell me if the soft device gets erased when I hit the erase button in nRfGo.

Thanks for the help.

Hopefully this isn't too dumb of a question.

Mark

[Deepansh]

yes soft device erased when you click on the erase button

[Deepansh]

Hii You can understand the softdevice from here and in simple you can understand it as the protocol implemented in it by nordic and you are using it in your ble applications

[endnode]

Btw. your assumption that some HEX binary contains only application and not Soft Device doesn't need to be true, e.g. pre-compiled HEX files in nRF5 SDK used to be merged app + SD (so you can flash them easily in one step). The easiest way o verify is some simple content comparison, you can see easily that ~80% of HEX matches 100% with certain SD binary release or not.