Program SoftDevice in Linux

[Nick]

I have been following this post and pure-gcc to set up my eclipse environment in ubuntu 14.04. Thus far everything works well except i cant figure out why the softdevice is corrupt when i use linux. I am using the evaluation board.

Using the command:

make flash-softdevice s110_nrf51822_6.0.0_softdevice.hex

in linux. It give me this output:

JLinkExe -device nrf51822 -if swd -speed 1000  erase-all.jlink
SEGGER J-Link Commander V4.86a ('?' for help)
Compiled Jun 11 2014 17:45:43

Script file read successfully.
Info: Device "NRF51822_XXAA" selected (257 KB flash, 16 KB RAM).
DLL version V4.86a, compiled Jun 11 2014 17:45:40
Firmware: J-Link OB-SAM3U128 V1 compiled Dec 11 2013 20:20:11
Hardware: V1.00
S/N: 480203173 
VTarget = 3.300V
Info: Found SWD-DP with ID 0x0BB11477
Info: Found Cortex-M0 r0p0, Little endian.
Info: FPUnit: 4 code (BP) slots and 0 literal slots
Found 1 JTAG device, Total IRLen = 4:
Cortex-M0 identified.
Target interface speed: 1000 kHz
Processing script file...

Writing 00000002 -> 4001E504

Writing 00000001 -> 4001E50C

Sleep(100)

Reset delay: 0 ms
Reset type NORMAL: Resets core & peripherals via SYSRESETREQ & VECTRESET bit.


Script processing completed.

make: [erase-all] Error 1 (ignored)
# Convert from hex to binary. Split original hex in two to avoid huge (>250 MB) binary file with just 0s.
arm-none-eabi-objcopy -Iihex -Obinary --remove-section .sec3 /home/leps/Nordic/s110_nrf51822_6.0.0/s110_nrf51822_6.0.0_softdevice.hex _build/s110_nrf51822_6.0.0_softdevice_mainpart.bin
arm-none-eabi-objcopy -Iihex -Obinary --remove-section .sec1 --remove-section .sec2 /home/leps/Nordic/s110_nrf51822_6.0.0/s110_nrf51822_6.0.0_softdevice.hex _build/s110_nrf51822_6.0.0_softdevice_uicr.bin
JLinkExe -device nrf51822 -if swd -speed 1000  flash-softdevice.jlink
SEGGER J-Link Commander V4.86a ('?' for help)
Compiled Jun 11 2014 17:45:43

Script file read successfully.
Info: Device "NRF51822_XXAA" selected (257 KB flash, 16 KB RAM).
DLL version V4.86a, compiled Jun 11 2014 17:45:40
Firmware: J-Link OB-SAM3U128 V1 compiled Dec 11 2013 20:20:11
Hardware: V1.00
S/N: 480203173 
VTarget = 3.300V
Info: Found SWD-DP with ID 0x0BB11477
Info: Found Cortex-M0 r0p0, Little endian.
Info: FPUnit: 4 code (BP) slots and 0 literal slots
Found 1 JTAG device, Total IRLen = 4:
Cortex-M0 identified.
Target interface speed: 1000 kHz
Processing script file...

Writing 00000001 -> 4001E504

Downloading file... [_build/s110_nrf51822_6.0.0_softdevice_mainpart.bin]
Info: J-Link: Flash download: Flash programming performed for 1 range (77824 bytes)
Info: J-Link: Flash download: Total time needed: 1.312s (Prepare: 0.088s, Compare: 0.016s, Erase: 0.000s, Program: 1.195s, Verify: 0.005s, Restore: 0.006s)

Downloading file... [_build/s110_nrf51822_6.0.0_softdevice_uicr.bin]
Info: J-Link: Flash download: Flash programming performed for 1 range (1024 bytes)
Info: J-Link: Flash download: Total time needed: 0.150s (Prepare: 0.106s, Compare: 0.001s, Erase: 0.000s, Program: 0.006s, Verify: 0.000s, Restore: 0.035s)

Reset delay: 0 ms
Reset type NORMAL: Resets core & peripherals via SYSRESETREQ & VECTRESET bit.



Script processing completed.

make: [flash-softdevice] Error 1 (ignored)

which appears to program the softdevice. Then I flash the application (in this case the ble_app_uart) and get the following:

JLinkExe -device nrf51822 -if swd -speed 1000  flash.jlink
SEGGER J-Link Commander V4.86a ('?' for help)
Compiled Jun 11 2014 17:45:43

Script file read successfully.
Info: Device "NRF51822_XXAA" selected (257 KB flash, 16 KB RAM).
DLL version V4.86a, compiled Jun 11 2014 17:45:40
Firmware: J-Link OB-SAM3U128 V1 compiled Dec 11 2013 20:20:11
Hardware: V1.00
S/N: 480203173 
VTarget = 3.300V
Info: Found SWD-DP with ID 0x0BB11477
Info: Found Cortex-M0 r0p0, Little endian.
Info: FPUnit: 4 code (BP) slots and 0 literal slots
Found 1 JTAG device, Total IRLen = 4:
Cortex-M0 identified.
Target interface speed: 1000 kHz
Processing script file...

Reset delay: 0 ms
Reset type NORMAL: Resets core & peripherals via SYSRESETREQ & VECTRESET bit.

Downloading file... [_build/kinomote_s110.bin]
Info: J-Link: Flash download: Flash programming performed for 1 range (9216 bytes)
Info: J-Link: Flash download: Total time needed: 0.258s (Prepare: 0.082s, Compare: 0.002s, Erase: 0.000s, Program: 0.166s, Verify: 0.000s, Restore: 0.006s)

Reset delay: 0 ms
Reset type NORMAL: Resets core & peripherals via SYSRESETREQ & VECTRESET bit.



Script processing completed.

make: [flash] Error 1 (ignored)

however the evaluation board is not detected on my Android device.

If I instead use nRFgo Studio on windows to program the softdevice and use linux to load the application it works fine!

Much Thanks in advanced,

Nick

[Asbjørn]

We’re trying to recreate your setup here as well and we see that we are just as unsuccessful as you are with regard to programming the softdevice. We are looking into it, but so far it looks like something has change with regard to the splitting of the softdevice hex file.

Have you tried programming the softdevice by removing the spilt from makefile? Are you able to merge the softdevice and your application into one hex, convert and try to program it that way?

We are looking into it, but wanted to check with you if you had tried different approaches.

Python merge option: hexmerge.py s110_nrf51822_6.0.0_softdevice.hex ble_hrs_pca10001.hex:0x14000: -o merged.hex

[Nick]

I havent tried but will give it a shot. Thanks for the help!

[Nick]

I re-installed everything on my linux machine and it seems to work now. Not sure why though.

[Steven L.]

The address changed to 0x16000 in S110 7.0. See release notes s110_nrf51822_7.0.0_releasenotes.pdf, the ld template in the SDK was updated, Source/templates/gcc/gcc_nrf51_s110_xx(aa OR bb).ld

[sandeep]

@asbjorn - did the python merged hex file work on your end. I'm trying to figure out the right way to flash a combined SD + app hex through gcc/linux.