nRF52840 dongle question

[Mike]

Hello,

I am trying to use IAR examples to debug some of the examples provided in the SDK.

I am only using examples that support the pca10059 dongle.

One example is the peripheral/Blinky.

The J-Link with IAR debugger is working. My problem is that I cannot flash the part and debug it because it is already programmed with USB bootloader.

What do I need to do please in order to be able to flash the dongle and debug it succefuly?

Thank you.

Mohammad Karaki

[Mike]

Hi Andreas,

I installed JTAG connector and used IAr J-Link to do that.

My question should be is how to debug any of the examples provided for the dongle?

The dongle uses a bootloader and I am not sure how to download the example to the dongle and be able to debug it using IAR workbench.

Is there a way to do that , whether using this method or any other one you may suggest?

Thank you.

Mohammad

[Mike]

Hi Andreas,

The J-link is working fine with the dongle. My problem is how to bypass the bootloader so I can debug the code on the dongle. 

If you have another method to debug examples on the dongle please let me know about it.

Thanks again.

Mohammad

[AndreasF]

Hi again.

You just have to reprogram it with your IAR J-Link. However, if you do a full flash erase (which includes erasing the UICR), you will have problems unless you have a debugger which has a levelshifter.

This is because in the UICR there is a register called REGOUT0, which sets the voltage (standard value 1.8 V). And you need to have 3.0V in order to program the chip.

To avoid this:

 - Never delete the UICR, and if you do delete UICR you should need to make sure that you set REGOUT0 to 3.0V before you reset.

- Or, use a debugger which supports level shifting (for example the J-Link Pro, but this debugger is expensive).

That's why I asked which IAR J-Link you have.

- Andreas

[Mike]

Hi AndreasF,

Ok. Thanks.

The SDK provides some examples to support the dongle using IAR.

One example is:

 ......\nRF5_SDK_for_Thread_and_Zigbee_2.0.0_29775ac\examples\peripheral\blinky

 

How can I debug such examples on the dongle using the JTAG or the USB  driver of the dongle itself?

Can you walk me through such steps?

Greatly appreciated.

Regards,

Mohammad

[AndreasF]

Hi.

You need to solder a ARM Cortex JTAG SWD 10pin Connector onto footprint P1, and either connect that to a external debugger or a development kit, like this:

Connected to a development kit it looks like this:

And connect the Dongle to a USB port

Note: it is really important that the voltage on the nRF52840 Dongle matches the nRF52832 DK if you do it this way.

If you want to use an external debugger, you could connect it like this:

And connected the Dongle to a USB port:

And also connected it to a debugger (I'm using the J-Link BASE here)

Then you just have to use the IDE you wish to use to debug.

- Andreas

[Mike]

Hi Andreasf,

I have done that already. I told you I was able to use IAR with Jlink to download an example to the dongle. The problem is that I had to erase the dongle program, retarget the example to address 0x0000000 instead of the 0x1000000 the dongle uses with its bootloader.

What I need from you, again, is to try to use one of the examples provided and succefuly debug it with the IAR workbench and let me know how you did it.

After downloading the code, the pointer should break at "main"

Thank you.

Mohammad

[AndreasF]

Hi.

Which specific example are you looking at? Please give me the exact path in your SDK folder.

The pca10059 examples have an offset, so if you have loaded a pca10059 example, you could have placed it in the wrong place.

Note that the peripherals examples does not require a SoftDevice.

- Andreas

[Mike]

Hi,

 ......\nRF5_SDK_for_Thread_and_Zigbee_2.0.0_29775ac\examples\peripheral\blinky

What about the examples that require softdevice? How do I load them into the dongle?

Thanks.

Mohammad

[AndreasF]

Hi.

If you look at the linker script for that project, you can see the following at the top of the file:

(i looked at the file: nRF5_SDK_for_Thread_and_Zigbee_2.0.0_29775ac\examples\peripheral\blinky\pca10059\mbr\armgcc\blinky_gcc_nrf52.ld)

MEMORY
{
  FLASH (rx) : ORIGIN = 0x1000, LENGTH = 0xff000
  RAM (rwx) :  ORIGIN = 0x20000008, LENGTH = 0x3fff8
}

As you see, ORGIN =0x1000, compaired to the pca10056 (for nRF52840 Development Kit):

MEMORY
{
  FLASH (rx) : ORIGIN = 0x0, LENGTH = 0x100000
  RAM (rwx) :  ORIGIN = 0x20000000, LENGTH = 0x40000
}

Which has ORGIN = 0x0.

So the application is placed in an area which is not run, because you have deleted the bootloader.

You have to change this address to 0x0.

A project which uses the SoftDevice have another origin, like this:

MEMORY
{
  FLASH (rx) : ORIGIN = 0x26000, LENGTH = 0xda000
  RAM (rwx) :  ORIGIN = 0x200022e0, LENGTH = 0x3dd20
}

The SoftDevice knows that there is an offset and the origin of the application is at 0x2600, so it will start that application.

If you wish to use a program which requires SoftDevice, you also have to load the SoftDevice .hex file (S140 v6.1.0 found in nRF5_SDK_15.2.0_9412b96\components\softdevice\s140\hex)

- Andreas

[mck]

Hi AndreasF,

I am having same issue maybe. I am trying to set up the nrf52840 dongle on IAR using an I-jet for debugging. I have iar version 8.32.1. I am using example project ble_app_blinky from the ble_peripheral examples folder. My preprocessor shows ok I think. It is as follows: 

BOARD_PCA10059
CONFIG_GPIO_AS_PINRESET
FLOAT_ABI_HARD
NRF52840_XXAA
NRF_SD_BLE_API_VERSION=6
S140
SOFTDEVICE_PRESENT
SWI_DISABLE0

I have the latest versions of s140 and the SDK because I have never worked with nordic semi and I have just downloaded everything in these last few days. I have used the P1 to connect the SWDIO, SWCLK, Vref, gnd lines as I usually do when I connect to the I-jet (although I use silabs blue geckos and not nRF52840). I also cut SB2 and soldered SB1.

I compile, link and build fine. The issue is a warning when I try to download to the dongle. I get this:

Fri Feb 01, 2019 11:56:52: Download error at 0x00026000: downloading into non-writable memory. 

and then nothing happens where normally I get put at main(). I can send you the rest of the messages when I do the download but in truth they look fine. This was the only warning during the initialization of the debugging session. 

My goal is to evaluate using the nRF52840 for a future project where it would be a ble peripheral and that is why I started with the example projects in that folder.

Can you help? Thanks, Maria

[AndreasF]

Hi mck.

Can you please create a new ticket for this question, so that other people who might have the same problem can see it? This ticket is 3 months old.

Best regards,

Andreas