nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

Hakon — Thu, 26 Mar 2020 14:58:59 GMT

MCUBOOT is the mcuboot image. MCUBOOT_SCRATCH is the space dedicated for image swapping. MCUBOOT_STORAGE is for storing images. MCUBOOT_PAD is an optional trailer on the image that indicates that the image should be considered an upgrade. Writing this image in the secondary slot will then cause the bootloader to upgrade to it.

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

kk2mkk — Wed, 25 Mar 2020 17:46:21 GMT

Thanks, I think the is no documentation available for whatever we discussed above, it would be great you can add some.

rom_report when mcuboot is enabled

More options can be learnt from build.ninja file located in the build folder.

MCUboot regions can be altered from mcuboot's menuconfig

<builld dir>\mcuboot>ninja menuconfig

Can you please help me understand what each of the macros above (highlighted in yellow) stands for?

regards

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

Hakon — Wed, 25 Mar 2020 12:30:18 GMT

The .dts file you're referring to does not show the correct memory placement. You can run "ninja rom_report" from build folder to get the memory layout, or you can look at the linker script.

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

kk2mkk — Mon, 23 Mar 2020 16:01:46 GMT

[quote userid="73166" url="~/f/nordic-q-a/58854/nrf91-questions-related-to-merged-image-app-smp-mcuboot/241188"]can you help me understand what going on there?[/quote]

My questions is why my application starting form @0x0001c200, as per the .dts the unsecured application image should start form @0x00040000???

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

Hakon — Mon, 23 Mar 2020 14:55:19 GMT

[quote user="kk2mkk"]can you help me understand what going on there?[/quote]

There might be some overlap between the files, but that should be taken care of by the mergehex script with the --overlap=replace flag included if I'm not mistaken.

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

kk2mkk — Thu, 19 Mar 2020 09:16:14 GMT

Image	Address	Location
1	0x00000000
1	0x00008960	mcuboot/zephyr/zephyr.hex

2	0x00010200
2	0x00017ff0	spm/zephyr/zephyr.hex

3	0x00010200
3	0x0002a77a	zephyr/mcuboot_primary.hex

4	0x0001c200
4	0x0002a770	zephyr/zephyr.hex

5	0x00010000
5	0x0002a8c0	zephyr/app_signed.hex

I did some analysis on where the individual images address are mapped in the flash and i found that only 1& 5 images are sufficient for your application to get up and running.

Image 5 is combination of images 2,3 & 4.

As per the nrf9160_pca10090_common.dts file the SPM should be places @0x00010000 and user app @0x00040000 but here its starting @0x0001c200, can you help me understand what going on there?

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

Hakon — Wed, 18 Mar 2020 16:20:47 GMT

One more update. I was able to flash the images separately by running

nrfjprog -f nrf91 --program mcuboot/zephyr/zephyr.hex --sectorerase
nrfjprog -f nrf91 --program spm/zephyr/zephyr.hex --sectorerase
nrfjprog -f nrf91 --program zephyr/mcuboot_primary.hex --sectorerase
nrfjprog -f nrf91 --program zephyr/zephyr.hex --sectorerase
nrfjprog -f nrf91 --program zephyr/app_signed.hex --sectorerase

in this specific order. Then after that the application would boot properly.

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

Hakon — Mon, 16 Mar 2020 17:22:03 GMT

You probably need to sign the application image before flashing it. You can sign it with imgtool. I'm testing this right now.

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

SharathMalve — Mon, 16 Mar 2020 05:08:48 GMT

Hi , based on the memory layout, 256KB may be insufficient for our application consider future scalability. Can you pl help in modifying the memory layout to get something around 350K-400K for the application

Sharath

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

kk2mkk — Thu, 12 Mar 2020 13:18:57 GMT

[quote userid="73166" url="~/f/nordic-q-a/58854/nrf91-questions-related-to-merged-image-app-smp-mcuboot/239181"]You can change the memory allocation of SPM, mcuboot; and application by using the partition manager. You will find the documentation here.[/quote]

I gone through the documentation pointed above but it dint explains anything about the memory map of any sample projects, but i learnt something about mcuboot+spm+app for the dts file "~\ncs\zephyr\boards\arm\nrf9160_pca10090\nrf9160_pca10090_common.dts" and other threads

https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/f/nordic-q-a/52329/what-address-to-manually-flash-zephyr-and-application/216304#216304

https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/f/nordic-q-a/46787/application-won-t-run---erroneous-flash-address-range

[quote userid="73166" url="~/f/nordic-q-a/58854/nrf91-questions-related-to-merged-image-app-smp-mcuboot/239509"]Do you have any more information other than "The board dint boots up"? Like output log and error messages.[/quote]

I have enabled the CONFIG_BOOTLOADER_MCUBOOT=y in my project and then flashing the following three file using JLINK

MCUboot zephyr image \build_nrf9160_pca10090ns\mcuboot\zephyr\zephyr.hex
SPM zephyr image \build_nrf9160_pca10090ns\spm\zephyr\zephyr.hex
user app zephyr image \build_nrf9160_pca10090ns\zephyr\zephyr.hex

After reset i see the below error message

*** Booting Zephyr OS build v2.1.99-ncs1-2-g30f47eace36c ***
[00:00:00.006,134] [0m<inf> mcuboot: Starting bootloader[0m
[00:00:00.014,282] [0m<inf> mcuboot: Primary image: magic=unset, swap_type=0x1, copy_done=0x3, image_ok=0x3[0m
[00:00:00.027,557] [0m<inf> mcuboot: Boot source: none[0m
[00:00:00.034,667] [1;33m<wrn> mcuboot: Failed reading image headers; Image=0[0m
[00:00:00.044,433] [1;31m<err> mcuboot: Unable to find bootable image[0m

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

Hakon — Thu, 12 Mar 2020 11:29:54 GMT

Do you have any more information other than "The board dint boots up"? Like output log and error messages.

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

kk2mkk — Wed, 11 Mar 2020 12:36:22 GMT

Considering the "http_application_update", can you please let me know how the flash memory locations are done for MCUboot, SPM & my APP?

[quote userid="73166" url="~/f/nordic-q-a/58854/nrf91-questions-related-to-merged-image-app-smp-mcuboot/238673"]You find the relevant files in the build folder in build/zephyr/zephyr.hex and build/spm/zephyr/zephyr.hex respectively[/quote]

The board dint boots up if i flash the images individually as per your suggestion.

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

Hakon — Tue, 10 Mar 2020 15:32:45 GMT

You can change the memory allocation of SPM, mcuboot; and application by using the partition manager. You will find the documentation here.

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

kk2mkk — Sun, 08 Mar 2020 16:27:51 GMT

HI Hakon,

I have got only partial answer to my questions, can you point me to the documentation where it described the memory map of bootloader, spm and sample app(http_application_update) are build, and how to control the allocation of memory regions?

regards

RE: nRF91: questions related to merged image (App , smp & mcuboot)

Hakon — Tue, 03 Mar 2020 13:34:04 GMT

[quote user=""]Can I flash the app and spm separately using jlink?[/quote]

Yes, using nrfjprog or Segger you can flash the images separately, You find the relevant files in the build folder in build/zephyr/zephyr.hex and build/spm/zephyr/zephyr.hex respectively. I don't think you can use west though, or at least I haven't figured out how to.