How to debug netX 90 application side with J-Link debug probe from SEGGER?
Hilscher provides netX Studio CDT IDE (Integrated Development Environment) for customers for developing application software for the netX 90 SoC. The main goal is to provide an out-of-the-box working solution for building and debugging applications for the netX SoC. netX Studio CDT is provided to customers free of charge and aims to make it easy for them to evaluate netX as a platform for their custom designs. The software (https://kb.hilscher.com/display/NDT) and Documentation are available on Hilscher Knowledgebase.
Since SEGGER's J-Link supports a wide range of CPUs and is very popular with some netX customers, SEGGER added support for netX 90, which allows customers to use the tools from the J-Link Software and Documentation Pack and the Ozone J-Link Debugger.
This is a step-by-step guide for debugging the netX 90 application side with J-Link.
Prerequisites
Please use J-Link Software and Documentation Pack v7.60 or later.
The v7.60 release includes the following fixes for netX 90:
- Hilscher NetX90 Com Core RAM base address for RAMCode was wrong. Fixed.
- Hilscher NetX90 Com core reset and halt after bootloader handling, fixed.
- Hilscher NetX90 Com core used software reset instead of reset pin toggling within reset routine. Fixed.
For use case B and use case C with an external SQI flash, please use J-Link Software and Documentation Pack v7.86c or later.
The v7.86c release includes the following new feature for netX 90:
- Hilscher NetX90: Added SQI(QSPI) flash programming support.
J-Link support in netX Studio CDT
Currently netX Studio CDT supports debugging with J-Link in one of the following two ways:
- J-Link with OpenOCD (not recommended)
- J-Link with GDB Server (not recommended)
Using J-Link with OpenOCD
In general, it is possible to use J-Link with OpenOCD, but it's not recommended due to the following main reason:
- To use the J-Link debug probe with OpenOCD, you have to replace the original J-Link USB driver with WinUSB using a tool like Zadig, and once the J-Link USB driver has been replaced, no SEGGER software from the J-Link software package will be able to communicate with J-Link anymore. To use SEGGER J-Link software again, the USB driver needs to be switched back to its default.
Please see further limitations and support from SEGGE: https://wiki.segger.com/OpenOCD
Using J-Link with GDB Server
netX Studio CDT supports debugging with a different GDB server backend than OpenOCD, e.g. SEGGER J-Link GDB Server. (Please refer to the attached example project, which has ready-to-use batch scripts for programming the flash and start gdbserver etc by calling the batch file in Terminal of netX Studio .)
It's not recommended as well, since to use the full feature of J-Link Debugger, Ozone is supposed to be used. If you want to use netX Studio CDT as frontend, please pay attention to the following points:
- Start J-Link GDB Server(Run jlinkgdbserver_run.bat) before start debugging in netX Studio CDT
- Disable Staut OpenOCD automatically in Debug Settings ->Target Settings
- Don't Load image(gdb load) if application is running directly in internal flash
- Remote Target should be localhost and Port number is 3333.
Using J-Link with J-Link Debugger (Ozone)
Before debugging, the netX 90 internal flash needs to be programmed with the required files. See Using J-Flash to setup the netX 90 internal flash above.
References