C/C++ template project for Vorago VA416xx based projects

It is recommended to use the RevB of the VA416xx chips, the RevA boards have prove problematic for development with non-Keil tools.

Prerequisites

ARM Cross-compiler installed and added to system path
CMake installed
SEGGER J-Link tools installed
Eclipse or VS Code for development recommended, project files provided

Note on RevA

For the RevA board, the JLink Server needs to be started with a JLinkScript file argument to ensure that the ROM protection is disabled. Otherwise, flashing the chip won't work.

Furthermore, resetting the chip on boot is problematic for this revision as well. It wasn't tested yet whether these problems occur on RevB as well.

Build

Instructions for command line. Make sure you can call the cross-compiler from the command line, e.g. with arm-none-eabi-gcc -v.

Create build directory
```
mmkdir build && cd build
```
Set up build system. Depending on the OS and desired build system, you might have to specify the build system explicitely (e.g. with -G "MinGW Makefiles" or -G "Ninja" on Windows) instead of using the defaults. There are also various build options available. See the cmake section for more information.
```
cmake ..
```
Build the project
```
cmake --build . -j
```

Flashing and Debugging

It is recommended to use Eclipse or VS code for convenient flashing. The instructions here show how to do it in the command line

Start the JLink GDB server, for example with JLinkGDBServer on Linux. You might need to pass the -jlinkscriptfile ./jlink/JLinkSettings.JLinkScript argument because this is required to disable the ROM protection, allowing flashing. See more information in the Note on RevA. A jlink-gdb.sh file was provided to perform this step conveniently
Run the GDB application, for example gdb-multiarch on Linux
```
gdb-multiarch -q -x jlink.gdb build/va416xx-template
```
The debugger should now be stopped at the start of the application. Press C to continue

Using VS Code

The only requirement on the VS Code installation is the following plugin:

Cortex-Debug

While this plugin is able to start the GDB application as well, it always resets the CPU in the process. For now, it was decided that the user needs to start the GDB server themselves like shown in step 1 of the debug section.

Another requirement is that you still need to set up the Eclipse build configuration at least once in the build folder like shown in the build section. After that, you can use the Run & Debug Tab of VS Code to debug your application.

Using Eclipse

The only requirement on the Eclipse installation is the following plugin:

Eclipse Embedded CDT. It is recommended to install the xPacks cross-compiler as it offers the best Eclipse support when used with this plugin

It is also recommended to install the following plugins

CMakeEditor

After installing all plugins, copy the .cproject and .project files from the eclipse folder to the repository root. Now open the folder in Eclipse as a project and make sure to deselect the eclipse folder in the selection Window.

Another requirement is that you still need to set up the Eclipse build configuration at least once in the build folder like shown in the build section. After that you should be able to build and debug with the hammer and debug button conveniently now.

Additional CMake options

You can configure the build process by passing these options with -D<Option>=<Value> to the cmake build generation call. This sections give an overview of the most important build options. All configuration options will be copied to the VORConfig.h file inside the build folder.

Boolean options

Set value to ON or OFF:

GCC_USE_NANO_LIB: Can be used to use newlib-nano for reduced code size.
GCC_NANOLIB_SCAN_FLOAT: Only relevant when using newlib-nano. Allow scanning floats.
GCC_NANOLIB_PRINT_FLOAT: Only relevant when using newlib-nano. Allow printing floats
VOR_ENABLE_RTT: Enable logging via Segger-RTT

Integer options

Set value to integer value

VOR_XTAL, VOR_HBO and VOR_EXTCLK: Set fixed clock values for software which can be modified by hardware configuration

us-irs/va416xx-cpp-base