Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Feb.15 Boot blinky, new forte, smaller eCos

Boot blinky not working.
Most obvious (and annoying) question is: 
Why did appear to work last week 
  and does not appear to work with the same forte lms now?
  • Obvious answer would seem to be wrong forte.bin downloaded. 
    •  Backing up to this version did not help. 
  • See OpenOCD notes @ end of previous blog entry
    • having a hard-code location for forte.bin can lead to wrong .bin file
    Obvious tests are 
    • go back to a working version 
      • Summer 2010 with forte0.3 and larger eCos
      • Works - but flashed only with Sam-ba so far 
        • is screen shot needed? Only in case blinky stops working with this version

      • hg_LMS_SummerBkup now a hg repository 
        • committed all files to preserve everything this time  
      • Regression test of hg version works

    Then  switch out one piece at a time
    • smaller eCos for larger eCos 
      • Problems in code not used by LMS forte (abandoned test for now)
    • hg forte 0.4 for forte 0.3
      •  larger eCos for smaller eCos in current (2/16) forte  
        • too large if any FBs included
        • boot blinky works with larger eCos
      •  working boot blinky so try again with smaller eCos
        • eCos version used by DW had files 1 day newer than smaller eCos tested with
        • boot blinky works with larger eCos
    • HERE
    • various lms code changes 
      • Does the lmsmain that only does boot blinky work everywhere?
      • Incrementally add the code changes back into hg
        • initially with old file structure.
        • then new file structure
          • blinky works in new structure 
        • add in avr_cntl
        • add in FBs
        • (only if doesn't work in new structure) move code around with incremental testing
        • renames with incremental testing
    Less obvious tests are:
    • Is creation of forte.bin correct? 
      • since was part of setup before
        • what was the forte file before? 
      • generalized OpenOCD -flash bat file so 
        • input directory and openocd directories are variables
        • and .cfg file is in the same dir as the .bat file
    • New forte code changes
      • in Nov an rv and vr were exchanged, but think this change is in hg version



    Feb. 15,16 OpenOCD

    OpenOCD bat file details
     Created dropbox dir with openocd bat files as backup
     Goal: get openocd working on my laptop
     Status: 
       Trying to change the lab PC openocd bat files so openocd can flash from a fixed location


    Questions:
    • Can the arm sectors be unlocked from OpenOCD or just via SAM-BA?
      • yes
        • flash protect 0 0 15 off
    • Can .cfg files on Lab PC be used on Laptop
      • So far - no, but lab pc can be in local directory
      • lab pc is openOCD 3 and Laptop openOCD 4

    Bat files examined in detail:
    openocd - FLASH.bat
    .cfg files will be copied here as backup, but real files used.

    Not currently used:
    arm-elf-objcopy
    -->Copies a binary file, possibly transforming it in the process
    Option
    --gap-fill               Fill gaps between sections with

    Files used:
    D:\AA_local\eclipseWork\forte_lms_neu\bin\lms\src\forte 
    -- created by ???
    D:\AA_local\eclipseWork\forte_lms_neu\bin\lms\src\forte.bin
    -- created from forte file

    arm-elf-size D:\AA_local\eclipseWork\forte_lms_neu\bin\lms\src\forte
    To see size of data downloaded to know if too big for LMS 

    openocd.exe

    Options:
    -v display version
    -f flash

    C:\openocd\trunk3\src\openocd.exe -v

    C:\openocd\trunk3\src\openocd.exe -f C:\openocd\trunk3\testing\examples\SAM7S256Test\prj\SAM7S256_flash.cfg -d2

    .cfg files 
    Here are the real instructions to open 

    Monday, February 14, 2011

    Feb. 13,14 Code Review 1

    Code Review was done via SkyPe.
    The comments have been organized by topics, not time.


    cMake compile of hg + 1103 code

    [10:37:33 PM] Carolyn Oates: for cmake you copied everything from arch/ecos/lms unchanged into modules'/lms?
    [10:37:40 PM] Alois Zoitl: nope
    [10:37:51 PM] Alois Zoitl: I moved it to modules/lms/lms_hw
    [10:38:04 PM] Alois Zoitl: I thought a little seperation might be nice
    [10:38:09 PM] Carolyn Oates: No cmake...txt changes
    [10:38:28 PM] Alois Zoitl: yes added subdirectory and added additional cmake.txt there


    [11:07:23 PM] Carolyn Oates: lms_main goes in plain lms dir?
    [11:11:20 PM] Carolyn Oates: filenames should all be lower case?
    [11:11:27 PM] Alois Zoitl: yes and yes
    [11:11:46 PM] Carolyn Oates: So I need to rename Buttons to buttons
    [11:22:01 PM] Carolyn Oates: Do the .h files need to be listed in the CMakeLists.txt file?
    [11:22:30 PM] Alois Zoitl: I'm not sure. However for building distributins afterwards it would be better I gues
    [11:27:10 PM] Carolyn Oates: Does your code have #include "../../arch/ecos/lms/buttons.h" in it?
    [11:27:38 PM] Alois Zoitl: no changed it to "lms_hw/buttons.h"


    2/14 note: avr_ctl, buttons, sensors now start with lowercase letter and end with cpp
     Other files must stay .c files

    ////
    follow the coding rules
    10:15:31 PM] Alois Zoitl: How about having a baseclass for all sensor port fbs e.g. CSensorPortFB : public CFunctionBlock{...};
    [10:15:43 PM] Alois Zoitl: and put there the port management


    [10:26:17 PM] Alois Zoitl: please don't start functions with uppercase letters


    ////


    2/14 note: LED on/off and initialization are ready inline functions in the FB.
    Need to change lms_main to use these functions.

    [11:44:04 PM] Alois Zoitl: I'll be gone for today. Had a look on the i2c files in ecos they are somewhat different. so we should currently stay with the ones we have.

    10:23:46 PM] Carolyn Oates: LMS_LTLED_INIT and LMS_RS485 are init functions
    [10:24:06 PM] Carolyn Oates: LMS_LT_LED_ON /OFF are led fns that do something
    [10:25:30 PM] Carolyn Oates: The LMS_ functions should go in an LED.h except LMS_RS485... its initialized the Port in general.

    [10:26:24 PM] Carolyn Oates: so lms_RsvSensorPort  and LMS_RS485_PORT_INIT() belong together
    [10:26:45 PM] Alois Zoitl: there should also be a unrsv function

    10:28:58 PM] Alois Zoitl: it is just needed to support the an INIT-
    [10:30:42 PM] Alois Zoitl: no it means that you want to deinitialize the FB
    [10:30:48 PM] Alois Zoitl: i.e., QI false

    [11:39:46 PM] Carolyn Oates: isnt this backwards?
    [11:39:48 PM] Carolyn Oates:   if (pa_nInputPortPin < NXT_SENSOR_PORTS_MAX)
        return PORT_NUMBER_UNDEFINED; // Port doesn't exist
    [11:40:43 PM] Alois Zoitl: yep



    Open Question: 
    2/14 latest comment - avr_ctl content is ok.
    Anything else in avr code other than sensor code that is:

    [10:16:44 PM] Alois Zoitl: currently your separation feels for me not very natural as it seperates things that belong together
    [10:16:48 PM] Alois Zoitl: e.g., avr code
    [10:16:56 PM] Alois Zoitl: and isolates other stuff




    What is the event sent to the application?
    [10:35:52 PM] Alois Zoitl: there is the nice clean recsource feature we used in the demo with the students   


    [10:55:52 PM] Carolyn Oates: Off the top of your head - any idea what misc.h an miscxx.c are?
    [10:58:12 PM] Carolyn Oates: Asked without looking... Having looked I think its Alex's and Dominik's debug via usb print.


    [11:05:57 PM] Carolyn Oates: Did you compile with or without boot blinky?
    [11:06:18 PM] Alois Zoitl: without but that should't be an issue afik
    [11:06:51 PM] Carolyn Oates: Does it compile files not needed?



    Friday, February 11, 2011

    (Short-term) Future Task (Wishlist)

    Very near future: SIGCSE
    Before SIGCSE work out what is feasible and what could be a problem:


    Racket on KIPR BotBall
    - Want to demo to Racket group March 9 
    Greenfoot connection to Forte/4DIAC for simulations
    - Want to discuss with Greenfoot author
    LMS Forte 
    - Would like to be able to demo to individuals when asked specfics


    March:
    [Online access to student statistics for distance learning school]
       
    By end of June:
    LMS Forte:

    - More HW FBs (need larger blocks of time)
      like Tacho motor; Sonar (I2c);
            LCD; Sound on board (if possible)
    4DIAC/forte Applications formalization
    - Lego Segway
    - Line Follower with Timed Events instead of E_DELAY


    Summer: 
    NXTBee and distributed applications

    Feb.11 More Project Notes

    Blinky works under hg version with smaller ecos
    next:- avr with led, motor and light sensor support.


    next steps:
    - code review
    --- stable version
    --- cleaned-up version
    --- lab version


    Blinky support functions:
    - void InitLed(void);
    - delay( x)


    Fix (must be pushed into hg!!!!!)
    Warning about Strings  need in Stringdict.h
    to add include:
    #include







    Feb. 10 Next Step- Boot blinky in new forte

    Just project notes today:
    Moved into Dropbox folders.


    cmake process is repeatable.


    Next step move code from summer into project.
    Change lmsmain.cpp so boot blinky works


    What are .cdl files? eCos related

    Tuesday, February 8, 2011

    Feb.8 SAM-BA again

    For SamBa 2.10 on Vista use  com port LMS connected to with usb to serial driver.
    For SamBa 2.9 on XP use Atm6124 TestBoard USB driver
    Flashes under Vista now, 
    eCos is much smaller .Only flashes 9 sectors now instead of 14 or 15..