Re: [ECOS] Re: redboot on STM32f4-discovery board

[Oleg Uzenkov <o.uzenkov@unicore.co.ua>]

Hello, John, Ilija,

Thanks for your help!

I will study in depth STM32x0G_EVAL and Kinetis platform HAL packages.

My main goal is to port and use redboot on my own custom board which is 
similar to STM32f4-discovery board (stm32f407VE processor, no external 
ram, 512KB of internal flash, 128KiB  of ram). The custom board has got 
sdcard (with FAT32) though. Redboot should be responsible for loading a 
binary stored in sdcard.

The general steps, it seems to me I need to take, are as follows:

1) add cdl items you mentioned in the previous mail into the board's HAL 
package ( + all what is needed to work with sdcard) -> build redboot.bin
2) load redboot.bin (built as "ROM" startup type)  into internal flash 
at 0x08000000
3) place app.bin file onto sdcard (image need to be built with "RAM" 
startup type)
4) on reset redboot mounts sdcard -> selects a binary and loads it into 
internal flash (at address not overlapping redboot)
5) need to copy app's code to ram for execution and run it (do not know 
how to, probably need startup code?)

Please, could you correct me if I am wrong in the general understanding.

I very much appreciate your help.

Oleg

> On 03.10.2014 13:40, John Dallaway wrote:
>> Hi Oleg
>>
>> On 02/10/14 09:47, Oleg Uzenkov wrote:
>>
>>> I am working with eCos on STM32f4-discovery board.
>>>
>>> I would like to build a redboot loader that could choose and load
>>> binaries (eCos+app) stored in internal flash at power on.
>>>
>>> The eCos port for STM32f4-discovery has got a redboot option under
>>> Packages list in Templates. However it seems to be very minimalistic and
>>> also not functional. Also there is no specific configuration file like
>>> redboot_ROM.ecm.
>>>
>>> Please, could you give me directions as to making a functional redboot
>>> loader for STM32f4-discovery board.
>>>
>>> Would it make sense to build redboot for stm32x0g_eval board (redboot
>>> seems to be working) and adapt it for STM32f4-discovery board?
>>>
>>> I would appreciate any input on this.
>> To be clear, there is no support for RedBoot in the STM32F4-Discovery
>> platform HAL at present. The STM32F4-Discovery board offers only 128KiB
>> of contiguous on-chip RAM, so loading applications into RAM prior to
>> execution would limit the size of your applications quite considerably.
>> RedBoot would also consume some of the available RAM for its own data
>> structures.
>>
>> If you are still interested in using RedBoot to load and launch your
>> applications, you will need to add the following to the
>> STM32F4-Discovery platform HAL package:
>>
>> a) CDL items and memory layout files for RAM startup
>> b) CDL items for behaving as a ROM monitor and for working with a ROM
>>     monitor
>> c) RedBoot-specific CDL items and data structures
>>
>> You will find examples of all the above in the STM32x0G_EVAL platform
>> HAL package, but keep in mind that the STM32x0G_EVAL boards feature
>> external RAM. The naming of memory regions and startup types is
>> therefore different. The STM32x0G_EVAL "ROMINT" and "SRAM" startup types
>> are broadly equivalent to the STM32F4-Discovery "ROM" and (proposed)
>> "RAM" startup types respectively.
> In addition, for example of RedBoot on a platform with only internal RAM
> you can look at Kinetis.
>
> Ilija
>
>> I hope this helps...
>>
>> John Dallaway
>> eCos maintainer
>> http://www.dallaway.org.uk/john
>>
>


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