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boards: ti: am243x_evm: add documentation
Add documentation for am243x_evm and while at it, add the openocd configuration as well. Co-authored-by: Mika Braunschweig <[email protected]> Signed-off-by: Amneesh Singh <[email protected]>
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boards/ti/am243x_evm/doc/index.rst

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.. zephyr:board:: am243x_evm
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Overview
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********
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The AM243x EVM is a development board that is based of a AM2434 SoC. The
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Cortex R5F cores in the SoC run at 800 MHz. The board also includes a flash
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region, DIP-Switches for the boot mode selection and 2 RJ45 Ethernet ports.
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See the `TI TMDS243EVM Product Page`_ for details.
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Hardware
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********
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The AM2434 SoC has 2 domains. A MAIN domain and a MCU domain. The MAIN domain
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consists of 4 R5F cores and the MCU domain of one M4F core.
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Zephyr currently supports the following cores:
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- R5F Subsystem 0 Core 0 (R5F0_0)
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- M4F Core (M4)
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The board physically contains:
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- Memory.
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- 256KB of SRAM
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- 2GB of DDR4
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- Debug
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- XDS110 based JTAG
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Devices
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========
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System Clock
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------------
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This board configuration uses a system clock frequency of
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- 800MHz for R5F0_0
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- 400MHz for M4
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DDR RAM
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-------
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The board has 2GB of DDR RAM available. This board configuration allocates:
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- 4KB Resource Table at 0xa4100000 for M4
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- 4KB Resource Table at 0xa0100000 for R5F0_0
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- 8MB Shared Memory at 0xa5000000 for inter-processor communication
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Serial Port
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-----------
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This board configuration uses by default:
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- MAIN domain UART (UART0) for R5F0_0
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- MCU domain UART (MCU_UART0) for M4
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Supported Features
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==================
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.. zephyr:board-supported-hw::
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Flashing
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********
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The boot process of the AM2434 SoC requires the booting image to be in a
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specific format and to wait for the internal DMSC-L of the AM2434 to start up
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and configure memory firewalls. Since there exists no Zephyr support it's
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required to use one of the SBL bootloader examples from the TI MCU+ SDK.
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Prerequisites
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=============
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The following steps are from the time this documentation was written and might
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change in the future. They also target Linux with assumption some basic things
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(like python3 and openssl) are installed.
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You might also want to take a look at the `Bootflow Guide`_ for more details.
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To build these you need to install the TI MCU+ SDK. To do this you need to
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follow the steps described in the ``mcupsdk-core`` repository, which includes
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cloning the repositories with west. It's recommended to use another Python venv
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for this since the MCU+ SDK has own Python dependencies that could conflict with
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Zephyr dependencies. You can replace ``all/dev.yml`` in the ``west init``
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command with ``am243x/dev.yml``, if you want to clone a few less repositories.
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You also need to follow the "Downloading And Installing Dependencies" section
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but you need to replace all ``am263x`` occurences in commands with ``am243x``.
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Please also take note of the ``tools`` and ``mcu_plus_sdk`` install path. The
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``tools`` install path will later be referred to as ``$TI_TOOLS`` and the MCU+
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SDK path as ``$MCUPSDK``. You can pass ``--skip_doxygen=true`` and
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``--skip_ccs=true`` to the install script since they aren't needed. You might
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encounter a error that a script can't be executed. To fix it you need to mark it
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as executable with ``chmod +x <path>`` and run the ``download_components.sh``
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again.
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Summarized you will most likely want to run the following commands or similar
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versions for setting up the MCU+ SDK:
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.. code-block:: console
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python3 -m venv .venv
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source .venv/bin/activate
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pip3 install west
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west init -m https://github.com/TexasInstruments/mcupsdk-manifests.git --mr mcupsdk_west --mf am243x/dev.yml
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west update
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./mcupsdk_setup/am243x/download_components.sh --skip_doxygen=true --skip_ccs=true
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After the script finished successfully you want to switch into the
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``mcu_plus_sdk`` directory and edit the
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``source/drivers/bootloader/bootloader.c`` file to set the ``entryPoint`` to
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``0`` inside ``Bootloader_runCpu`` unconditionally. This is needed due to how
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Zephyr builds the image currently.
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Now you can build the internal libraries with the following commands:
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.. code-block:: console
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make gen-buildfiles DEVICE=am243x PROFILE=release
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make libs DEVICE=am243x PROFILE=release
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If you encounter compile errors you have to fix them. For that you might have to
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change parameter types, remove missing source files from makefiles or download
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missing headers from the TI online reference.
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Depending on whether you later want to boot from flash or by loading the image
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via UART either the ``sbl_ospi`` or the ``sbl_uart`` example is relevant for the
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next section.
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Building the bootloader itself
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==============================
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The example bootloader implementation is found in the
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``examples/drivers/boot/<example>/am243x-evm/r5fss0-0_nortos`` directory.
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You can either build the example by invoking ``make -C
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examples/drivers/boot/<example>/am243x-evm/r5fss0-0_nortos/ti-arm-clang/
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DEVICE=am243x PROFILE=release`` or use the prebuilt binaries in
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``tools/boot/sbl_prebuilt/am243x-evm``
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Converting the Zephyr application
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=================================
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Additionally for booting you need to convert your built Zephyr binary into a
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format that the TI example bootloader can boot. You can do this with the
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following commands, where ``$TI_TOOLS`` refers to the root of where your
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ti-tools (clang, sysconfig etc.) are installed (``$HOME/ti`` by default) and
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``$MCUPSDK`` to the root of the MCU+ SDK (directory called ``mcu_plus_sdk``).
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You might have to change version numbers in the commands. It's expected that the
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``zephyr.elf`` from the build output is in the current directory.
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.. code-block:: bash
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export BOOTIMAGE_CORE_ID_r5fss0-0=4
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export BOOTIMAGE_CORE_ID_m4=14
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# set CORE_ID as per your target core
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export BOOTIMAGE_CORE_ID=${BOOTIMAGE_CORE_ID_desired-core}
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$TI_TOOLS/sysconfig_1.21.2/nodejs/node $MCUPSDK/tools/boot/out2rprc/elf2rprc.js ./zephyr.elf
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$MCUPSDK/tools/boot/xipGen/xipGen.out -i ./zephyr.rprc -o ./zephyr.rprc_out -x ./zephyr.rprc_out_xip --flash-start-addr 0x60000000
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$TI_TOOLS/sysconfig_1.21.2/nodejs/node $MCUPSDK/tools/boot/multicoreImageGen/multicoreImageGen.js --devID 55 --out ./zephyr.appimage ./zephyr.rprc_out@${BOOTIMAGE_CORE_ID}
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$TI_TOOLS/sysconfig_1.21.2/nodejs/node $MCUPSDK/tools/boot/multicoreImageGen/multicoreImageGen.js --devID 55 --out ./zephyr.appimage_xip ./zephyr.rprc_out_xip@${BOOTIMAGE_CORE_ID}
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python3 $MCUPSDK/source/security/security_common/tools/boot/signing/appimage_x509_cert_gen.py --bin ./zephyr.appimage --authtype 1 --key $MCUPSDK/source/security/security_common/tools/boot/signing/app_degenerateKey.pem --output ./zephyr.appimage.hs_fs
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All these steps are also present in various Makefiles in the ``examples/``
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directory of MCU+ SDK source.
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Running the Zephyr image
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========================
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After that you want to switch the bootmode to UART by switching the DIP-Switches
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into the following configuration:
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.. list-table:: UART Boot Mode
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:header-rows: 1
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* - SW2 [0:7]
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- SW3 [8:15]
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* - 11011100
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- 10110000
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If you want to just run the image via UART you need to run
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.. code-block:: console
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python3 uart_bootloader.py -p /dev/ttyUSB0 --bootloader=sbl_uart.release.hs_fs.tiimage --file=zephyr.appimage.hs_fs
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The ``uart_bootloader.py`` script is found in ``$MCUPSDK/tools/boot`` and the
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``sbl_uart.release.hs_fs.tiimage`` in
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``$MCUPSDK/tools/boot/sbl_prebuilt/am243x-evm``. After sending the image your
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Zephyr application will run after a 2 second long delay.
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If you want to flash the image instead you have to take the OSPI example config
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file from the ``$MCUPSDK/tools/boot/sbl_prebuilt/am243x-evm`` directory and
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change the filepath according to your names. It should look approximately like:
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.. code-block::
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--flash-writer=sbl_uart_uniflash.release.hs_fs.tiimage
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--operation=flash-phy-tuning-data
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--file=sbl_prebuilt/am243x-evm/sbl_ospi.release.hs_fs.tiimage --operation=flash --flash-offset=0x0
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--file=zephyr.appimage.hs_fs --operation=flash --flash-offset=0x80000
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--file=zephyr.appimage_xip --operation=flash-xip
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You then need to run ``python3 uart_uniflash.py -p /dev/ttyUSB0
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--cfg=<path/to/your-config-file>``. The scripts and images are in the same path
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as described in the UART section above.
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After flashing your image you can power off your board, switch the DIP-Switches
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into following configuration to boot in OSPI mode and your Zephyr application
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will boot immediately after powering on the board.
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.. list-table:: OSPI Boot Mode
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:header-rows: 1
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* - SW2 [0:7]
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- SW3 [8:15]
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* - 11001110
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- 01000000
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Debugging
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*********
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OpenOCD
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=======
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The board is equipped with an XDS110 JTAG debugger. To debug a binary, utilize
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the ``debug`` build target:
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.. zephyr-app-commands::
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:app: <my_app>
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:board: am243x_evm/<soc>/<core>
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:maybe-skip-config:
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:goals: debug
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.. hint::
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To utilize this feature, you'll need OpenOCD version 0.12 or higher. Due to the possibility of
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older versions being available in package feeds, it's advisable to `build OpenOCD from source`_.
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Code Composer Studio
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====================
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Instead of using ``sbl_ospi`` from above, one may also flash ``sbl_null`` and load the
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application ELFs using Code Composer Studio IDE to individual cores and run/debug
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the application. Note that this does not require converting the Zephyr ELF to another
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forma, making development much easier.
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References
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**********
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AM64x/AM243x EVM Technical Reference Manual:
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https://www.ti.com/lit/ug/spruj63a/spruj63a.pdf
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MCU+ SDK Github repository:
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https://github.com/TexasInstruments/mcupsdk-core
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.. _Bootflow Guide:
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https://software-dl.ti.com/mcu-plus-sdk/esd/AM64X/latest/exports/docs/api_guide_am64x/BOOTFLOW_GUIDE.html
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.. _TI TMDS243EVM Product Page:
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https://www.ti.com/tool/TMDS243EVM
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.. _build OpenOCD from source:
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https://docs.u-boot.org/en/latest/board/ti/k3.html#building-openocd-from-source
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License
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*******
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This document Copyright (c) Siemens Mobility GmbH
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This document Copyright (c) 2025 Texas Instruments
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SPDX-License-Identifier: Apache-2.0
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# Texas Instruments AM243x EVM
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#
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# Copyright (c) 2025 Texas Instruments
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#
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# SPDX-License-Identifier: Apache-2.0
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source [find board/ti_am243_launchpad.cfg]

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