Zephyr and Nordic nRF52-DK: debugging, unit testing, project analysis¶

Setting Up the Project¶

1. Click on “PlatformIO Home” button on the bottom PlatformIO Toolbar:

   

2. Click on “New Project”, select Nordic nRF52-DK as the development board, Zephyr as the framework and a path to the project location (or use the default one):

   

Adding Code to the Generated Project¶

1. Create a new file main.c in src_dir folder and add the following code:

   //
   // Copyright (c) 2015-2016 Intel Corporation
   //
   // SPDX-License-Identifier: Apache-2.0
   //
   
   #include <zephyr/types.h>
   #include <stddef.h>
   #include <sys/printk.h>
   #include <sys/util.h>
   
   #include <bluetooth/bluetooth.h>
   #include <bluetooth/hci.h>
   
   #define DEVICE_NAME CONFIG_BT_DEVICE_NAME
   #define DEVICE_NAME_LEN (sizeof(DEVICE_NAME) - 1)
   
   // Set Advertisement data. Based on the Eddystone specification:
   // https://github.com/google/eddystone/blob/master/protocol-specification.md
   // https://github.com/google/eddystone/tree/master/eddystone-url
   
   static const struct bt_data ad[] = {
       BT_DATA_BYTES(BT_DATA_FLAGS, BT_LE_AD_NO_BREDR),
       BT_DATA_BYTES(BT_DATA_UUID16_ALL, 0xaa, 0xfe),
       BT_DATA_BYTES(BT_DATA_SVC_DATA16,
                     0xaa, 0xfe,
                     0x10, // Eddystone-URL frame type
                     0x00, // Calibrated Tx power at 0m
                     0x00, // URL Scheme Prefix http://www.
                     'z', 'e', 'p', 'h', 'y', 'r',
                     'p', 'r', 'o', 'j', 'e', 'c', 't',
                     0x08) // .org
   };
   
   // Set Scan Response data
   static const struct bt_data sd[] = {
       BT_DATA(BT_DATA_NAME_COMPLETE, DEVICE_NAME, DEVICE_NAME_LEN),
   };
   
   static void bt_ready(int err)
   {
     if (err)
     {
       printk("Bluetooth init failed (err %d)\n", err);
       return;
     }
   
     printk("Bluetooth initialized\n");
   
     // Start advertising
     err = bt_le_adv_start(BT_LE_ADV_NCONN, ad, ARRAY_SIZE(ad),
                           sd, ARRAY_SIZE(sd));
     if (err)
     {
       printk("Advertising failed to start (err %d)\n", err);
       return;
     }
   
     printk("Beacon started\n");
   }
   
   void main(void)
   {
     int err;
   
     printk("Starting Beacon Demo\n");
   
     // Initialize the Bluetooth Subsystem
     err = bt_enable(bt_ready);
     if (err)
     {
       printk("Bluetooth init failed (err %d)\n", err);
     }
   }
   

2. By default Bluetooth feature is disabled, we can enable it by creating a new file prj.conf in zephyr folder and adding the following lines:

   CONFIG_BT=y
   CONFIG_BT_DEBUG_LOG=y
   CONFIG_BT_DEVICE_NAME="Test beacon"
   

Compiling and Uploading the Firmware¶

1. To compile the project use one of the following options:

   • Build option from the Project Tasks menu

   • Build button in PlatformIO Toolbar

   • Task Menu Tasks: Run Task... > PlatformIO: Build or in PlatformIO Toolbar

   • Command Palette View: Command Palette > PlatformIO: Build

   • Hotkeys cmd-alt-b / ctrl-alt-b:

   

2. If everything went well, we should see a successful result message in the terminal window:

   

3. To upload the firmware to the board we can use the following options:

   • Upload option from the Project Tasks menu

   • Upload button in PlatformIO Toolbar

   • Command Palette View: Command Palette > PlatformIO: Upload

   • Task Menu Tasks: Run Task... > PlatformIO: Upload

   • Hotkeys cmd-alt-u / ctrl-alt-u:

   

4. Connect the board to your computer and update the default monitor speed to 115200 in platformio.ini file:

   [env:nrf52_dk]
   platform = nordicnrf52
   board = nrf52_dk
   framework = zephyr
   monitor_speed = 115200
   

5. Open Serial Monitor to observe the output from the board:

   

6. If everything went well, the board should be visible as a beacon:

   

Debugging the Firmware¶

Since Nordic nRF52-DK includes an onboard debug probe we can use Debugging without any configuration.

1. To start a debug session we can use the following options:

   • Debug: Start debugging from the top menu

   • Start Debugging option from Quick Access menu

   • Hotkey button F5:

   

2. We can walk through the code using control buttons, set breakpoints, add variables to Watch window:

   

Writing Unit Tests¶

For the sake of simplicity, let’s create a small library called calculator, implement several basic functions add, sub, mul, div and test them using Unit Testing solution.

1. PlatformIO uses a unit testing framework called Unity. Unity is not compatible with C library implemented in the framework. Let’s enable standard version of newlib C library in prj.conf file using the following config:

   CONFIG_NEWLIB_LIBC=y
   

2. Create a new folder calculator in the lib folder and add two new files calculator.h and calculator.c with the following contents:

   calculator.h:

   #ifndef _CALCULATOR_H_
   #define _CALCULATOR_H_
   
   #ifdef __cplusplus
   extern "C" {
   #endif
   
   int add (int a, int b);
   int sub (int a, int b);
   int mul (int a, int b);
   int div (int a, int b);
   
   #ifdef __cplusplus
   }
   #endif
   
   #endif // _CALCULATOR_H_
   

   calculator.c:

   #include "calculator.h"
   
   int add(int a, int b)
   {
       return a + b;
   }
   
   int sub(int a, int b)
   {
       return a - b;
   }
   
   int mul(int a, int b)
   {
       return a * b;
   }
   

3. Create a new file test_calc.c to the folder test and add basic tests for calculator library:

   #include <calculator.h>
   #include <unity.h>
   
   void setUp(void)
   {
     // set stuff up here
   }
   
   void tearDown(void)
   {
     // clean stuff up here
   }
   
   void test_function_calculator_addition(void)
   {
     TEST_ASSERT_EQUAL(32, add(25, 7));
   }
   
   void test_function_calculator_subtraction(void)
   {
     TEST_ASSERT_EQUAL(20, sub(23, 3));
   }
   
   void test_function_calculator_multiplication(void)
   {
     TEST_ASSERT_EQUAL(50, mul(25, 2));
   }
   
   void test_function_calculator_division(void)
   {
     TEST_ASSERT_EQUAL(32, div(100, 3));
   }
   
   void main()
   {
     UNITY_BEGIN();
   
     RUN_TEST(test_function_calculator_addition);
     RUN_TEST(test_function_calculator_subtraction);
     RUN_TEST(test_function_calculator_multiplication);
     RUN_TEST(test_function_calculator_division);
   
     UNITY_END();
   }
   

4. Let’s run tests on the board and check the results. There should be a problem with test_function_calculator_division test:

   

5. Let’s fix the incorrect expected value, run tests again. After processing the results should be correct:

   

Project Inspection¶

For illustrative purposes, let’s imagine we need to find a function with the biggest memory footprint. Also, let’s introduce a bug to our project so Static Code Analysis can report it.

1. Open PlatformIO Home and navigate to Inspect section, select the current project and press Inspect button:

   

2. Project statistics:

   

3. The biggest function:

   

4. Possible bugs:

   

Conclusion¶

Now we have a project template for Nordic Nordic nRF52-DK board that we can use as a boilerplate for the next projects.