Project Slinky using the Nordic nRF52 Board

This tutorial shows you how to create, build and run the Slinky application and communicate with newtmgr for a Nordic nRF52 board.

Prerequisites

Create a New Project

Create a new project if you do not have an existing one. You can skip this step and proceed to create the targets if you already have a project created or completed the Sim Slinky tutorial.

Run the following commands to create a new project. We name the project slinky.

$ newt new slinky
Downloading project skeleton from apache/mynewt-blinky...
...
Installing skeleton in slink...
Project slinky successfully created
$ cd slinky
$newt install 
apache-mynewt-core

Create the Targets

Create two targets for the nRF52-DK board - one for the bootloader and one for the Slinky application.

Run the following newt target commands, from your project directory, to create a bootloader target. We name the target nrf52_boot.

$ newt target create nrf52_boot
$ newt target set nrf52_boot bsp=@apache-mynewt-core/hw/bsp/nrf52dk
$ newt target set nrf52_boot build_profile=optimized
$ newt target set nrf52_boot app=@apache-mynewt-core/apps/boot

$ newt target create nrf52_slinky
$ newt target set nrf52_slinky bsp=@apache-mynewt-core/hw/bsp/nrf52dk
$ newt target set nrf52_slinky build_profile=debug
$ newt target set nrf52_slinky app=@apache-mynewt-core/apps/slinky

Build the Targets

Run the newt build nrf52_boot command to build the bootloader:

$ newt build nrf52_boot
Building target targets/nrf52_boot
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/image_ec256.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/image_ec.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/image_rsa.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/crypto/mbedtls/src/aes.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/loader.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/image_validate.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/bootutil_misc.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/apps/boot/src/boot.c
    ...

Archiving sys_mfg.a
Archiving sys_sysinit.a
Archiving util_mem.a
Linking ~/dev/slinky/bin/targets/nrf52_boot/app/apps/boot/boot.elf
Target successfully built: targets/nrf52_boot

Run the newt build nrf52_slinky command to build the Slinky application:

$newt build nrf52_slinky
Building target targets/nrf52_slinky
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/image_ec256.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/image_ec.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/image_rsa.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/split/src/split.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/loader.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/bootutil_misc.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/split/src/split_config.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/crypto/mbedtls/src/aesni.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/boot/bootutil/src/image_validate.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/crypto/mbedtls/src/aes.c
Compiling repos/apache-mynewt-core/apps/slinky/src/main.c

       ...

Archiving util_mem.a
Linking ~/dev/slinky/bin/targets/nrf52_slinky/app/apps/slinky/slinky.elf
Target successfully built: targets/nrf52_slinky

Sign and Create the Slinky Application Image

Run the newt create-image nrf52_slinky 1.0.0 command to create and sign the application image. You may assign an arbitrary version (e.g. 1.0.0) to the image.

$ newt create-image nrf52_slinky 1.0.0
App image succesfully generated: ~/dev/slinky/bin/targets/nrf52_slinky/app/apps/slinky/slinky.img
$

Connect to the Board

  • Connect a micro-USB cable from your computer to the micro-USB port on the nRF52-DK board.
  • Turn the power on the board to ON. You should see the green LED light up on the board.

Run the newt load nrf52_boot command to load the bootloader onto the board:

$ newt load nrf52_boot
Loading bootloader
$

Connect Newtmgr with the Board using a Serial Connection

Set up a serial connection from your computer to the nRF52-DK board (See Serial Port Setup).

Locate the port, in the /dev directory on your computer, that the serial connection uses. The format of the port name is platform dependent:

  • Mac OS uses the format tty.usbserial-<some identifier>.

  • Linux uses the format TTYUSB<N>, where N is a number. For example, TTYUSB2.

  • MinGW on Windows uses the format ttyS<N>, where N is a number. You must map the port name to a Windows COM port: /dev/ttyS<N> maps to COM<N+1>. For example, /dev/ttyS2 maps to COM3.

    You can also use the Windows Device Manager to find the COM port number.

Setup a newtmgr connection profile for the serial port. For our example, the port is /dev/tty.usbserial-1d11.

Run the newtmgr conn add command to define a newtmgr connection profile for the serial port. We name the connection profile nrf52serial.

Note:

  • You will need to replace the connstring with the specific port for your serial connection.
  • On Windows, you must specify COM<N+1> for the connstring if /dev/ttyS<N> is the serial port.
$ newtmgr conn show
Connection profiles:
  nrf52serial: type=serial, connstring='/dev/tty.usbserial-1d11'
  sim1: type=serial, connstring='/dev/ttys012'
$

Run the newtmgr echo hello -c nrf52serial command. This is the simplest command that requests the board to echo back the text.

$ newtmgr echo hello -c nrf52serial 
hello
$

$ newtmgr image list -c nrf52serial 
Images:
 slot=0
    version: 1.0.0
    bootable: true
    flags: active confirmed
    hash: f411a55d7a5f54eb8880d380bf47521d8c41ed77fd0a7bd5373b0ae87ddabd42
Split status: N/A
$

$ newtmgr taskstat -c nrf52serial
      task pri tid  runtime      csw    stksz   stkuse last_checkin next_checkin
      idle 255   0    43484      539       64       32        0        0
      main 127   1        1       90     1024      353        0        0
     task1   8   2        0      340      192      114        0        0
     task2   9   3        0      340       64       31        0        0
$