Remote Debugging Using JTAG Hardware

The Eclipse IDE is very popular to debug remote applications. It uses the cross GDB client installed on the host workstation to connect to the remote GDB server. The remote target must include a GDB server that is reachable either from a serial or Ethernet connection. eCos provides several means to allow remote debugging, however, this article only presents the use of a hardware debugger. The hardware debugger has a GDB server integrated and is used as an interface toward the target. This method is usually more efficient when bringing up a new hardware platform. Using the built-in eCos debugging feature seems more suited for application level debugging and has some limitations.



Some of the well known debuggers are:
- Zylin ARM JTAG debugger
- Abatron BDI BDM/JTAG debugger

In usual setup, the workstation is connected to the debugger via Ethernet and the debugger is connected to the remote target via the JTAG interface. Debuggers can usually be configured via telnet and/or a web interface. The BDI debugger for instance also requires a TFTP server accessible on the network to download the initialization script and the CPU registers definition file.

RAM Application Debugging

This example requires (2) Eclipse plug-ins to be installed, the C/C++ Development add-on and the embedded plug-in from Zylin. A BDI debugger is used to interface a PowerPC based target. This example demonstrates debugging a RAM application. In order to load the application to the target’s external RAM, some minimal CPU register initialization must be performed. There are two possible methods. With the first method, the CPU registers initialization sequence is part of the BDI configuration script. This script is executed by the BDI probe after issuing a reset of the target. The second alternative is to compile a ROM or ROMRAM application in charge of setting up the CPU IOs. The ROM or ROMRAM application is programmed on the target FLASH or booting device. The later method is used in this example. The target FLASH is programmed with a ROMRAM application (Boot Loader)

Once the Eclipse plug-in is installed and the BDI configured and connected to the target, open the Debug perspective in Eclipse and create a new Debug configuration entry under the Zylin Embedded debug type. Use Cygwin or Native depending on your host machine. Give it a name (PPC in this case) and select the application to be debugged.

Move to the next tab (Debugger) and select the GDB debugger to be used. In this example, the path to the PowerPC debugger is entered.

The last step is to enter the initialization sequence you wish GDB to execute when starting a debugging session. This is done under the Commands tab.

The initialization steps in this example are:
- target remote 10.10.11.1:2001 : (connect to the hardware debugger on port 2001)
- mon reset : (reset the target CPU)
- mon ti : (execute a single step)
- mon go : (run)
- mon delay 2000 : (let the CPU run for 2 seconds)
- mon halt : (stop the CPU)
- load : (load the application in RAM)
- stepi : (execute a single step in the loaded RAM application)

All commands using the mon suffix are commands specific to the Hardare debugger. In this example, the GDB client is first connected to the server (integrated server into the debugger). The CPU is reset and released in order to execute the ROMRAM application present in FLASH. After 2 seconds, all CPU IOs configuration shall be completed. The CPU is halted and the RAM application is loaded. Debugging can start.

Main GDB Commands