mspdebug/README

MSPDebug
========

MSPDebug is a free debugger for use with MSP430 MCUs. It supports
FET430UIF, eZ430, RF2500 and Olimex MSP430-JTAG-TINY programmers, as
well as many other compatible devices. It can be used as a proxy for
gdb or as an independent debugger with support for programming,
disassembly and reverse engineering.

Features
--------

  * Userspace only: no kernel modifications required.
  * Works with RF2500, eZ430, FET430UIF (V2 and V3), Launchpad, Chronos,
    GoodFET, Olimex MSP430-JTAG-TINY and MSP430-JTAG-ISO programmers.
    Also supports the TI flash bootloader.
  * Can act as a GDB remote stub (replacement for msp430-gdbproxy)
    and/or a GDB client.
  * Can single-step, program, run to breakpoint and inspect memory on
    supported devices.
  * Can be used to access the FET430UIF bootloader.
  * Supports Intel HEX, ELF32, BSD symbol table, COFF, TI Text and
    SREC file formats.
  * Can disassemble code in memory, including translating addresses to
    symbols.
  * Includes reverse-engineering features such as instruction search,
    call-graph analysis and symbol table editing.
  * Simulation mode allows execution of MSP430 code without hardware.
  * Cross-platform: compiles on Linux, *BSD, OS/X and Windows.

Compiling from source
---------------------

Ensure that you have the necessary packages to compile programs that use
libusb (on Debian or Ubuntu systems, you might need to do apt-get
install libusb-dev | on Arch systems, you might need to do sudo 
pacman -S libusb-compact). After that, unpack and compile the source code 
with:

    tar xvfz mspdebug-version.tar.gz
    cd mspdebug-version
    make

On Debian Ubuntu systems sudo apt-get install libreadline-dev may be 
required. On Arch systems sudo pacman -S readline may be required.
If you don't want GNU readline support, you can invoke make with:

    make WITHOUT_READLINE=1

After compiling, install the binary and manual page by running (as
root):

    make install

Type "mspdebug --help" for usage instructions.