mspdebug/mspdebug.man

.TH mspdebug 1 "18 Mar 2010" "Version 0.4"
.SH NAME
MSPDebug - debugging tool for MSP430 MCUs
.SH SYNOPSIS
\fBmspdebug\fR \-R [\-v \fIvoltage\fR] [\fIcommand\fR ...]
.br
\fBmspdebug\fR \-u \fIdevice\fR [\-j] [\-v \fIvoltage\fR] [\fIcommand\fR ...]
.br
\fBmspdebug\fR \-B \fIdevice\fR [\fIcommand\fR ...]
.br
\fBmspdebug\fR \-s [\fIcommand\fR ...]
.SH DESCRIPTION
MSPDebug is a command-line tool designed for debugging and programming
the MSP430 family of MCUs. It supports the eZ430-F2013, eZ430-RF2500
and FET430UIF programming tools.

When started with appropriate options, MSPDebug will attempt to
connect to the debugging tool specified and identify the device under
test. Once connected, the user is presented with a command prompt
which can be used to reflash the device memory, inspect memory and
registers, set registers, and control the CPU (single step, run and
run to breakpoint).

It supports ELF32, Intel HEX and BSD-style symbol tables (such as the
output produced by \fBnm\fR(1)).
.SH OPTIONS
Command-line options accepted by MSPDebug are described below. If
commands are specified on the end of the command-line, then they are
executed after connecting to the device, and the interactive prompt is
not started. See the section labelled \fBCOMMANDS\fR for more
information.
.IP "\-R"
Connect to an eZ430-RF2500 device. The USB bus will be searched for
the first available device. You must have write permission for usbfs
in order for this to work. You can achieve this by running as root
(not recommended), or by remounting usbfs using the
devuid/devgid/devmode options.
.IP "\-v \fIvoltage\fR"
Set the programming voltage. The voltage should be specified as an integer
in millivolts. It defaults to 3000 (3.0 V).
.IP "\-u \fIdevice\fR"
Connect to an eZ430-F2013 or a FET430UIF device. The device argument
should be the filename of the appropriate tty device. The TI serial
converter chips on these devices are supported by newer versions of the
Linux kernel, and should appear as /dev/tty\fIXX\fR when attached.
.IP "\-j"
Use JTAG instead of Spy-Bi-Wire to communicate with the MSP430. This
option only works on FET430UIF devices.
.IP "\-B \fIdevice\fR"
Connect to the bootloader on a FET430UIF device. These devices contain
MSP430F419 chips. By sending a special command sequence, you can obtain
access to the bootloader and inspect memory on the MSP430F419 in the
programming device itself.

Currently, only memory inspection is supported. CPU control via the
bootloader is not possible. Memory erase and write is possible, but is
currently not implemented, for lack of ability to test it. If implemented,
this would allow firmware updates to FET430UIF devices.

The argument should be the filename of the appropriate tty device.
.IP "\-s"
Do not connect to any hardware device, but instead start in simulation
mode. A 64k buffer is allocated to simulate the device memory. All of
the memory inspection and programming commands can be used on this
buffer, but CPU control is not supported.

This mode is intended for testing of changes to MSPDebug, and for
aiding the disassembly of MSP430 binaries (as all binary and symbol
table formats are still usable in this mode).
.SH COMMANDS
MSPDebug can accept commands either through an interactive prompt, or
non-interactively when specified on the command line. The supported
commands are listed below.
.IP "= \fIexpression\fR"
Evaluate an address expression and show both its value, and the result
when the value is looked up in reverse in the current symbol
table. This result is of the form \fIsymbol\fR+\fIoffset\fR, where
\fIsymbol\fR is the name of the nearest symbol not past the address in
question.

See the section marked \fBADDRESS EXPRESSIONS\fR for more information on
the syntax of expressions.
.IP "dis \fIaddress\fR [\fIlength\fR]"
Dissassemble a section of memory. Both arguments may be address
expressions. If no length is specified, a section of the default
length (64 bytes) is disassembled and shown.

If symbols are available, then all addresses used as operands are
translated into \fIsymbol\fR+\fIoffset\fR form.
.IP "help [\fIcommand\fR]"
Show a brief listing of available commands. If an argument is
specified, show the syntax for the given command. The help text shown
when no argument is given is also shown when MSPDebug starts up.
.IP "hexout \fIaddress\fR \fIlength\fR \fIfilename\fR"
Read the specified section of the device memory and save it to an
Intel HEX file. The address and length arguments may both be address
expressions.

If the specified file already exists, then it will be overwritten. If
you need to dump memory from several disjoint memory regions, you can
do this by saving each section to a separate file. The resulting files
can then be concatenated together to form a single valid HEX file.
.IP "md \fIaddress\fR [\fIlength\fR]"
Read the specified section of device memory and display it as a
canonical\-style hexdump. Both arguments may be address expressions. If
no length is specified, a section of the default length (64 bytes) is
shown.

The output is split into three columns. The first column shows the
starting address for the line. The second column lists the hexadecimal
values of the bytes. The final column shows the ASCII characters
corresponding to printable bytes, and . for non-printing characters.
.IP "nosyms"
Clear all symbols from the symbol table. Symbols may be reloaded with
the \fBsyms\fR command.
.IP "prog \fIfilename\fR"
Erase and reprogram the device under test using the binary file
supplied. The file format will be auto-detected and may be either
Intel HEX or ELF32.

In the case of an ELF32 file, symbols will be automatically loaded
from the file into the symbol table (discarding any existing symbols),
if they are present.

The CPU is reset and halted before programming.
.IP "regs"
Show the current value of all CPU registers in the device under test.
.IP "reset"
Reset (and halt) the CPU of the device under test.
.IP "run [\fIbreakpoint\fR]"
Run the CPU, optionally specifying a breakpoint. The breakpoint can be
specified as an address expression.

The interactive command prompt is blocked when the CPU is started and
the prompt will not appear again until the CPU halts. The CPU will halt
if it encounters the specified breakpoint, or if Ctrl\-C is pressed by
the user.

After the CPU halts, the current register values are shown as well as
a disassembly of the first few instructions at the address selected
by the program counter.
.IP "set \fIregister\fR \fIvalue\fR"
Alter the value of a register. Registers are specified as numbers from
0 through 15. Any leading non-numeric characters are ignored (so a
register may be specified as, for example, "R12"). The value argument
is an address expression.
.IP "step"
Step the CPU through a single instruction. After stepping, the new
register values are displayed, as well as a disassembly of the
instructions at the address selected by the program counter.
.IP "syms \fIfilename\fR"
Load symbols from the specified file and add them to the symbol table.
The file format will be auto-detected and may be either ELF32 or a
BSD-style symbol listing (like the output from \fBnm\fR(1)).

Symbols can be combined from many sources, as the syms command adds
to the existing symbol table without discarding existing symbols.
.SH ADDRESS EXPRESSIONS
Any command which accepts a memory address, length or register value
as an argument may be given an address expression. An address
expression consists of a sequence of one or more address values
separated by the operators \fB+\fR or \fB\-\fR.

An address value may be either a decimal value, a hexadecimal value
preceeded by the prefix \fB0x\fR, or a symbol name.

The following are all valid examples of address expressions:

.B 64
.br
.B 0xffe0
.br
.B main+0x3f
.br
.B __bss_end-__bss_start
.SH SEE ALSO
.BR nm (1),
.BR objcopy (1)
.SH BUGS
If you find any bugs, you should report them to the author at
daniel@tortek.co.nz. It would help if you could include a transcript
of an MSPDebug session illustrating the program, as well as any
relevant binaries or other files. Below, known bugs in the current
version of MSPDebug are described.

Memory addresses above 0x10000 (in devices with more than 64k of
memory) are not accessible. All other memory in these devices is
accessible as normal.

Most of the popular device IDs are recognized, but the set is not
complete. If you see a message like the following after connecting:

.B Unknown device ID: 0x\fI1234\fP

Please report it, as well as the model of the device you are using.

Some firmware versions of the FET430UIF are not supported. If you
encounter a version which doesn't work, you should try to extract
the firmware using the command:

.B mspdebug -B \fIdevice\fP 'hexout 0x3100 0xdb00 firmware.hex'

Please send the HEX file, along with the firmware version. The
firmware version is reported in the transcript when connecting
with the \fB-u\fR option.

Firmware version 20107000 is known to work with MSPDebug, and you can
update your FET to this version using the proprietary
\fBmsp430\-gdbproxy\fR program:

.B msp430-gdbproxy msp430 \fIdevice\fP --update-usb-fet

This command updates the FET firmware using the same bootloader
supported by MSPDebug's \fB\-B\fR option. However, as mentioned above,
MSPDebug does not support erase or programming in this mode.
.SH COPYRIGHT
Copyright (C) 2009, 2010 Daniel Beer <daniel@tortek.co.nz>

MSPDebug is free software, distributed under the terms of the GNU
General Public license (version 2 or later). See the file COPYING
included with the source code for more details.