Preparations

To complete this tutorial you need to have the following tools installed.

Docker

In this example, we use the Docker Engine as a containerization platform. It will handle the required container images.

Installation

Warning

Please follow the installation steps carefully.
Also, you need to be able to manage Docker as a non-root user:
Linux post-installation steps

Python

You need at least python 3.10 to be able to run the dem.

Installation

DEM

We use our open source command-line tool DEM, to manage the containerized Development Environments.

Installation

VSCode

Installation

In this tutorial, the VSCode editor is used to showcase the benefits of containerized tools when developing embedded software. We also provide a separate chapter about how to integrate and utilize the containerized tools.

Nevertheless, all the not VSCode-specific steps can be followed with any other editor.

The base of the example project

We would like to write a very simple application for our target board. When creating software applications for embedded systems - even for very simple ones like LED blinking - some additional functionality is needed:

• Startup: instructions to bring up the processor to operate on a very basic level.
• Hardware Abstraction Layer: interfaces to communicate with the peripherals. In our case, the GPIO.

Implementing the above functionality is not in the scope of this tutorial, so we use ST's solution to generate it, the STM32CubeMX.

Tip

You can jump to Development Environment intallation if you use the example NUCLEO-F103RB board, and you don't want to write the example application by yourself. Clone the example repo: git clone https://github.com/axem-solutions/example

Run the STM32CubeMX

You need to install the STM32CubeMX for your development PC. Installation

Note

For this tutorial version 6.8.1 was used.

Generate the skeleton project

Start the STM32CubeMX application.

1. Select ACCESS TO BOARD SELECTOR.
2. In the new window make sure you are at the Board Selector tab.
   1. In Commercial Part Number dropdown menu, select NUCLEO-F103RB.
   2. Select the board from the Boards List.
   3. Press Start Project
   4. The CubeMX prompts a question to initialize all peripherals with their default mode. Select Yes. For this basic task, we only need to modify a few things.
3. On the Pinout & Configuration tab under Timers select TIM1. We need a timer for the blinking.
   1. Select the Internal Clock as Clock Source.
   2. Under the timers configuration, on the Parameter Settings tab set the Prescaler value to 63999 and the Counter Period to 499. As the default clock routed for this peripheral is 64MHz, we get a ms counter.
   3. On the NVIC Settings tab enable the TIM1 update interrupt. After 500 counts, an interrupt gets generated so now we have a 0.5s scheduler.
4. On the Project Manager tab:
   1. Set the Project Name to tutorial.
   2. Set the Project Location.
   3. From the Toolchain / IDE dropdown, select Makefile.
5. Finally you can generate the project skeleton by selecting GENERATE CODE.
6. After the generation is complete you can close the STM32CubeMX application.