First, you have to know there are several boards supported by the software. Those boards use a chip to translate from USB to JTAG commands. The chip is called stlink and there are 2 versions:

• STLINKv1, present on STM32VL discovery kits,
• STLINKv2, present on STM32L discovery and later kits.

Two different transport layers are used:

• STLINKv1 uses SCSI passthru commands over USB
• STLINKv2 uses raw USB commands.

• pkg-config
• libusb-1.0 (plus development headers for building, on debian based distros libusb-1.0.0-dev package)

The STLINKv1's SCSI emulation is very broken, so the best thing to do is tell your operating system to completely ignore it.

Options (do one of these before you plug it in)

• modprobe -r usb-storage && modprobe usb-storage quirks=483:3744:i
• or 1. echo "options usb-storage quirks=483:3744:i" >> /etc/modprobe.conf
• 2. modprobe -r usb-storage && modprobe usb-storage
• or 1. cp stlink_v1.modprobe.conf /etc/modprobe.d
• 2. modprobe -r usb-storage && modprobe usb-storage

You're ready to go :)

This project was converted to Autotools by a well meaning individual. The following steps will build the project for you.

$ ./autogen.sh
$ ./configure
$ make

$ mkdir build && cd build
$ cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug ..
$ make

To run the gdb server: (you do not need sudo if you have set up permissions correctly)

$ make && [sudo] ./st-util

There are a few options:

./st-util - usage:

  -h, --help		Print this help
  -vXX, --verbose=XX	Specify a specific verbosity level (0..99)
  -v, --verbose		Specify generally verbose logging
  -s X, --stlink_version=X
			Choose what version of stlink to use, (defaults to 2)
  -1, --stlinkv1	Force stlink version 1
  -p 4242, --listen_port=1234
			Set the gdb server listen port. (default port: 4242)
  -m, --multi
			Set gdb server to extended mode.
			st-util will continue listening for connections after disconnect.
  -n, --no-reset
			Do not reset board on connection.

The STLINKv2 device to use can be specified in the environment variable STLINK_DEVICE on the format <USB_BUS>:<USB_ADDR>.

Then, in your project directory, someting like this... (remember, you need to run an ARM gdb, not an x86 gdb)

$ arm-none-eabi-gdb fancyblink.elf
...
(gdb) tar extended-remote :4242
...
(gdb) load
Loading section .text, size 0x458 lma 0x8000000
Loading section .data, size 0x8 lma 0x8000458
Start address 0x80001c1, load size 1120
Transfer rate: 1 KB/sec, 560 bytes/write.
(gdb)
...
(gdb) continue

Have fun!

You may reset the chip using GDB if you want. You'll need to use `target extended-remote' command like in this session:

(gdb) target extended-remote localhost:4242
Remote debugging using localhost:4242
0x080007a8 in _startup ()
(gdb) kill
Kill the program being debugged? (y or n) y
(gdb) run
Starting program: /home/whitequark/ST/apps/bally/firmware.elf

Remember that you can shorten the commands. `tar ext :4242' is good enough for GDB.

For convenience, you may install udev rules file, 49-stlinkv*.rules, located in the root of repository. You will need to copy it to /etc/udev/rules.d, and then either reboot or execute

$ udevadm control --reload-rules
$ udevadm trigger

Udev will now create a /dev/stlinkv2_XX or /dev/stlinkv1_XX file, with the appropriate permissions. This is currently all the device is for, (only one stlink of each version is supported at any time presently)

You can run your firmware directly from SRAM if you want to. Just link it at 0x20000000 and do

(gdb) load firmware.elf

It will be loaded, and pc will be adjusted to point to start of the code, if it is linked correctly (i.e. ELF has correct entry point).

The GDB stub ships with a correct memory map, including the flash area. If you would link your executable to 0x08000000 and then do (gdb) load firmware.elf then it would be written to the memory.

Q: My breakpoints do not work at all or only work once.

A: Optimizations can cause severe instruction reordering. For example, if you are doing something like `REG = 0x100;' in a loop, the code may be split into two parts: loading 0x100 into some intermediate register and moving that value to REG. When you set up a breakpoint, GDB will hook to the first instruction, which may be called only once if there are enough unused registers. In my experience, -O3 causes that frequently.

Q: At some point I use GDB command `next', and it hangs.

A: Sometimes when you will try to use GDB next' command to skip a loop, it will use a rather inefficient single-stepping way of doing that. Set up a breakpoint manually in that case and do continue'.

Q: Load command does not work in GDB.

A: Some people report XML/EXPAT is not enabled by default when compiling GDB. Memory map parsing thus fail. Use --enable-expat.

STLink v1 (as found on the 32VL Discovery board)

Known working targets:

• STM32F100xx (Medium Density VL)
• STM32F103 (according to jpa- on ##stm32)

No information:

• everything else!

STLink v2 (as found on the 32L and F4 Discovery boards), known working targets:

• STM32F030F4P6 (custom board)
• STM32F0Discovery (STM32F0 Discovery board)
• STM32F100xx (Medium Density VL, as on the 32VL Discovery board)
• STM32L1xx (STM32L Discovery board)
• STM32F103VC, STM32F107RC, STM32L151RB, STM32F205RE and STM32F405RE on custom boards (https://github.com/UweBonnes/wiki_fuer_alex/layout/usps...)
• STM32F103VET6 (HY-STM32 board)
• STM32F105RCT6 (DecaWave EVB1000 board)
• STM32F303xx (STM32F3 Discovery board)
• STM32F407xx (STM32F4 Discovery board)
• STM32F429I-DISCO (STM32F4 Discovery board with LCD)
• STM32F439VIT6 (discovery board reseated CPU)
• STM32L052K8T6 (custom board)
• STM32L151CB (custom board)
• STM32L152RB (STM32L-Discovery board, custom board)
• STM32F051R8T6 (STM320518-EVAL board)

STLink v2-1 (as found on the Nucleo boards), known working targets:

• STM32F401xx (STM32 Nucleo-F401RE board)
• STM32F030R8T6 (STM32 Nucleo-F030R8 board)
• STM32F072RBT6 (STM32 Nucleo-F072RB board)
• STM32F103RB (STM32 Nucleo-F103RB board)
• STM32F303RET6 (STM32 Nucleo-F303RE board)
• STM32F334R8 (STM32 Nucleo-F334R8 board)
• STM32F411RET6 (STM32 Nucleo-F411RE board)
• STM32F756NGHx (STMF7 evaluation board)
• STM32L053R8 (STM32 Nucleo-L053R8 board)

Please report any and all known working combinations so I can update this!

The stlink library and tools are licensed under the BSD license