CCSTUDIO: Long Load Time in Theia

Hello,

Timor said:

I am currently working with F28379D Lauchpad and debugging through the on board XDS110.

Note that the on-board debug probe on the F28379D is an XDS100v2, not an XDS110. I assume you are indeed using the XDS100v2. It is a slower debug probe but should be ok for smaller MCU based programs. If you are loading the program to flash, that would slow things down more. I assume loading to RAM is fast?

Also, what host OS are you running on? I have heard reports of flashing that launchpad from a macOS environment can be especially slow.

Timor said:

p.s. must mention that I am working with CCS for almost 20 years (on its various platforms) and I just moved forward to V20 Theia and although it seems not complete yet, it looks great. Glad to see that CCS keeps evolving.

Thanks for the feedback!

ki

Thanks for the prompt response.

Yes its XDS110v2 and yes i am loading to FLASH (RAM is indeed faster). I am using winodws10.

Just made a comparison, on CCS V12 (Eclipse) it takes ~45 seconds to load timer_ex1_cputimers.c, on CCS V20 (Theia) it takes ~75 seconds (same board same code, load to flash). More than 50% longer. One would expect that the later would be faster or at least not slower...

p.s. would have been useful if LAUCHPAD would have a JTAG connecter to connect external debugger

Timor said:

Just made a comparison, on CCS V12 (Eclipse) it takes ~45 seconds to load timer_ex1_cputimers.c, on CCS V20 (Theia) it takes ~75 seconds (same board same code, load to flash). More than 50% longer. One would expect that the later would be faster or at least not slower...

The underlying flash download functionality should be similar between the two versions. I never did a direct comparison but I will give it a try and let you know of my findings.

Ki said:

I never did a direct comparison but I will give it a try and let you know of my findings.

I took out the old stopwatch and tried flashing the same example on my F28379D LaunchPad. Here were my results:

- CCS 20.1.1: 38 seconds

- CCS 12.8.1: 34 seconds

I started the timer just after I starting the flashing of the program to the device.

They were pretty much similar in my case. I can't explain the discrepancy in you case. 

Perhaps try cleaning out your CCS 20 environment to start fresh: https://software-dl.ti.com/ccs/esd/documents/users_guide_ccs/ccs_faqs.html#i-want-to-restart-code-composer-studio-with-a-fresh-environment-how-do-i-do-this

If that has no impact, please generate a debug server log during the entire flashing procedure so engineering can analyze for any issues. Please see the below articles for more information on debug server logs:

https://software-dl.ti.com/ccs/esd/documents/ccs_diagnostic-logs.html

Thanks

ki 

Thank you for checking that. I guess the difference is just the machine you are using (i guess my PC is slower).

Still, also in your test, CCS12 is faster than CCS20 and, as i said, one would expect that later to be faster.

I will try to generate and provide the log file.

Timor said:

Thank you for checking that. I guess the difference is just the machine you are using (i guess my PC is slower).

Even if it is slower, it should be consistently slower with both CCS 12 and 20. But 12 is roughly the same speed I had. 

Here is the log file:  ccs_debug_log.zip

I tried cleaning the cache. It didn't help. its a new installation anyway.

I don't know why CCS20 is much slower compared to CCS12. I don't use a very strong PC (Lenovo T14) and i was only guessing it maybe due to running a newer platform (Theia) which is what usually happens when moving to newer platforms. 

p.s. just for reference, loading to RAM with CCS20 takes about 17sec.

Timor said:

Here is the log file:  ccs_debug_log.zip

Thank you.

If I could trouble you with more more request... can you generate and provide the same exact log for CCS 12 doing the same exact steps there?

of course. Here: ccs12_debug_log.zip

Thank you for the logs. I have sent them to engineering for investigation.

Can you try closing all views that can be closed and to remove all entries in the Watch view? Then try reloading again and see if that makes a difference.

Didn't see a difference.  log.zip

Thanks for trying. We did see quite a few memory accesses by each of the 9 variables you had in the Watch view while the program loaded hence we thought the slow down was related to this.