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LAUNCHXL-CC1350: CC1350 Simplelink Documentation and SDK out of date

Martin Helie
Expert 2555 points
Part Number: LAUNCHXL-CC1350
Other Parts Discussed in Thread: CC1350

Hello,

it appears documentation in the TI Resource Explorer for the CC1350 Launchpad is out of date, and so are supporting applications. In trying to follow Project 0 (dev.ti.com/.../


Also, the iOS and Android apps do not work to update the firmware of the launchpads (OAD). Latest versions of iOS just crash when trying to upload, earlier ones simply get stuck in Safe or Fast mode, or fail in Advanced mode.

For anyone who stumbles upon this thread, you are better off using this document (even if it also contain errors) for OAD on the CC1350 Launchpad:

http://dev.ti.com/tirex/content/simplelink_cc13x0_sdk_1_30_00_06/docs/blestack/html/cc1350/oad/oad.html 

Forget the iOS or Android apps, and use BLE Device Monitor 2.9.0.

Of note: I've had no luck with btool 1.14.21 (which, in the CC1350 SDK is NOT the correct version for OAD, but can be found the CC2640r SDK!). It reports errors when loading a bin firmware, which the latest BLE Device Monitor (so contrary to what the docs state, BLE Device Monitor 2.9.0 works better than btool for OAD).

All this to say:


Are there more up-to-date resources that can be used ? The SDK, tools and documents are so out of tune with each other it makes for a less-than-ideal first step. 

If there is an interest on TI's part in updating the SDK docs, tools and Simplelink Academy, I will list a concise list of issues, but the are easily found when following the steps for the CC1350 Launchpad Project 0.

  • 0
    TI__Guru* 78191 points

    Hi mh,

    I'm sorry to hear of your difficulties. If you look at http://dev.ti.com/tirex/#/ and then click the square target icon on the upper right (it's part of the red bar at the top of the page), this will open the package picker.

     

    Can you please check if the dropdown for the CC13x0 SDK is set to Latest, or is it set to something else?

    Additionally, when you are building and running applications, are you doing this in a desktop version of CCS on your PC? Can you check which SDK version is installed on your PC, and if you are importing projects using the CCS version of resource explorer, check the package picker setting there as well to see if it matches what you were viewing online?

    I noted that the OAD page that you linked says it is for SDK version 1.30.00.06, while the latest version on TI-Rex is 2.10.00.36, here: dev.ti.com/.../index.html This is why I suspect that your resource explorer may be showing an old version or perhaps that there is a version mismatch between the documentation you are looking at vs the SDK that you have installed.

    Basically, make sure that the SDK version you have installed on your PC and are building code with matches the docs version you have TI-Rex set to display. The package picker lets you change this so it can match.

    Regards,
    Katie

  • 0 in reply to Katie Pier
    Expert 2555 points
    Hi Katie,

    thanks for getting back. Sorry about the confusion from the link I provided (though its contents were more helpful than the more up-to-date Project 0 from the SDK!).

    I am using the latest TIRex, with corresponding locally installed SDK (2.10.00.36) on CCS8. It really doesn't look like a SDK/Doc mismatch on my end, unfortunately.

    For reference, here are some of my notes regarding Project 0:

    > "We will use the rfWsnDmNode example in CCS as a basis for this tutorial."

    This project is not in the most recent SDK. A guess can be made, and one can choose the rfWsnNodeBleAdv project instead.

    > "Clone or copy the OAD conversion script at ti-simplelink Github"

    These tools are no longer in the github repo. Updated documentation should point to their location in the SDK.

    >"Include the `cc26xx_app_oad.cmd` linker command file into the rfWsnDmNode_CC1350_LAUNCHXL_tirtos_ccs project. This can be 'drag and dropped' in the workspace from simple_peripheral_cc1350lp_app_FlashOnly_OAD_ExtFlash/TOOLS to rfWsnDmNode_CC1350_LAUNCHXL_tirtos_ccs"

    This may be due to the fact that I am using a local version of CCS8, but this step doesn't work unless you update the simple_peripheral_cc1350lp_app_FlashOnly_OAD_ExtFlash project's Linked Resources. In my case, this project had no reference to the CC1350 SDK's location.

    There are possibly more issues I've encountered besides those to get a working .bin, but with all the Googling, I forgot what they may be :-)

    Once that is done, I realized I was stuck, since the iOS application doesn't perform as it should (at least with the .bins I created). Trying to OAD with this newly created firmware (or any other, for that matter), progress is stuck at 0. I updated iOS to the latest version, and now the app just crashes when trying to update (these apps should really be looked at!). My only option prior to these steps was the Android app, with which I was successful for TI firmware updates, but as far as I understand it, the procedure for custom firmwares doesn't apply there.

    That led me down the path of Btool, which documentation refers to as preferred over BLE Device Monitor:

    1. You truly have to look for the right version of Btool, as the one in the CC1350 SDK doesn't have OAD support (takes a bit of hair pulling and googling to figure that out)
    2. You eventually download the entire CC2640r SDK to get the right version of Btool (...)
    3. You fight with this version of Btool for a good long while, as it reports errors for custom firmware (but is ok with the hexes included in the SDK, btw)
    4. I then gave BLE Device Monitor a try. The latest version seems pretty good, and accepted the firmware I built and OAD worked on a target device.

    Sorry about the long email. But getting to this point was fairly time-consuming (for something that should have been at most a couple of hours). Anything you can do to help people new to the platform, or maybe point out mistakes I made would be appreciated! I will be happy to provide a hex or bin for simple_peripheral (with bim and ble stack) corresponding to all this if it can help.