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Using DAPLink Firmware

One nRF52840 MDK USB Dongle can be used to program and debug another, using the DAPLink interface firmware, which creates a bridge between your development computer and the target's debug access port.

Requirements

Before you start, check that you have the required hardware and software:

  • 2x nRF52840 MDK USB Dongle
  • Several jumper wires
  • A computer running macOS, Linux, or Windows 7 or newer
  • Python 3.6.0 or later
  • pyOCD - Python based tool and API for debugging, programming, and exploring Arm Cortex microcontrollers.

You must program the DAPLink firmware onto a nRF52840 MDK USB Dongle to make it become a CMSIS-DAP debug probe. The latest DAPLink firmware is located in the firmware/daplink folder.

To program the firmware, complete the following steps:

  1. Push and hold the button and plug your dongle into the USB port of your computer. Release the button after your dongle is connected. The RGB LED turns green.

  2. It will mount as a Mass Storage Device called UF2BOOT.

  3. Drag and drop the firmware with the name daplink-nrf52840_mdk_usb_dongle-<version>.uf2 onto the UF2BOOT volume. The RGB LED blinks red fast during flashing.

  4. Reset the dongle, the DAPLink firmware is running and a disk drive called DAPLINK will be automatically detected by the computer.

Installing pyOCD

The latest stable version of pyOCD may be installed via pip. Open up a terminal and run:

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py -3 -m pip install -U pyocd

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python3 -m pip install -U pyocd

Wiring the boards

Perform the following steps to connect the boards:

  1. Connect the DAPLink board to the target board using the jumper wires.
  2. Plug the DAPLink board to the PC.

The following table shows the signals between the DAPLink and the target:

DAPLink Wire Target
3V3 VIN
GND GND
P4 RESET
P5 SWDCLK
P6 SWDIO

Drag-and-drop programming

Drag-and-drop is an optional intuitive programming feature of DAPLink. It allows programming of your target microcontroller in a very simple way: dragging and dropping a file (.hex-format) onto the DAPLINK drive.

Using pyOCD

The pyocd command line tool gives you total control over your device with these subcommands:

  • gdbserver: GDB remote server allows you to debug using gdb via either the console or several GUI debugger options.
  • load: Program files of various formats into flash or RAM.
  • erase: Erase part or all of an MCU's flash memory.
  • pack: Manage CMSIS Device Family Packs that provide additional target device support.
  • commander: Interactive REPL control and inspection of the MCU.
  • server: Share a debug probe with a TCP/IP server.
  • reset: Hardware or software reset of a device.
  • rtt: Stream Segger RTT IO with any debug probe.
  • list: Show connected devices.

You can get additional help by adding --help option.

To load/erase the nRF52840-based target, open up a terminal and run:

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pyocd load -t nrf52840 firmware.hex

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pyocd load -t nrf52840 --base-address 0x1000 firmware.bin

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pyocd erase -t nrf52840 --chip

Explore further

To learn more about pyOCD, check the pyOCD Documentation.