Where is CodeWarrior 10.4 for Linux?

[DavidBrown]

Where is CodeWarrior 10.4 for Linux?  I use Linux as my main development platform for work on Qorivva microcontrollers, and now Kinetis micros.  Cross-platform development tools are one of our reasons for picking Freescale as a supplier.  I know I can use other compilers - in particular, gcc from CodeSourcery - but CW has other features that I would like to use as well.

[yibbidy]

Thanks Josh and Erich.  I just got myself the Personal Edition of Codesourcery for Coldfire hosted on Linux since Freescale dropped Linux support for CW.  This will give me experience with the GCC tools on Coldfire.  I haven't been baptised into the Order of ARM yet :smileyhappy:, but as it is inevitable so I also got the Linux hosted ARM version, which will give me support for non Freescale ARM chips and a subset of Kinetis.  I've also downloaded the KDS Linux hosted edition to try out.   I'll have to get myself an ARM board to play with now.

Regards, Shaun.

[Illusion]

We're in the same situation...  We began developing a project on the KwikStik40 about a year ago, but higher priorities came up (development using high-end ARM CPUs from TI) and had to shelve the project for a little while. My engineers have just wasted several days of their time trying to install the CodeWarrior 10.5 on Linux, including moving components into the "new" Eclipse IDE (Kepler) so we could use it in Linux.  We tried reinstalling our old Linux version of CW 10.2 on a new dev computer, but it says the license has expired. What a waste of our resources!

I'm really surprised a company in such a competitive market is shedding their hosting support for Linux.  But then, as mentioned earlier in this thread, a company that was really "with-it" would have developed their Eclipse-based IDE as Eclipse packages so we (& they) would have an easy migration path to newer Eclipse platforms.

We won't change our world (exclusively Linux-based) to accommodate the whims of this company. We're actively looking into development boards from other companies (so far, we really like the NXP dual-core M4/M0 boards), so we don't expect to be using Freescale for any future projects. Too bad, I really liked some of the Kinetis features when we researched them last year.

[jcottier]

Yes agree, I like the NXP micros. I like the Kinetis cores too, but I too have wasted a lot of time getting their software and drivers working properly (ish). Makes you wonder if thats one reason why NXP bought up Code Red, as their pro version used to support the Freescale micro range. I was going to buy the pro version too, so I was not too happy about that, but I can see why they would do it. It just amazes me that after all these years they just dont get it that the tools are as important as the product.

[robotjosh]

I can't believe some short-signed bean counter was allowed to declare the linux version and 15% of users to be irrelevant.  Didn't you switch from the custom codewarrior gui to eclipse BECAUSE it was cross platform?  What kind of professional software developer can screw up the main strength of eclipse by adding some tidbit that is windows-only?  If dumb short-sighted decisions like this are permitted with the dev tools, how do I know you aren't making dumb short-sighted decisions in the silicon? 

Related to this, they just switched out cwarm for cwgcc from 10.5 to 10.6.  NOT A SINGLE MENTION OF GCC IN THE RELEASE NOTES!  Freescale thinks their customers are stupid!  I'm not saying that switching to gcc is dumb, but trying to mislead your customers about it is dumb.  What is it with the american chip makers? Seems like all of them let short-sighted short-term-profit decisions totally ruin their dev tools (I'm looking at you too TI).  Think for a moment that you are ultimately trying to sell silicon.  When you milk us so hard on the dev tools by making them both inferior and expensive, that it is going to reduce the amount of silicon you will sell.  None of the european or asian chip companies make decisions like this.  Atmel and NXP tools are a pleasure to work with.  They are simple- code in binary out.  No required gui, no required windows stuff, no expensive license.  With freescale its delay after delay all because of toolchain issues where someone made a greedy decision.

[yibbidy]

Hi Josh,

I too am lamenting the dropping of CW for Linux, I am still using CW 10.2 on Linux.  I am looking for another silicon vendor who has linux offerings.  After your post I chcecked out Atmel but found that their Atmel Studio 6 is Windows only.  I then checked out NXP and found that their in house software LPCXpresso IDE is also Windows only.  Can you tell me what tools of theirs support Linux?  Maybe I'm looking in the wrong place.

Thanks, Shaun

[robotjosh]

Atmel studio is windows only but the makefile and linker scripts they release will work on any system that you can install avr-gcc and arm-gcc.  They don't lock you into needing atmel studio.  Its the same deal with nxp, you can compile for lpc parts using their makefiles and linker scripts on any arm-gcc installation.

Josh Jordan

Engineer

[yibbidy]

Thanks for that Josh.  I'd be a liitle weary to switch vendors because I can use their linker scripts and makefiles, sounds like it might be something that could cause headaches, if not now but down the track.  Is it a hassle to set up and what do you do for debugging/flashing?

I totally agree with you about Freescale switching from the Windows only CodeWarrior Classic, to the mulitplatform Eclipse, going to the effort of making the tools work on lInux then going back to making it Windows only.  It's even crazier when you think that CodeWarrior started out on the Mac (first the classic OS then OS X), and Freescale still have a CodeWarrior Classic that is Linux hosted for certain applications.  It's even crazier still that when Freescale purchased Metrowerks, they firesaled off all of the non-Freescale compiler technologies, including the ARM compilers!

Shaun

[robotjosh]

Getting your toolchain setup with just a makefile and linker script from the vendor is empowering.  Once you can setup your compiler and debugger for arm on the commandline, understanding the makefile and linker script, you have complete control of and knowledge of using any vendor's arm7 chip (or any gcc supported chip) on any OS in any general purpose IDE or no IDE.  Other vendors release gcc versions of firmware, makefiles, linker scripts and app notes to help you do this.  Debugging other arm chips is done with openocd and it usually just works with gdb.  Not sure if freescale supports openocd, would be surprised if they did.

Josh Jordan

Engineer

[BlackNight]

Kinetis Design Studio supports OpenOCD: http://www.freescale.com/kds

[BlackNight]

If you are using Kinetis/ARM: Freescale announced Kinetis Design Studio (KDS) which is in beta phase right now. It supports Windows and Linux, with Mac OS later this year:

http://freescale.com/kds

Erich

[yibbidy]

Thanks Erich.  At the moment I am using Coldfire and DSC.  As Coldfire now appears to have been frozen, it might be time to look into using Kinetis for future projects, which is unfortunate as I'm really happy with both of these architectures.  Wow, Mac OS as well, that'd be awesome, that's my daily drive.  So going on the way that Freescale have made decisions in the past, if we want to keep them supporting Mac OS or Linux then we all need to keep downloading them everyday to keep the download count up :smileyhappy:

[joesteeve]

Holy Fish. This is really bad. I guess we'll have to dump Freescale in our solutions :-/

[Ed_EmbeddedAcce]

I know many of you are concerned about the massive productivity drop you will get when you run Windows.  (ie spending time with virus software and Windows updates and cleaning hardrives)  None of which adds to your development productivity.  My solution is to run Windows in a virtual machine.  I actually use a mac but it should work well on linux too.  This way when Windows crashed or get bogged down I just open a new VM.  The only program I use for development on Windows is CodeWarrior so I run that in a VM with no virus protection since I don't normally go on the Web with the virtual machine I haven't had any problems.

[TICS_Fiona]

CW MCU v10.3 and CW10.4 are only available for Windows. Since the number of customers downloading Linux version were less than 15% and some of them actually downloaded both products, it is decided to discontinue Linux support from v10.3.

[jcottier]

Wow, Freescale dont care about 1/6th of their customers. Meanwhile NXP release V6 of CodeRed for Linux and Windows and it just works, no bugs or driver issues.

[AdCmo]

Hi,

Are there application notes or examples of migrating a Windows

Code warrior project to Linux?

We have a Freescale Wireless Kit, 1322XEVK. The demo application that comes

with it is setup in Windows Code Warrior. How can we find a Linux altenative of rebuilding

the demo application?

The "1322x ZigBee Evaluation Kit" listed in column 5 here:

http://www.freescale.com/webapp/sps/site/prod_summary.jsp?code=1322x_Dev_Kits

Thanks,

Ad.

[trytohelp]

Hello Ad,

Probably you will get more info if you will post your request to:

      Other Freescale Solution + RF

https://community.freescale.com/community/other/content?filterID=contentstatus[published]~category[r...]

Regards

Pascal

[AdCmo]

This is the error I get when I click on that link.

Unauthorized

Access to this place or content is restricted. If you think this is a mistake, please contact your administrator or the person who directed you here.

[trytohelp]

Hello Ad,

I got the same message when I click on the link without login.

If I'm logged in the community with my account and copy the link to the Internet explorer page, it's running.

Else you can access it by:

      https://community.freescale.com/welcome

      click on Login

      under PLACES, click on Other Freescale Solutions (direct link https://community.freescale.com/community/other)

      under Categories (at right), you can click on RF.

Regards

Pascal

[bob_walker]

Which is why we moved our product lines to NXP ARM due to this idiotic move on Freescale's part. Coupled with their I2C turdware issues, we have totally lost faith in Freescale.

Dropping tool support for Linux was the last straw. BTW, if you need Eclipse/ARM for MAC, NXP/CodeRed provides that. Ultimately, this decision by Freescale will come back to haunt them - Microsoft continues to lose market share to the alternate OSes.