PDF "Version 3 ColdFire Core User’s Manual" document looks to be corrupted.

[TomE]

I can't find anywhere else to report this. There are no Freescale web pages or links for reporting problems like this that I can find.

The "Version 3 ColdFire Core User’s Manual" PDF document on Freescale's web site is corrupted.

It doesn't display properly in Adobe Acrobat on Windows or t=on the Document Viewer in Ubuntu.

Section 4.11 is mangled starting on page 4-25, and has a lot missing.

This is the one linked from the "Documentation" tab of the MCF5329 product page. It is available at the following URL:

http://www.freescale.com/files/netcomm/doc/ref_manual/COLDFIRE3UM.pdf?fpsp=1&WT_TYPE=Reference%20Man...

Please advise when a corrected version is available, or if a good version is available from somewhere else.

[kef]

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TomE wrote:

I can't find anywhere else to report this. There are no Freescale web pages or links for reporting problems like this that I can find.

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To report bugs and problemss you should go Support -> Online assisted support -> Submit service request:

Submit a service request online

[TomE]

> To report bugs and problemss you should go Support -> Online assisted

> support -> Submit service request:

Good suggestion. I've done that and got the following response:

Dear Tom Evans, In reply to your Service Request SR 1-598217585: Sorry, the pdf you mentioned is quite old and we do not have a new version of it.( Actually it was published when we was Motorola.) Thank you for your interest in Freescale Semiconductor products and for the opportunity to serve you. Should you need to contact us with regard to this message, please see the notes below. Best Regards, Fang Technical Support Freescale Semiconductor

Maybe so, and I guess t looks like it. It has "Freescale" stamped all over it with terrible registration - overlapping existing text in the page headers and footers. The usual Motorola document pages that carry date and version seem to have been removed, so there's no date or version anywhere, except for a red box on page 24 giving a date in 1998 and a version of 0.1.

I suspect the original document was OK, but it was broken (PDF corruptions most likely)  when stamped with "Freescale".

What documents am I meant to read for V3 Coldfire CPUs?

[vier_kuifjes]

Maybe your download was corrupted?

I downloaded the document from the link above, just to give it a try, and was able to browse every single page of it. Each page looked normal...

[w_wegner]

Hi Marc,

did you have a look at pages 64/65? There seems to be a formatting error, and I am quite sure there are instructions missing... 

Best regards,

Wolfgang

[vier_kuifjes]

Maybe, I don't know... looks like a frame is missing on page 65.

This is how it looks like on my PC...

[w_wegner]

BTW, just noticed that there is a note on page 41 (beginning of section 4) saying "Date: 08-21-98 Revision No: 0.1 Pages affecxted: 25, 26 (see change bars)" - however, there are not change bars and not even pages 25 and 26 in this section.

[J2MEJediMaster]

I am seeng the same sort of text that appears in Marc VDH's post. I have sent a link to this forum thread to our documentation people to see what the situation is with the file.

---Tom

[TomE]

> I have sent a link to this forum thread to our documentation people to see what the situation is with the file.

Any progress on this?

If someone there could find a copy (from 1998) before "Freescale" was stamped on the PDF then we might have a readable one.

Does anyone on this forum have an old Motorola copy (circa 1998) they could email me?

[TomE]

The response to my Service Request was:

> Date: 2009-11-25
> Dear Tom Evans, In reply to your Service Request
> SR 1-598217585:
>

> Sorry, the pdf you mentioned is quite old and we do not have a new version of it.

By "we" I think they must have meant the people who respond to the Service Requests and not "Freescale as a whole".

I've just received (19 months later) the following from someone higher up after I pointed this out to them:

> The file is fairly old, but we do have the source files for the manual.

> I've talked to the documentation team and they are in the process of
> correcting the problem. 

That's good!

Tom

[TomE]

I didn't mention the "final" response I got from my Service Request:

I reported:
2009-11-25
Section 4.11 is mangled starting on page 4-25, and has a lot missing.

The Response:
2009-12-03
Sorry, we do not have an equivalent manual of this. Instead we
recommend customer to make reference directly the concrete ColdFire
part user manual, for example MCF5329RM, MCF5373RM etc. BTW, I just
check with the pdf you mentioned on our website, it can been read
without any problem. I am not quite sure why you think it can not
read.

The "Concrete ColdFire part user manual" doesn't include the instruction list or instruction timing, or any of the information specific to the Version 3 core that isn't detailed anywhere else. You can tell why I gave up on getting anything done via that Service request.

Slightly after my previous post on this thread I received the following uplifting email:

Subject: RE: Corrupted ColdFire 3 Core User Manual Update
Date: Mon, 4 Jul 2011 06:54:56 +0800

I just got a delivery date from our documentation team.
The corrected version of the V3 user's manual will
be posted by July 17th.

Has anybody seen this anywhere? It is over 3 months since the promised date and the one linked from the MCF5329 page is still the 13 year old broken one dated "6/19/1998". Searching for "coldfire3um" finds the same version:

http://cache.freescale.com/files/netcomm/doc/ref_manual/COLDFIRE3UM.pdf

The visible faults start on page 4-25.

Tom

[TomE]

Latest progress from Freescale:

The documentation team is still working on the update forthis document. My apologies for the delay.

 Tom

[TomE]

I just missed the second anniversary of my original report. The manual is still broken.

Tom

[TomE]

The corrupted "Version 3 Cold Fire Core User Reference Manual" has finally been fixed and I have a copy.

But, from Freescale via our Rep:

In reviewing the document with design, we've actually decided to remove the file from the website. The information in the reference manual for each chip and the programmer's reference manual covers most of the details in this document.

I've been sent a copy, but aren't at liberty to share it.

I've compared the relevant sections (Core, Cache, Debug, etc) of the MCF5329 manual and this old one. There is a some detail in the old manual that isn't in the newer one, but I don't think it is that relevant to anyone using the chips. It details things like the internal core "pin connections" that we can't get to anyway. So I guess I agree with Freescale's assessment.

Tom

[vier_kuifjes]

Congratulations anyway!