PD-BDM with iSYSTEM winIDEA won't work

[lucabarbiero]

Hello,

I work with FreeMASTER 2.5 and my debugger environment is winIDEA 9.17.100 from iSYSTEM. I can connect to the target with direct access to the memory, but I fail to do so using the PD-BDM protocol (which I need because I want to use the FreeMASTER recorder feature).

I compiled the FreeMASTER communication driver on the target with the appropriate option:

#define FMSTR_USE_PDBDM 1 /* To select Packet Driven BDM communication interface (optional) */

And I know the address of the packet buffer:

In the FreeMASTER plugin I can see that the connection with winIDEA is successful:

But it fails to find the packet buffer at the specified address (and the automatic search runs but cannot find it as well):

Why it does not work? :smileysad:

Luca

[MichalH]

Dear Luca,

can you try installing the latest FreeMASTER version 3.0 (3.0.2)? Installing this version will register a new PD-BDM plug-in version in system. You will be able to use it also from both 2.5 and 3.0.

There were few compatibility issues solved in PD-BDM since the version released with FreeMASTER 2.5, so I believe this operation will help. Let me know if not.

Thank you,

Michal

[lucabarbiero]

Hello Michal,

Thank you for your prompt reply. I installed FreeMASTER 3.0 but the problem persists, using either FreeMASTER 3.0 or 2.5 (I understand that the plugin is the same but I tried with both versions anyway). Here is a screenshot:

You will recognize from it that this is the new plugin (the GUI is different). Still no success. I Inserted the address and I also did a search just in case. So the problem is still there. Note that I am using a recent version of winIDEA 9.17.100 (released 9/2019). Maybe when you tested the plugin you used the previous version 9.17.39? I can't say if the problem could be here, recall that I can connect with direct memory access (so I can confirm that debugger and target are reachable by FreeMASTER). The issue is when trying to connect with PD-BDM.

Luca

[MichalH]

Dear Luca,

can you please create a FreeMASTER variable (2-byte unsigned int) at the expected address of the PD-BDM buffer (0x40001b00)? And please display its value in a variable watch and send it to me here. Then update the variable to 4 byte size and send me the value too.

I suspect we have a compatibility issue of PD-BDM operation and big-endian parts. I will test also locally.

Thank you for your help,

Michal

[lucabarbiero]

Hello Michal,

This is the FreeMASTER variable definition as uint16:

And this the definition of the same variable as uint32:

This is the FreeMASTER watch:

And this is winIDEA debugger:

Everything looks consistent though. I am available to do further checks.

Thanks,

Luca

[MichalH]

Thank you very much. Let me prepare a fix for you to test. It should be available by tomorrow. Can you contact me directly on this email? 

Thank you,

Michal

[lucabarbiero]

Michal, thanks for the patch you sent me. Now it works!

[MichalH · Accepted solution]

Hello Luca, thanks for your cooperation. The fix will officially appear in FreeMASTER 3.0.3 in June 2020. 

If observing a performance issues with PD-BDM, please note that you can select Direct BDM Memory Read and Write so the packet-driven protocol is not used for such basic operations.

Thanks,

Michal