NXTGCC

From NXTGCC

The First Open Source LEGO® MINDSTORMS® NXT Firmware Development Kit: http://nxtgcc.sf.net

This project uses the GCC toolchain to program Lego Mindstorms NXT. It provides a good foundation for those who are interested in the combination of open source software, embedded systems, and Lego Mindstorms: the NXTreme approach!. The NXTGGC firmware kit consists of three things: a tool to convert from IAR¹ sources to GCC compatible sources, an ARM GCC/GDB toolchain, and an IDE for programming in assembler and C.

Contents 1 NXTGCC Documentation 2 NXTGCC Forum 3 ARM Documentation 4 Installation 5 LEGO Mindstorms NXT 6 NXTGCC Projects 7 Programming 8 Other Firmware Development Kits (FDK) 9 NXT (Host-based) Communication Kits 10 Roadmap to Fun 11 About 12 Notes

NXTGCC Documentation

• Online documentation (you are reading it right now): http://nxtgcc.sourceforge.net
  • NXTGCC GDB (Experimental stage): Debugging NXT with the GNU debugger (and posted on nxtasy.org).
  • NXT memory layout
  • GCC and IAR compiler comparison
• NXTGCC Sourceforge navigation panel: http://sourceforge.net/projects/nxtgcc
  • Web statistics

NXTGCC Forum

• A new dedicated NXTGCC forum for questions, bugs, your project demos, etc. I can also recommend the nxtasy forums.

ARM Documentation

• The PDF file for the Atmel ARM7 processor in NXT can be downloaded here: AT91SAM7S Series Preliminary
• The technical reference manual here: ARM7TDMI Technical Reference Manual
• ARM documentation at Wikipedia: ARM and specifically the ARM7
• ARM7 documentation from ARM itself and an ARM7TDMI overview
• A high-quality GCC compiler is supported by ARM and is released by Codesourcery
• ARM has a University program
• A nice hardcover book on the ARM processor is ARM System Developer's Guide
• If you are in doubt: ARM is a very widespread micro processor according to Frederick P. Brooks, Jr. It is one of the 25 chips that shook the world according to IEEE Spectrum.

Installation

• You should download the latest NXTGCCECLIPSE.0.0.x.zip file and unzip.
• Then there is a ReadMe.rtf file in the root of the NXTGCCECLIPSE directory.
• Please start by selecting the NXTGCC folder and press F5 for a refresh of the workspace.

LEGO Mindstorms NXT

• There is good coverage of NXT at Wikipedia: NXT Programming
• Some good blogs on Mindstorms include: nxtasy.org, and The NXT STEP
• Forums that concentrate on NXT inlcude: Lego NXT forum and NXT Firmware Hacking (if you want a relevant link placed next to the latter forum, pls. contact me).

NXTGCC Projects

• It has been used for a masters thesis in 2007
• A (work-in-progress) TinyOS implementation (see http://nxtmote.sf.net)
• NXTGCC was used in DTU Robocup 2009
• KDubiq Ph.D. summer school
• Google IO (cool pic. of Google in LEGO)
• ESWEEK 2009 LEGO MINDSTORMS Tutorial
• Olimex is a good place for PCBs and NXTGCC is listed there

Programming

• Free (and printed) book on GCC
• Website for C programming
• Wikipedia on C
• Assembler

Other Firmware Development Kits (FDK)

• None at the moment (there is one around that I can't remember from David?)
• Not sure if it is an FDK, but it is smart.

NXT (Host-based) Communication Kits

• You can look in the GDB debugger that comes with the NXTGCC project: It uses C programming to interface to NXT with USB and the Fantom.DLL
• There is libnxt

Roadmap to Fun

• Here is an ever changing list of ideas that I am playing around with.

About

• The NXTGCC project is maintained by Rasmus Ulslev Pedersen.

Notes

¹You may also want to try the IAR compiler (the one that Lego uses): a free version is http://www.iar.com/mindstorms available, but this project focuses on GCC. The IAR linker reference is useful when you start comparing GCC and IAR compiler output (map files).