DAPLink VS PlatformIO

If you just want to transfer data without necessarily using a filesystem on your storage device, check out daplink. It implements a virtual FAT filesystem over USB so you can copy over firmware updates easily.

From what I've found that DAP-Link is actually an ARM Mbed open source project to basically be similar to STM32 ST-Link: https://github.com/ARMmbed/DAPLink

It's used for flashing the BBC micro:bit in both Microsoft MakeCode (makecode.microbit.org) and the micro:bit Python Editor (python.microbit.org). MakeCode uses it for lots of other devices like MakeCode Arcade too https://arcade.makecode.com )

It's amazing for students to be able to quickly get a program they've written in their browser onto a device in their hands that can respond to and interact with the real world.

Also great because with MicroPython and the Python Editor you get a standalone Python environment including REPL that's completely isolated from the PC - schools love it because no matter what the students do they're not going to break the host PCs.

(The firmware that implements web USB on the micro:bit's USB interface chip is open source, DAPLink https://github.com/ARMmbed/DAPLink - poke

https://github.com/ARMmbed/DAPLink/blob/main/source/daplink/...

Note the nested do { do { } while (); if (err) break;} while(); if (err) break;

Should that code be rewritten? Most certainly it should, and it should be given a proper Error type. However, when you are first porting it, you need to match semantics or you get a bunch of off-by-one, missed error, or missed end of stream bugs. And, as you point out, the Rust loop{} equivalents suck.

We've all written suboptimal code, and we all live in a suboptimal world. :)

I checked for DAPLink, but this seems to require keil, based on what I read in the readme.

For the ESP32 in read mode, we've successfully developed a project using PlatformIO that accepts the key during build time and stores it in memory.

Check out Zephyr OS and Platform IO. Zephyr is part of the Linux foundation and has similarities to Linux with how it performs hardware abstraction (device tree). Platform IO integrates with other frameworks including mbed and Arduino.

PlatformIO together with avr-stub can be used to do source level debugging but there are some caveats.

Look into https://platformio.org/, it can abstract over a few RTOSes, and can show you which OSes work with which chips/boards.

If the HW looks like it works, you could also try alternate programming software. (e.g. TinyGo or PlatformIO)

You might have better luck with PlatformIO than the Arduino IDE; it's better at automatically choosing the serial port, though I can't say I've used it under Windows.

My other suggestion takes more work but will make your life oh so much better. Professionally I have used and highly recommend. https://platformio.org/ which is free!

Will you be doing embedded Linux? Embedded RTOS? Bare metal? Microcontrollers? SoC (say, FPGA with a hard processor core)?

You can do a lot with QEMU. https://bootlin.com/ has a lot of great, free training material.

https://bootlin.com/doc/training/embedded-linux-qemu/embedde...

is one of my favorites.

Learning to cross-compile, do embedded debugging, the process of booting an embedded system (which varies depending on the answers to the above questions), learning how to read a technical reference for the processor you’re using as well as for peripherals you’re likely to interact with - SPI, i2c, UART, maybe PCIe, are all handy skills. Learn a bit about JTAG, hardware, reading schematics, etc. Even being able solder is helpful.

There may be books (I had a great embedded Linux book when I started) but there are lots of online materials too. Check out https://platformio.org/

There are fun embedded boards and projects for microcontrollers too - micropython on an rpi pico, tinygo, eLua, etc.