macOS Setup for Practicals

The MEC4126F practicals will require a way for you to develop code either through an IDE or text editor for STM32. If you do not have either setup from a previous course, please follow the guide below. The instructions below were tested on a fresh installation of macOS Sequioa 15.2, but should work on other versions similarly.

Table of Contents

Visual Studio Code (IDE)

The preferred IDE for MEC4126F STM32 programming is Visual Studio Code (VSC), since the installation can be standardized over multiple operating systems.

Visual studio code is available for macOS here

C Compiling

Your first task is to make sure your laptop can compile C code. For this we need a compiler, which basically converts a .c file into an executable program your computer can run. Installing a C compiler on macOS is very simple, just open a terminal and run the following command:

xcode-select --install

You should be prompted to install Command Line Tools. Accept and let the installation finish. You can make sure the installation was successful by running the following command in your terminal:

gcc --version

You should see a print-out with details of your gcc installation.

C Programming

Now that a C compiler is installed, one or two more installations are necessary before you can write your first program. Within VSCode install Microsoft’s C/C++ Extension for VSCode from the extension marketplace, which includes debugging and intellisense functionality. It is available under the extensions menu on the left hand side of VSCode’s GUI. The C/C++ Extension Pack also includes some other useful tools, and can also be installed.

Once the desired extensions are installed, create a new file called hello.c. Inside, include code as follows:

#include <stdio.h>

int main() {
   printf("Hello, world!\n");
   return 0;
}

This file is also available under ./setup/Resources/hello.c.

Save the file, and try and compile the program. Open a new terminal in VSCode with Terminal → New Terminal menu at the top left of the GUI or the keyboard shortcut and run:

$ gcc hello.c -o hello

This should compile hello.c into an executable hello which can now be run. In the same terminal, run:

$ ./hello

You should see output similar to the following as output (this specific output was captured on Ubuntu, but macOS should also display the “Hello World!” message).

STM32 Programming

Compiling and flashing code for your STM32 with VSCode is done primarily through the PlatformIO extension.

This extension is available in the extensions marketplace, similar to the C/C++ Extension already installed. Go ahead and install it now. You may also need to install Python to make this work.

While it is installing, you may be asked to install other pre-requisites in a pop-up in the bottom right of the screen. If you see this pop-up, accept and install anything requested.

If you don’t see any pop-ups, that is fine - you will be prompted in the next step.

Once the PlatformIO extension is installed, download the MEC4126F STM32 Programming Template available in its own GitHub repo. Save it to a convenient location (either use git clone … or download as a .zip file and extract) and open the folder in VSCode using File → Open Folder ...

Once it is open, you should see the following file directory:

Open a new VS Code Window and click on the PlatformIO extension icon (the bug face) and then Create New Project once the initialisation is complete. Then click New Project which will take you to this screen:

You at this point see three blue blocks, and a message saying the extension cannot find the build tools. In this case, simply select Install Build Tools from the menu, and wait for them to finish installing. This may take a while - the arm-eabi-gcc toolchain is about 1.5GB once it is unpacked.

If the build tools are found, you should see a menu like the one below:

Here, you will need to give your new project a name, choose the ST STM32F0DISCOVERY board, and the CMSIS framework. You can either use the default location or choose one.

Once your new project has opened, replace the src and lib folders with those from the template which you should still have open.

At this point, you can plug in your STM32 Development Board. Select Build (the tick mark in the top right corner) to build the demo program. If successful, you will see “SUCCESS” in the terminal window:

Then navigate to the Run and Debug view and click the play icon to Start Debugging. Your STM32 board should now flash with the code provided, and display Hello World :) on the attached LCD.