Get Started with the FRDM-KL26Z
Contents of this document
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Plug It In
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Get Software
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Build, Run
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Create
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Purchase your FRDM-KL26Z | KL16/KL26 | Dev Platform
Plug It In
Let's take your FRDM-KL26Z for a test drive. You have the choice of watching the sequence in a short video or following the detailed actions list below.
Let's take your FRDM-KL26Z for a test drive
1.1 Attach the USB Cable
1.2 Run the Out-of-Box Demo
Your FRDM-KL26Z comes loaded with a "bubble level" demo that leverages the on-board accelerometer. When the board is flat, the RGB LED is turned off, and when the board is tilted, the red or blue LEDs gradually illuminate based on the degree of tilt on the X- and Y-axis.
Demo not working?
Did your board come in a box that looks like this?
No problem, your board simply came in the old packaging and has a different out-of-box demo loaded into the flash memory.
You should be seeing the RGB LED toggling between each of the three colors; red, blue and green. It's OK to move onto the next step when you're ready.
Still not working?
Try proceeding to the next steps to get other example applications running on your board. If you still have problems, try contacting us through the NXP Community.
Get Software
Installing software for the FRDM-KL26Z
2.1 Jump Start Your Design with the Kinetis SDK
The Kinetis Software Development Kit (SDK) is complimentary and includes full source code under a permissive open-source license for all hardware abstraction and peripheral driver software.
Click below to download the SDK Release appropriate for your computer's operating system.
Get SDK2.2 Install Your Toolchain
NXPoffers a complimentary toolchain called Kinetis Design Studio (KDS).
Want to use a different toolchain?
No problem, the Kinetis SDK includes support for other tools such as IAR, Keil and command-line GCC.
2.3 PC Configuration
Many of the example applications output data over the MCU UART so you’ll want to make sure that the driver for the board’s virtual COM port is installed. It should install automatically when you plug the board in to your PC. If the driver does not automatically install, click here to download the installer.
With the serial port driver installed, run your favorite terminal application to view the serial output from the MCU's UART. Configure the terminal to 115200 baud rate, 8 data bits, no parity and 1 stop bit. To determine the port number of the FRDM-KL26Z's virtual COM port, open the device manager and look under the "Ports" group.
Not sure how to use a terminal application? Try one of these tutorials:
Tera Term Tutorial
Tera Term is a very popular open source terminal emulation application. This program can be used to display information sent from your NXP development platform's virtual serial port.
- Download Tera Term from SourceForge. After the download, run the installer and then return to this webpage to continue.
- Launch Tera Term. The first time it launches, it will show you the following dialog. Select the serial option. Assuming your board is plugged in, there should be a COM port automatically populated in the list.
- Configure the serial port settings (using the COM port number identified earlier) to 115200 baud rate, 8 data bits, no parity and 1 stop bit. To do this, go to Setup -> Serial Port and change the settings.
- Verify that the connection is open. If connected, Tera Term will show something like below in it's title bar.
- You're ready to go
PuTTY Tutorial
PuTTY is a popular terminal emulation application. This program can be used to display information sent from your NXP development platform's virtual serial port.
- Download PuTTY using the button below. After the download, run the installer and then return to this webpage to continue.
- Launch PuTTY by either double clicking on the *.exe file you downloaded or from the Start menu, depending on the type of download you selected.
- Configure In the window that launches, select the Serial radio button and enter the COM port number that you determined earlier. Also enter the baud rate, in this case 115200.
- Click Open to open the serial connection. Assuming the board is connected and you entered the correct COM port, the terminal window will open. If the configuration is not correct, PuTTY will alert you.
- You're ready to go
Build, Run
Build and Run SDK Demos on the FRDM-KL26Z
3.1 Explore the SDK Example Code
The Kinetis SDK comes with a long list of demo applications and driver examples. To see what's available, browse to the SDK 'examples' folder of your SDK installation and select your board, the FRDM-KL26Z (
To learn more about demo applications or driver examples, open the Kinetis SDK Demo Applications User's Guide, located in
3.2 Build, Run and Debug SDK Examples
If one or more of the demo applications or driver examples sounds interesting, you're probably wanting to know how you can build and debug yourself. The Getting Started with Kinetis SDK guide provides easy, step-by-step instructions on how to configure, build, and debug demos for all toolchains supported by the SDK.
Use the guide below to learn how to open, build and debug an example application using the Kinetis Design Studio (KDS) IDE.
Using a different toolchain?
Create
Create an Application for the FRDM-KL26Z
4.1 Get SDK Project Generator
Let's create our own project and make a simple SDK-based application. NXP provides an intuitive, simple project generation utility that allows creation of custom projects based on the Kinetis SDK.
4.2 Run the SDK Project Generator
After extracting the ZIP file, open the utility by clicking on the KSDK_Project_Generator executable for your computer's operating system. Point the tool to your SDK installation path, name your project, and select the board that it uses as a reference. Click on the Quick Generate button to finish.
4.3 Open Your Project
Your new project will be located in
4.4 Write Some Code
Now, let's make our new project do something other than spin in an infinite loop. The SDK examples provide a board support package (BSP) to do various things specific to the board, including macros and definitions for items such as LEDs, switches and peripheral instances. To keep things simple, lets make the LED blink using the BSP macros.
Update the main() function in your project's main.c file with the following code:
volatile int delay;
// Configure board specific pin muxing
hardware_init();
// Initialize the UART terminal
dbg_uart_init();
PRINTF("\r\nRunning the myProject project.\n");
// Enable GPIO port for LED1
LED1_EN;
for (;;)
{
LED1_ON;
delay = 5000000;
while(delay--);
LED1_OFF;
delay = 5000000;
while(delay--);
}
4.5 Build, Download, Run
With the changes made to your main() function, build your application. Remember to build the SDK platform library first if you did not build any of the other SDK examples in the previous steps. Once the build is complete, download the application to your board.
If you need help figuring out how to build, download or run an application, reference your tool-specific guide from section 3.2.
4.6 Success
With the application downloaded, you will see the FRDM-KL26Z's green LED blinking. You can also view terminal output using PRINTF.
Running a demo using Kinetis Design Studio IDE
1. Install KDS Updates
Before using KDS IDE with KSDK, it is recommended that you make sure that your tools are up-to-date. The steps discussed below are shown using the Windows version of KDS, but are identical for Mac and Linux users.
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Select "Help" -> "Check for Updates".
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Install all updates from Freescale/NXP – these are denoted by “com.NXP.xxx” or “com.nxp.xxx”. There may also be updates for things such as toolchain or debug interfaces. While these additional updates are typically OK to install, sometimes they may cause issues since they aren’t released as part of the KDS toolchain.
2. Build an Example Application
The following steps will guide you through opening the hello_world application. These steps may change slightly for other example applications as some of these applications may have additional layers of folders in their path.
NOTE
The steps required for Linux and Mac OS are identical to those for Windows.
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Select File->Import from the KDS IDE menu. In the window that appears, expand the "Project of Projects" folder and select "Existing Project Sets". Then, click the "Next" button.
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Click the "Browse" button next to the "Import from file:" option.
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Point to the example application project, which can be found using this path:
/boards/ / / /kds For this guide, choose the specific location:
/boards/frdmke15z/demo_apps/hello_world/kds -
After pointing to the correct directory, your "Import Working Sets and Projects" window should look like the figure below. Click the "Finish" button.
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There are two project configurations (build targets) supported for each KSDK project:
- Debug – Compiler optimization is set to low, and debug information is generated for the executable. This target should be selected for development and debug.
- Release – Compiler optimization is set to high, and debug information is not generated. This target should be selected for final application deployment.
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Choose the appropriate build target, "Debug" or "Release", by clicking the downward facing arrow next to the hammer icon, as shown below. For this example, select the "Debug" target.
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The library starts building after the build target is selected. To rebuild the library in the future, click the hammer icon (assuming the same build target is chosen).
3. Run an Example Application
The FRDM-KE15Z board comes loaded with the mbed/CMSIS-DAP debug interface from the factory. If you have changed the debug OpenSDA application on your board, visit http://www.nxp.com/opensda for information on updating or restoring your board to the factory state.
NOTE
Mac users must install the J-Link OpenSDA application in order to use the KDS IDE to download and debug their board.
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Connect the development platform to your PC via USB cable between the "SDAUSB" USB port on the board and the PC USB connector.
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Open the terminal application on the PC (such as PuTTY or TeraTerm) and connect to the debug COM port you determined earlier. Configure the terminal with these settings:
- 15200 baud rate
- No parity
- 8 data bits
- 1 stop bit
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For Linux OS users only, run the following commands in your terminal. These install libudev onto your system, which is required by KDS IDE to launch the debugger.
user@ubuntu:~$ sudo apt-get install libudev-dev libudev1user@ubuntu:~$ sudo ln –s /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libudev.so /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libudev.so.0 -
Ensure that the debugger configuration is correct for the target you're attempting to connect to. This refers to the OpenSDA interface of your board. If you’re unsure what your board has, please consult Appendix B of the PDF linked in the top right hand corner of this dialog.
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To check the available debugger configurations, click the small downward arrow next to the green "Debug" button and select "Debug Configurations".
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In the Debug Configurations dialog box, select debug configuration that corresponds to the hardware platform you’re using. For Windows or Linux users, select is the mbed/CMSIS-DAP option under OpenOCD For Mac users, select J-Link.
After selecting the debugger interface, click the "Debug" button to launch the debugger.
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The application is downloaded to the target and automatically run to main():
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Start the application by clicking the "Resume" button:
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The hello_world application is now running and a banner is displayed on the terminal. If this is not the case, check your terminal settings and connections.
