Although it’s always been possible to use Sming compiled apps with rBoot it wasn’t easy. I’ve shared Makefiles and talked a few people through it previously on the esp8266.com forum, but now there is a new sample project on GitHub to help everyone do it. The sample demonstrates: Compiling a basic app (similar to the … Continue reading rBoot now supports Sming for ESP8266→
Just a quick post with a C version of the decompiled ESP8266 rom function Cache_Read_Enable. This function is responsible for memory mapping the SPI flash. I’ve previously discussed it, but a couple of people have wanted the code so it seemed worth posting here. This compiles to quite a few bytes which must stay in … Continue reading C Version of Cache_Read_Enable for ESP8266→
Since I haven’t seen this documented anywhere, here is my attempt to explain the Cache_Read_Enable function. Valid values and what they do (at a register level) are from decompiling the code. The outcome of those values is based on my own experimentation so my descriptions and explanations may be silly but they currently fit the … Continue reading ESP8266 Cache_Read_Enable→
Time to write something about esptool2, as I’ve been using it in the last few posts. The SDK way of creating rom images is a mess involving a shell script / batch file and Makefile. I did find a windows version of esptool by mamalala, but it didn’t create the newer rom format used by … Continue reading esptool2 – a rom creation tool for ESP8266→
Ok, hope you’re still with me after my previous massive post. Now I’m going to show you how to perform an over-the-air (OTA) update with rBoot. I’ve covered all the background already, so this should be pretty straight forward as long as you have a simple two rom rBoot setup running. Now add rboot.h, rboot-ota.h … Continue reading rBoot tutorial for ESP8266 – OTA updates→
From recent reading and discussions it seems that lots of people aren’t using the Espressif boot loader (or my own rBoot, but that’s less of a surprise) on the ESP8266. Why? Maybe people aren’t aware of the reasons why you might want to. Or maybe they can’t figure out how to – when I started … Continue reading A boot loader tutorial for ESP8266 using rBoot→
As promised here is my new boot loader for the ESP8266 – rBoot. Advantages over SDK supplied bootloader: Open source (written in C) – this is the big one. Supports any number of roms. Roms can be different sizes. Rom slots can be used for resource storage as well as bootable apps (and benefit from … Continue reading rBoot – A new boot loader for ESP8266→
So having looked at the standard boot process on the ESP8266, let’s look at the boot loader and how it extends it. The boot loader is written to the first sector of the SPI flash and is executed like any other program, the built in first stage boot loader does not know it is loading … Continue reading Decompiling the ESP8266 boot loader v1.3(b3)→
I decided to write my own version of esptool for windows to create rom images. Although there is already a windows version available it can’t create new type firmware images for use with the latest versions of the boot loader from the espressif sdk (e.g v1.2). I could have just used the python version, but … Continue reading ESP8266 boot process→
Once you have a real time clock working on the ESP8266, you might actually want to set it. As they have a backup battery you may just set it before you connect it to the ESP8266 and forget about it, but that’s not ideal. These cheap RTCs probably aren’t perfectly accurate and if it stops … Continue reading A simple NTP client for ESP8266→