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# The MCF5272 ColdFire Processor

## Name

`CYGPKG_HAL_M68K_MCF5272` -- eCos Support for the Freescale MCF5272 Processor

## Description

The MCF5272 is one member of the Freescale MCFxxxx ColdFire range of processors. It comes with a number of on-chip peripherals including 2 UARTs, ethernet, and USB slave. The processor HAL package `CYGPKG_HAL_M68K_MCF5272` provides support for features that are specific to the MCF5272. It complements the M68K architectural HAL package `CYGPKG_HAL_M68K` and the variant HAL package `CYGPKG_HAL_M68K_MCFxxxx`. An eCos configuration should also include a platform HAL package, for example `CYGPKG_HAL_M68K_M5272C3` to support board-level details like the external memory chips.

## Configuration

The MCF5272 processor HAL package should be loaded automatically when eCos is configured for appropriate target hardware. It should never be necessary to load this package explicitly. Unloading the package should only happen as a side effect of switching target hardware.

The component `CYGPKG_HAL_M68K_MCF5272_HARDWARE` contains configuration options for the available hardware. This includes all GPIO pin settings, with defaults provided by the platform HAL. In turn the pin settings are used to determine defaults for other hardware settings, for example which of the two on-chip uarts are usable. Users can override these settings if necessary, subject to any constraints imposed by the platform HAL, but care has to be taken that the resulting configuration still matches the actual hardware.

The option `CYGIMP_HAL_M68K_MCF5272_IDLE` controls what happens in configurations containing the eCos kernel when the idle thread runs, i.e. when there is nothing for the processor to do until the next interrupt comes in. Usually the processor made to sleep, halting the cpu but leaving all peripherals active.

The package contains a single configuration option `CYGFUN_HAL_M68K_MCF5272_PROFILE_TIMER`. This controls the support for gprof-based profiling. By default it is active and enabled if the configuration contains the gprof profiling package, otherwise inactive. The relevant code uses hardware timer 2, so that timer is no longer available for application code. If the timer is required but a platform HAL provides an alternative implementation of the profiling support then this option can be disabled.

## The HAL Port

This section describes how the MCF5272 processor HAL package implements parts of the eCos HAL specification. It should be read in conjunction with similar sections from the architectural and variant HAL documentation.

### HAL I/O

The header file `cyg/hal/proc_io.h` specifies which generic MCFxxxx devices are present, and provides details of MCF5272-specific devices. This header file is automatically included by the architectural header `cyg/hal/hal_io.h`, so typically application code and other packages will just include the latter.

It should be noted that the Freescale documentation is occasionally confusing when it comes to numbering devices. For example the four on-chip timers are numbered TMR0 to TMR3, but in the interrupt controller the corresponding interrupts are numbered TMR1 to TMR4. The eCos port consistently starts numbering at 0, so these interrupts have been renamed TMR0 to TMR3.

### Interrupt Handling

The header file `cyg/hal/proc_intr.h` provides VSR and ISR vector numbers for all interrupt sources. The VSR vector number, for example `CYGNUM_HAL_VECTOR_TMR0`, should be used for calls like `cyg_interrupt_get_vsr`. It corresponds directly to the M68K exception number. The ISR vector number, for example `CYGNUM_HAL_ISR_TMR0`, should be used for calls like `cyg_interrupt_create`. This header file is automatically included by the architectural header `cyg/hal/hal_intr.h`, and other packages and application code will normally just include the latter.

The eCos HAL macros `HAL_INTERRUPT_MASK`, `HAL_INTERRUPT_UNMASK`, `HAL_INTERRUPT_SET_LEVEL`, `HAL_INTERRUPT_ACKNOWLEDGE`, and `HAL_INTERRUPT_CONFIGURE` are implemented by the processor HAL. The mask and unmask operations are straightforward, simply manipulating the on-chip interrupt controller. The acknowledge and configure macros are only relevant for external interrupts: internal interrupts generated by on-chip devices do not need to be acknowledged. The set-level operation, used implicitly by higher level code such as `cyg_interrupt_create`, is mapped on to M68K IPL levels so interrupts can be given a priority between 1 and 7. Priority 7 corresponds to non-maskable interrupts and must be used with care: such interrupts cannot be managed safely by the usual eCos ISR and DSR mechanisms; instead application code will have to install a custom VSR and manage the entire interrupt.

### Clock Support

The processor HAL provides support for the eCos system clock. This always uses hardware timer 3, which should not be used directly by application code. If gprof-based profiling is in use then that will use hardware timer 2. Timers 0 and 1 are never used by eCos so application code is free to manipulate these as required.

Some of the configuration options related to the system clock, for example `CYGNUM_HAL_RTC_PERIOD`, are actually contained in the platform HAL rather than the processor HAL. These options need to take into account the processor clock speed, a characteristic of the platform rather than the processor.

### Cache Handling

The MCF5272 has a small instruction cache of 1024 bytes. This is fully supported by the processor HAL. There is no data cache.

### Idle Thread Support

The configuration option `CYGIMP_HAL_M68K_MCF5272_IDLE` controls what happens when the kernel idle thread runs. The default behaviour is to put the processor to sleep until the next interrupt.

### Profiling Support

The MCF5272 processor HAL provides a profiling timer for use with the gprof profiling package. This uses hardware timer 2, so application code should not manipulate this timer if profiling is enabled. The M68K architectural HAL implements the `mcount` function so profiling is fully supported on all MCF5272-based platforms.

### Other Issues

The MCF5272 processor HAL does not affect the implementation of data types, stack size definitions, linker scripts, SMP support, system startup, or debug support. The architectural HAL's bit index instructions are used rather than the MCFxxxx variant HAL's versions since the MCF5272 does not implement the ff1 and bitrev instructions.

### Other Functionality

The MCF5272 processor HAL only implements functionality defined in the eCos HAL specification and does not export any additional functions.

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