Hello, World!
table of contents
Here we will, finally, generate the first project: Blinking a LED. This project is essentially the Hello, World! of the embedded systems since, in the embedded domain, there is nowhere to write Hello.
Write the First Program
If you’ve set up your first project with default peripheral initialization, navigate Your Project Name > Core > Src > main.c. Within the while loop in that file, add the following code:
/* Infinite loop */
/* USER CODE BEGIN WHILE */
while (1)
{
/* USER CODE END WHILE */
/* USER CODE BEGIN 3 */
HAL_GPIO_TogglePin(LD4_GPIO_Port, LD4_Pin);
HAL_Delay(500);
}
/* USER CODE END 3 */
NOTE
Make sure to insert your code between /* USER CODE BEGIN 3 / and / USER CODE END 3 */ sections. Neglecting this step might result in your code disappearing when you reconfigure the project using CubeMX. Always use the defined user code sections to safeguard your custom code.
Flash the MCU
Before running your code on the MCU, it’s a good practice to update your ST-LINK firmware. Follow these steps
- Connect your device to the computer
- In CubeIDE, go to
Help > ST-LINKUpgrade - Refresh the list and, if any updates are available, proceed to upgrade your firmware.
Finally, you can now flash your MCU.
Upon completing this step, one of your LEDs should be flashing.
From this point forward, I won’t provide detailed explanations for every step. It’s time to dive into other projects