romprg is a project by tehKaiN aimed to program 29Fxxx and other ROM/flash chips using an
inexpensive Arduino board as the programmer.
Original source code can be obtained from https://github.com/tehKaiN/ROMprg.
This directory contains a port of the original C++ "fw/romprg-fw/src" and
"sw-cli/src" files.
The code that originally ran on the Atmega MCU is ported to run as an ELKS
application. As it is right now, it only works on the 80c188 board because
it has a hardcoded address on where the flash memory is found (see flash.c's
function "flash_load" and "flash_read"). Not only that, but the main entrypoint
also contains code that only works on the 80188x CPU.
It also hijacks the OS completely, that is, it disables the interrupts. This
is required on these embedded boards because ELKS is running exactly from the
same memory that this application would interact with (erease/etc). Since the
application runs from RAM, disabling the interupts is enough for it to continue
running, granted that it can't use anything that ELKS provides, as these might
not be available while flashing the main memory.
A PC is required to run the "client" part of this program, which is built
as "hostromprg". The "hostromprg" and "romprg" talk to each other using the
built-in serial port of this CPU.
It could be adapted to flash memory chips on a PC by modifying the actual
starting address of the memory chip, and how it talks to the UART.
The hostromprg baudrate is hardcoded on the "version.h" file, while the
8018x baudrate is fixed on the "main.c" file. These should match, and it's
currently set to 38400bps.
In order to use it, make sure you have your 8018x serial port connected to
a PC. From the terminal, run "romprg" and exit the console emulator. Now,
invoke the "hostromprg" program to interact with the memory that's attached
to the ELKS system.
Examples (assuming the serial port is /dev/ttyUSB0):
* Erase entire chip: "romprg /dev/ttyUSB0 erase chip"
* Write a chunk of data: "romprg /dev/ttyUSB0 write 0x5000 binary.file"
(where 0x5000 is the offset of the flash)
* Read a chunk of data: "romprg /dev/ttyUSB0 read 0x5000 0x6000 readback.bin"
(it'll read from 0x5000 thru 0x6000 and save it to readback.bin)
* Erase sectors: "romprg /dev/ttyUSB0 erase 0x5000 0x6000"
(it'll erase the sectors from 0x5000 thru 0x6000)
* Ping the "romprg": "romprg /dev/ttyUSB0 ping"
(it'll report the version of the romprg)
* Read the memory chip ID: "romprg /dev/ttyUSB0 id"
(reads the ID of the chip, which needs to be supported in order for this to program the memory chip)