NetBurner header format and binary compression?

[commodorejohn]

I've picked up a MOD54415 development kit for hobby purposes. One of the things I'd like to be able to do is send any arbitrary binary image to the device, but I know the boot ROM has its own way of doing things w.r.t. decompressing a packed executable image (it looks like this might be LZO compression - is that correct?) and while the image is clearly in S-record format, I'm not sure what the format for the header record is - does the boot ROM care?

[dciliske]

Uh... I'm not sure I understand the question. Is it that just that you want to send a binary instead of a s19?

-Dan

[commodorejohn]

No, s19 is fine; I just would like to be able to send any arbitrary executable (with a particular eye towards being able to develop from platforms other than Windows/Mac.) Converting to s19 format is easy enough (it's been around for decades and there's tools for conversion on about any platform in existence.) The things I'm not sure of are what needs to be done to compress the executable into the format the boot ROM is looking for (is it just LZO?) and what if anything the boot ROM requires in the s19 header record.

[dciliske]

Uh, just use compcode? Use the build system?

I really don't understand what you're trying to accomplish that isn't already in place with the build and deploy tools.

-Dan

[commodorejohn]

What I'm trying to accomplish is to be able to produce usable executables for the device using other tools than the provided development kit (again, so that I can do some development work using something other than Windows or Mac OS.) I can get tools to build a Coldfire executable binary, and I can turn a binary into an S-record file, but I need to know how to compress it, and what information if any needs to be in the header.

[dciliske]

Oh, there's the real answer. We actually have compcode building on Linux now... Would that work for you? The version shipping in 2.8.0 is compatible. We actually have a complete tool chain internally for building on Linux, but are missing the Eclipse support...

Basically, I don't know off hand what the header format is; I'm not sure it has specific documentation. The binary gets LZMA compressed and converted to an SREC. Even with the format, rebuilding the tools from scratch would take a while.

-Dan

[commodorejohn]

Yeah, that's good information - thanks! I also just realized that the source for the tools is included with the development kit, so I should be able to work it out from here.