Last edited 4 months ago

DBGMCU internal peripheral



1. Article purpose

The purpose of this article is to:

  • briefly introduce the DBGMCU peripheral and its main features,
  • indicate the peripheral instances assignment at boot time and their assignment at runtime (including whether instances can be allocated to secure contexts),
  • list the software frameworks and drivers managing the peripheral,
  • explain how to configure the peripheral.

2. Peripheral overview

On STM32MP15x lines More info.png only, the DBGMCU peripheral is used by the boot chain and by OP-TEE to get the device ID and revision, to adapt their behavior accordingly. On other devices this information is obtained through SYSCFG.
The DBGMCU peripheral is also used to configure internal peripherals behavior when one of the available cores enters in debug mode.

During a debug session, the DBGMCU can be accessed via the debug access port (DAP) to configure the expected behavior on break, typically to get a watchdog (IWDG) frozen when the Cortex®-A enters in debug mode (via a breakpoint or JTAG break) and to avoid getting a watchdog reset during a debug session.

On STM32MP25x lines More info.png only, each peripheral freeze bit inherit the permissions that are set on the same peripheral it controls.

Refer to the STM32 MPU reference manuals for the complete list of features, and to the software frameworks and drivers, introduced below, to see which features are implemented.

3. Peripheral usage

This chapter is applicable in the scope of the OpenSTLinux BSP running on the Arm® Cortex®-A processor(s), and the STM32CubeMPU Package running on the Arm® Cortex®-M processor.

3.1. Boot time assignment

3.1.1. On STM32MP13x lines More info.png

Click on How to.png to expand or collapse the legend...

Domain Peripheral Boot time allocation Comment How to.png
Instance Cortex-A7
secure
(ROM code)
Cortex-A7
secure
(TF-A BL2)
Cortex-A7
non-secure
(U-Boot)
Trace & Debug DBGMCU DBGMCU

3.1.2. On STM32MP15x lines More info.png

Click on How to.png to expand or collapse the legend...

Domain Peripheral Boot time allocation Comment How to.png
Instance Cortex-A7
secure
(ROM code)
Cortex-A7
secure
(TF-A BL2)
Cortex-A7
non-secure
(U-Boot)
Trace & Debug DBGMCU DBGMCU

3.1.3. On STM32MP2 series

Click on How to.png to expand or collapse the legend...

Domain Peripheral Boot time allocation Comment How to.png
Instance Cortex-A35
secure
(ROM code)
Cortex-A35
secure
(TF-A BL2)
Cortex-A35
nonsecure
(U-Boot)
Trace & Debug DBGMCU DBGMCU

3.2. Runtime assignment

3.2.1. On STM32MP13x lines More info.png

Click on How to.png to expand or collapse the legend...

Domain Peripheral Runtime allocation Comment How to.png
Instance Cortex-A7
secure
(OP-TEE)
Cortex-A7
non-secure
(Linux)
Trace & Debug DBGMCU DBGMCU

3.2.2. On STM32MP15x lines More info.png

Click on How to.png to expand or collapse the legend...

Domain Peripheral Runtime allocation Comment How to.png
Instance Cortex-A7
secure
(OP-TEE)
Cortex-A7
non-secure
(Linux)
Cortex-M4

(STM32Cube)
Trace & Debug DBGMCU DBGMCU

3.2.3. On STM32MP21x lines More info.png

Click on How to.png to expand or collapse the legend...

Domain Peripheral Runtime allocation Comment How to.png
Instance Cortex-A35
secure
(OP-TEE /
TF-A BL31)
Cortex-A35
nonsecure
(Linux)
Cortex-M33
secure
(TF-M)
Cortex-M33
nonsecure
(STM32Cube)
Trace & Debug DBGMCU DBGMCU

3.2.4. On STM32MP23x lines More info.png

Click on How to.png to expand or collapse the legend...

Domain Peripheral Runtime allocation Comment How to.png
Instance Cortex-A35
secure
(OP-TEE /
TF-A BL31)
Cortex-A35
nonsecure
(Linux)
Cortex-M33
secure
(TF-M)
Cortex-M33
nonsecure
(STM32Cube)
Trace & Debug DBGMCU DBGMCU

3.2.5. On STM32MP25x lines More info.png

Click on How to.png to expand or collapse the legend...

Domain Peripheral Runtime allocation Comment How to.png
Instance Cortex-A35
secure
(OP-TEE /
TF-A BL31)
Cortex-A35
nonsecure
(Linux)
Cortex-M33
secure
(TF-M)
Cortex-M33
nonsecure
(STM32Cube)
Cortex-M0+
(STM32Cube)
Trace & Debug DBGMCU DBGMCU

4. Software frameworks and drivers

There is no software dedicated to the DBGMCU internal peripheral delivered with STM32MPU ecosystem. Nevertheless, debuggers like STM32CubeIDE and OpenOCD can use the DBGMCU to freeze DMA and timer execution during step by step debugging.

5. How to assign and configure the peripheral

The peripheral assignment can be done via the STM32CubeMX graphical tool (and manually completed if needed).
This tool also helps to configure the peripheral:

  • partial device trees (pin control and clock tree) generation for the OpenSTLinux software components,
  • HAL initialization code generation for the STM32CubeMPU Package.

The configuration is applied by the firmware running in the context in which the peripheral is assigned.