SBSFU and userApp bigelf size

[sute]

Hello,

I am trying to generate the combined elf file with SBSFU and user app. The provided postbuild scripts use the following code to create the file:

command=$programmertool" -ms "$elf" "$headerbin" "$sbsfuelf

There is a problem that the combined elf file is huge. For my own application it is 147M and for the example userApp 59M. Why is the file so big? How do I get a normal combination elf file? The combination bin-file is normal and works.

[Jocelyn RICARD]

Hello @MS.12utela​ 

I checked on simple STM32L476 example on last SBSFU 2.5.0 and I get 23M elf file.

Looking inside, it is full of zeros. I don't know why.

STM32CubeIDE provides elf tools in (for CubeIDE 1.8.0)

plugins\com.st.stm32cube.ide.mcu.externaltools.gnu-tools-for-stm32.9-2020-q2-update.win32_2.0.0.202105311346\tools\bin\

arm-none-eabi-readelf.exe UserApp.elf  shows a very big section .shstrtab

Then, I tried using command

arm-none-eabi-objcopy.exe --strip-unneeded UserApp.elf

elf size is now 78 KB

Now, I'm not sure this combined elf feature is well tested in SBSFU.

What are you trying to do with it ?

Best regards

Jocelyn

[sute]

Hi thanks for help!

I am trying to get an elf file that I can debug on the MCU.

Indeed, running arm-none-eabi-objcopy on my own application I am able to decrease the elf size, however I get two warnings:

st4M9tlx: section .isr_vector lma 0x8010034 adjusted to 0x8018400

st4M9tlx: warning: allocated section `Header' not in segment

The first one seems OK, but not the second one. I am also unable to run the elf file on target.

[Jocelyn RICARD]

Hello @MS.12utela​ 

OK so in order to debug I would suggest doing the following:

1) Flash the big binary generated

2) setup your debugger to only load symbols: You can load symbols of SBSFU, SE and application with associated elf files (deactivate generation with programmer)

3) Attach to target and debug

Best regards

Jocelyn

[sute]

Thanks. I have been debugging and it seems to me that STM32_Programmer_CLI places the Header section to wrong place. Here are the section headers using arm-none-eabi-readelf from combined bootloader and userApp elf file from the SBSFU examples:

Section Headers: [Nr] Name Type Addr Off Size ES Flg Lk Inf Al [ 0] NULL 00000000 000000 000000 00 0 0 0 [ 1] .isr_vector PROGBITS 08018400 0001b4 000400 00 A 0 0 1 [ 2] .text PROGBITS 08018800 00f47c 0052d8 00 AX 0 0 16 [ 3] .rodata PROGBITS 0801dad8 014754 000f40 00 A 0 0 4 [ 4] .ARM.extab PROGBITS 0801ea18 015b3c 000000 00 W 0 0 1 [ 5] .ARM ARM_EXIDX 0801ea18 015694 000008 00 AL 2 0 4 [ 6] .preinit_array PREINIT_ARRAY 0801ea20 01569c 000000 04 WA 0 0 1 [ 7] .init_array INIT_ARRAY 0801ea20 01569c 000008 04 WA 0 0 4 [ 8] .fini_array FINI_ARRAY 0801ea28 0156a4 000008 04 WA 0 0 4 [ 9] .data PROGBITS 20001000 0156ac 000078 00 WA 0 0 4 [10] .align32 PROGBITS 0801eaa8 015724 000018 00 WA 0 0 1 [11] .bss NOBITS 20001078 015b3c 0005ac 00 WA 0 0 4 [12] ._user_heap_stack NOBITS 20001624 015b3c 000a04 00 WA 0 0 1 [13] .ARM.attributes ARM_ATTRIBUTES 00000000 015b3c 00002e 00 0 0 1 [14] .comment PROGBITS 00000000 015b6a 000053 01 MS 0 0 1 [15] SBSFU0 PROGBITS 08000000 0005b4 0002b0 00 WA 0 0 4 [16] SBSFU1 PROGBITS 08000404 000864 005154 00 WA 0 0 4 [17] SBSFU2 PROGBITS 08006000 0059b8 0007cc 00 WA 0 0 4 [18] SBSFU3 PROGBITS 08006900 006184 000088 00 WA 0 0 4 [19] SBSFU4 PROGBITS 08006a00 00620c 009270 00 WA 0 0 4 [20] Header PROGBITS 20000c78 01573c 000400 00 WA 0 0 4 [21] .shstrtab STRTAB 00000000 015bbd 0000c5 00 0 0 1

Note that the address for Header is 0x20000c78 while it should be 0x0801800 according to mapping_fwimg.ld. Is this a bug or am I doing something wrong?

Is there a simple way to fix this?

[Jocelyn RICARD]

Hello @MS.12utela​ 

As I said, I'm not sure this feature is working well.

So, to debug please use original elf files generated by the compiler.

Best regards

Jocelyn