Reddit reviews Embedded Systems: Introduction to Arm® Cortex™-M Microcontrollers , Fifth Edition (Volume 1)

Embedded Systems: Introduction to Arm Cortex-M Microcontrollers , Fifth Edition (Volume 1) https://www.amazon.com/dp/1477508996/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_lEcJBbGEZ1DE5

Digital Design and Computer Architecture: ARM Edition https://www.amazon.com/dp/0128000562/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_aFcJBb49BEQFE

The Art of Electronics https://www.amazon.com/dp/0521809266/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_AFcJBb6P452VQ

https://www.publishing.umich.edu/publications/ee/

Troubleshooting Analog Circuits (EDN Series for Design Engineers) https://www.amazon.com/dp/0750694998/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_MGcJBbHN2BD9G

Should help your for microcontrollers

Hi,

I have two-part suggestion for you. Naturally, this is really just what I did to move from your shoes to where I am now (writing device drivers, and using real-time operating systems) on nice toolchains (sets of IDEs coupled with compilers and debugger interfaces).

The first thing you ought to do next is focus on learning C. ANSI C.

This is book to use: Introduction to Embedded Systems by David Russel

By actually stepping through the book, you'll get to learn what is embedded is all about, without having to learn a new debugging interface (because you won't have one), and without having to buy a new board.

The book uses the Arduino Uno board, and the Arduino IDE to teach you how to NOT use the Arduino API and libraries. This teaches you about the "building" process of C programs - the compilation, linking, bootlaoders, etc. You'll learn all the low level stuff, on a platform (The AT Mega 328p) that is easier to understand. You'll even get into making interrupt-based programs, a buffered serial driver, pulse-width modulation, input capture on timers etc.

Ever since having gone through the book, I've been able to move to other platforms, knowing that the ideas are essentially the same, but more involved. If you were to jump straight into the Arm Cortex-based 32 bit processors, you would feel rather overwhelmed by the complexity of the peripherals that typically get placed onto the same die. You would end up resorting to high level hardware abstraction libraries (like ST Microelectronic's horrid HAL) and MAYBE be able to use them, but you would have no idea what would actually be going on. As soon as a library stops working, you need to be able to know where it broke and why.

So do this patiently.

Start with the 8 bit micro on the Arduino using the book, using basic timers, basic interrupts, basic C types.


Only later, it is wise to pick up an ARM board to start experimenting with. These devices are powerful monsters that get work done. But you won't have an appreciation for what they and their powerful peripherals can do until you've wrestled with their simpler cousins on the AT Mega 328p.

You'll have to pick an IDE, (or none if you really want to know and understand the build process), a set of libraries to use (or none, if you want to learn the monster peripherals the hard way), and an operating system (or none, if you want to stick to bare-metal programs, but really, a 120 MHz cpu with all that power and no OS is sort of a waste).

I would recommend starting with the TIVA C series board from Texas Instruments. It's used in the very nicely paced Intro to ARM Microcontrollers by Jonathan Valvano.

That would be another book well worth the time to go through like a tutorial, because it is.

These book have also helped me along the way: Definitive Guide Cortex M3 Cortex M4 Processors by Joseph Yiu
and Computer Organization and Embedded Systems by Zvonko Vranesic.

If you want to explore this field, please be prepared to be patient. The learn curves here can be steep. But the things you'll be capable of making are incredible if you keep it up. I hope your exploration goes well!

Wow that's awesome! Are you interested in embedded and RTOS systems at all?

If so, I'd highly recommend this and this and picking up a TI TM4C123 board to do some development on.

I also recommend this book for learning more about the practical application of algorithms.

I was in your situation exactly. My schools microcontroller course used TIVA C for learning. I knew nothin else before that, just CS 1, and circuits/electronics. This was about 12 months ago. Tiva C is arm based, 32 bit architecture. And so it is very deep, it can do a ton. But as a result, the documentation is extremely deep, and it is very easy to get lost in.

I tried some textbooks like this one , but all they did was retell the data sheets after the first 2 chapters, and they assumed a lot of assembly/computer organization knowledge which I didn’t have yet. So I stopped using it.

Eventually I asked around, and realized that TIVA-C is really not the best for educational purposes. I picked up an MSP430FR6989, part of the MSP430 series which is extremely popular for educational purposes. I bought this udemy course for like $9 on sale which has been wonderful so far. It has thorough labs which help a lot, and lectures too. It’s been really good for the sake of just learning the microcontroller concepts. So Idk if that’s what you want, but that’s been working extremely well for me.

Also to answer your question about TI-RTOS, that is not what you need right now. RTOS is something you would put on your MCU for a heavy, multithreaded project which is doing many tasks at once. I did the training videos you found, because my senior design group is using TI-RTOS, but you won’t need those yet.

Well actually i started with "Embedded Systems: Introduction to Arm® Cortex™-M Microcontrollers , Fifth Edition (Volume 1)" in my class at college. We did 5 projects in assembly and 5 projects in C using the Keil IDE.The first 5 were around making the built in LED function in different ways either with brightness vs. color or how it functions in relation to the onboard button, after that we added a bread board and made an analog to digital converter for a speaker (i was shown the diagram of the wires and resisters we didnt have to make them from scratch) this time we used C after that I think we did a stop light type set up with LEDs our final was s a simple round robin operating system. The book was really helpful with getting each project up and running.