Importing and Exporting Synergy Software Projects

One benefit that developers using the Renesas Synergy™ Platform get is the ability to leverage existing projects and integrate them into their own products. These projects could come as Synergy Application Projects that are used to become familiar with the platform or custom projects that are developed in-house to speed up development. Importing and exporting Synergy Software projects is slightly different and unique to the way projects are normally handled. Let’s dig into how projects are imported and exported.

Before diving in too deeply, the big difference that developers are going to like about importing and exporting projects is that the SSP does not need to be exported with the project! Exported projects will typically include only the application source code and then the Synergy Configuration file. There are many advantages that go along with this method. First, the exported project size is kept to a minimum since the entire SSP does not need to be carted around with the project. The Synergy Configuration file contains all the necessary SSP components and definitions to reconstruct the settings once a project is imported. Second, the application code and the SSP are kept separate which allows an imported project to be easily adapted to use the SSP framework that is installed on the host machine.

Let’s start by looking at how a project is exported since many application notes on the Renesas website follow this procedure and will allow the reader to understand how those projects are prepared. First, a developer will have their project open in the ISDE and select File>Export. The export dialog window shown below will be displayed:

Developers will want to select the Renesas Synergy Archive File option and select next. Selecting the archive file option will only export application related settings and ignore any files directly pertaining to the SSP, minus the configuration file. At this point, another dialog will be displayed.

These folders and files are now the project, application and debug related files. In general, a developer does not need to export the Debug directory so that can be unchecked. One reason to leave the Debug directory might be to save a .elf or s-record file. In this case the Debug directory could still be unchecked and then in the screen’s right hand window, the .elf file can be selected. This will add the Debug folder back in but on the selected file. A useful practice is also to make sure that the debug file is also included so that any custom debugger commands and settings are archived as well.

Once the desired files and folders have been selected, developers can configure where the archive file will be saved and whether it will be in a zip or tar format. Selecting the finish button will then archive the project. The file can then be distributed, placed on a server or maybe even revision control.

When receiving a project to import, developers will select File>Import. The import dialog box contains many options for importing into the ISDE. The two most common options that developers will want is

• Existing Project into Workspace
• Rename and Import Existing Project into Workspace

The developer can now select the directory where the project is located. If the rename option was selected, the developer will have a chance to change the project name. A good practice is to make sure that the project name is descriptive to what the project is actually doing. Including dates and version numbers in the project name are not a recommended practice. Another option that developers should not is the “Copy into Workspace” option. This option will create a new project copy that is stored in the workspace if selected, otherwise, the original project directory will be used.

Once the project has been imported, a developer will notice that there are no synergy or synergy_cfg directories. The developer needs to regenerate the SSP files in order to build the project. There are two ways to generate the SSP files. First a developer can open the Synergy Configuration file and press the generate button. Alternatively, a developer can just do a build all and the generation process will automatically take place. Be warned! The process may take a few minutes to read the configuration, generate the SSP files and then perform a clean build.

Importing and exporting projects isn’t difficult but it is very useful to understand the slight differences that come with importing and exporting Synergy projects. As a next step, select a Renesas application project and practice importing and exporting a project. Until next time,

Live long and profit!

Professor_IoT

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