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1.. _module-pw_cpu_exception_cortex_m:
2
3-------------------------
4pw_cpu_exception_cortex_m
5-------------------------
6This backend provides an ARMv7-M implementation for the CPU exception module
7frontend. See the CPU exception frontend module description for more
8information.
9
10Setup
11=====
12There are a few ways to set up the ARMv7-M exception handler so the
13application's exception handler is properly called during an exception.
14
15**1. Use existing CMSIS functions**
16  Inside of CMSIS fault handler functions, branch to ``pw_cpu_exception_Entry``.
17
18  .. code-block:: cpp
19
20    __attribute__((naked)) void HardFault_Handler(void) {
21    asm volatile(
22        " ldr r0, =pw_cpu_exception_Entry  \n"
23        " bx r0                            \n");
24    }
25
26**2. Modify a startup file**
27  Assembly startup files for some microcontrollers initialize the interrupt
28  vector table. The functions to call for fault handlers can be changed here.
29  For ARMv7-M, the fault handlers are indexes 3 to 6 of the interrupt vector
30  table. It's also may be helpful to redirect the NMI handler to the entry
31  function (if it's otherwise unused in your project).
32
33  Default:
34
35  .. code-block:: cpp
36
37    __isr_vector_table:
38      .word  __stack_start
39      .word  Reset_Handler
40      .word  NMI_Handler
41      .word  HardFault_Handler
42      .word  MemManage_Handler
43      .word  BusFault_Handler
44      .word  UsageFault_Handler
45
46  Using CPU exception module:
47
48  .. code-block:: cpp
49
50    __isr_vector_table:
51      .word  __stack_start
52      .word  Reset_Handler
53      .word  pw_cpu_exception_Entry
54      .word  pw_cpu_exception_Entry
55      .word  pw_cpu_exception_Entry
56      .word  pw_cpu_exception_Entry
57      .word  pw_cpu_exception_Entry
58
59  Note: ``__isr_vector_table`` and ``__stack_start`` are example names, and may
60  vary by platform. See your platform's assembly startup script.
61
62**3. Modify interrupt vector table at runtime**
63  Some applications may choose to modify their interrupt vector tables at
64  runtime. The ARMv7-M exception handler works with this use case (see the
65  exception_entry_test integration test), but keep in mind that your
66  application's exception handler will not be entered if an exception occurs
67  before the vector table entries are updated to point to
68  ``pw_cpu_exception_Entry``.
69
70Module Usage
71============
72For lightweight exception handlers that don't need to access
73architecture-specific registers, using the generic exception handler functions
74is preferred.
75
76However, some projects may need to explicitly access architecture-specific
77registers to attempt to recover from a CPU exception. ``pw_cpu_exception_State``
78provides access to the captured CPU state at the time of the fault. When the
79application-provided ``pw_cpu_exception_DefaultHandler()`` function returns, the
80CPU state is restored. This allows the exception handler to modify the captured
81state so that execution can safely continue.
82
83Expected Behavior
84-----------------
85In most cases, the CPU state captured by the exception handler will contain the
86ARMv7-M basic register frame in addition to an extended set of registers (see
87``cpu_state.h``). The exception to this is when the program stack pointer is in
88an MPU-protected or otherwise invalid memory region when the CPU attempts to
89push the exception register frame to it. In this situation, the PC, LR, and PSR
90registers will NOT be captured and will be marked with 0xFFFFFFFF to indicate
91they are invalid. This backend will still be able to capture all the other
92registers though.
93
94In the situation where the main stack pointer is in a memory protected or
95otherwise invalid region and fails to push CPU context, behavior is undefined.
96
97Nested Exceptions
98-----------------
99To enable nested fault handling:
100  1. Enable separate detection of usage/bus/memory faults via the SHCSR.
101  2. Decrease the priority of the memory, bus, and usage fault handlers. This
102     gives headroom for escalation.
103
104While this allows some faults to nest, it doesn't guarantee all will properly
105nest.
106
107Configuration Options
108=====================
109
110 - ``PW_CPU_EXCEPTION_EXTENDED_CFSR_DUMP``: Enable extended logging in
111   ``pw::cpu_exception::LogCpuState()`` that dumps the active CFSR fields with
112   help strings. This is disabled by default since it increases the binary size
113   by >1.5KB when using plain-text logs, or ~460 Bytes when using tokenized
114   logging. It's useful to enable this for device bringup until your application
115   has an end-to-end crash reporting solution.
116
117Exception Analysis
118==================
119This module provides Python tooling to analyze CPU state captured by a Cortex-M
120core during an exception. This can be useful as part of a crash report analyzer.
121
122CFSR decoder
123------------
124The ARMv7-M and ARMv8-M architectures have a Configurable Fault Status Register
125(CFSR) that explains what illegal behavior caused a fault. This module provides
126a simple command-line tool to decode CFSR contents (e.g. 0x00010000) as
127human-readable information (e.g. "Encountered invalid instruction").
128
129For example:
130
131  .. code-block::
132
133    $ python -m pw_cpu_exception_cortex_m.cfsr_decoder 0x00010100
134    20210412 15:11:14 INF Exception caused by a usage fault, bus fault.
135
136    Active Crash Fault Status Register (CFSR) fields:
137    IBUSERR     Bus fault on instruction fetch.
138    UNDEFINSTR  Encountered invalid instruction.
139
140    All registers:
141    cfsr       0x00010100
142
143.. note::
144  The CFSR is not supported on ARMv6-M CPUs (Cortex M0, M0+, M1).
145