Services or capabilities described in Amazon Web Services documentation might vary by Region. To see the differences applicable to the China Regions, see Getting Started with Amazon Web Services in China (PDF).

Preparing to test your microcontroller board for the first time

You can use IDT for FreeRTOS to test as you port the FreeRTOS interfaces. After you have ported the FreeRTOS interfaces for your board’s device drivers, you use Amazon IoT Device Tester to run the qualification tests on your microcontroller board.

Add library porting layers

To port FreeRTOS for your device, follow the instructions in the FreeRTOS Porting Guide.

Configure your Amazon credentials

You need to configure your Amazon credentials for Amazon IoT Device Tester to communicate with the Amazon Cloud. For more information, see Set up Amazon Credentials and Region for Development. Valid Amazon credentials must be specified in the devicetester_extract_location/devicetester_afreertos_[win|mac|linux]/configs/config.json configuration file.

Create a device pool in IDT for FreeRTOS

Devices to be tested are organized in device pools. Each device pool consists of one or more identical devices. You can configure IDT for FreeRTOS to test a single device in a pool or multiple devices in a pool. To accelerate the qualification process, IDT for FreeRTOS can test devices with the same specifications in parallel. It uses a round-robin method to execute a different test group on each device in a device pool.

You can add one or more devices to a device pool by editing the devices section of the device.json template in the configs folder.

To enable parallel builds of the source code for different test groups, IDT for FreeRTOS copies the source code to a results folder inside the IDT for FreeRTOS extracted folder. The source code path in your build or flash command must be referenced using either the testdata.sourcePath or sdkPath variable. IDT for FreeRTOS replaces this variable with a temporary path of the copied source code. For more information see, IDT for FreeRTOS variables.

The following is an example device.json file used to create a device pool with multiple devices.

[
    {
        "id": "pool-id",
        "sku": "sku",
        "features": [
            {
                "name": "WIFI",
                "value": "Yes | No"
            },
            {
                "name": "Cellular",
                "value": "Yes | No"
            },
            {
                "name": "OTA",
                "value": "Yes | No",
                "configs": [
                    {
                        "name": "OTADataPlaneProtocol",
                        "value": "HTTP | MQTT"
                    }
                ]
            },
            {
                "name": "BLE",
                "value": "Yes | No"
            },
            {
                "name": "TCP/IP",
                "value": "On-chip | Offloaded | No"
            },
            {
                "name": "TLS",
                "value": "Yes | No"
            },
            {
                "name": "PKCS11",
                "value": "RSA | ECC | Both | No"
            },
            {
                "name": "KeyProvisioning",
                "value": "Import | Onboard | No"
            }
        ],

        "devices": [
          {
            "id": "device-id",
            "connectivity": {
              "protocol": "uart",
              "serialPort": "/dev/tty*"
            },
            ***********Remove the section below if the device does not support onboard key generation***************
            "secureElementConfig" : {
              "publicKeyAsciiHexFilePath": "absolute-path-to/public-key-txt-file: contains-the-hex-bytes-public-key-extracted-from-onboard-private-key",
              "secureElementSerialNumber": "secure-element-serialNo-value",
              "preProvisioned"           : "Yes | No"
            },
            **********************************************************************************************************
            "identifiers": [
              {
                "name": "serialNo",
                "value": "serialNo-value"
              }
            ]
          }
        ]
    }
]

The following attributes are used in the device.json file:

Configure build, flash, and test settings

For IDT for FreeRTOS to build and flash tests on to your board automatically, you must configure IDT to run the build and flash commands for your hardware. The build and flash command settings are configured in the userdata.json template file located in the config folder.

Configure settings for testing devices

Build, flash, and test settings are made in the configs/userdata.json file. We support Echo Server configuration by loading both the client and server certificates and keys in the customPath. For more information, see Setting up an echo server in the FreeRTOS Porting Guide. The following JSON example shows how you can configure IDT for FreeRTOS to test multiple devices:

{
    "sourcePath": "/absolute-path-to/freertos",
    "vendorPath": "{{testData.sourcePath}}/vendors/vendor-name/boards/board-name",
    // ***********The sdkConfiguration block below is needed if you are not using the default, unmodified FreeRTOS repo. 
    // In other words, if you are using the default, unmodified FreeRTOS repo then remove this block***************
    "sdkConfiguration": {
        "name": "sdk-name",
        "version": "sdk-version",
        "path": "/absolute-path-to/sdk"
    },
    "buildTool": {
        "name": "your-build-tool-name",
        "version": "your-build-tool-version",
        "command": [
            "{{config.idtRootPath}}/relative-path-to/build-parallel.sh {{testData.sourcePath}} {{enableTests}}"
        ]
    },
    "flashTool": {
        "name": "your-flash-tool-name",
        "version": "your-flash-tool-version",
        "command": [
            "/{{config.idtRootPath}}/relative-path-to/flash-parallel.sh {{testData.sourcePath}} {{device.connectivity.serialPort}} {{buildImageName}}"
        ],
        "buildImageInfo" : {
            "testsImageName": "tests-image-name",
            "demosImageName": "demos-image-name"
        }
    },
    "testStartDelayms": 0,
    "clientWifiConfig": {
        "wifiSSID": "ssid",
        "wifiPassword": "password",
        "wifiSecurityType": "eWiFiSecurityOpen | eWiFiSecurityWEP | eWiFiSecurityWPA | eWiFiSecurityWPA2 | eWiFiSecurityWPA3"
    },
    "testWifiConfig": {
        "wifiSSID": "ssid",
        "wifiPassword": "password",
        "wifiSecurityType": "eWiFiSecurityOpen | eWiFiSecurityWEP | eWiFiSecurityWPA | eWiFiSecurityWPA2 | eWiFiSecurityWPA3"
    },
    //**********
    //This section is used to start echo server based on server certificate generation method,
    //When certificateGenerationMethod is set as Automatic specify the eccCurveFormat to generate certifcate and key based on curve format,
    //When certificateGenerationMethod is set as Custom specify the certificatePath and PrivateKeyPath to be used to start echo server
    //**********
    "echoServerCertificateConfiguration": {
      "certificateGenerationMethod": "Automatic | Custom",
      "customPath": {
          "clientCertificatePath":"/path/to/clientCertificate",
          "clientPrivateKeyPath": "/path/to/clientPrivateKey",
          "serverCertificatePath":"/path/to/serverCertificate",
          "serverPrivateKeyPath": "/path/to/serverPrivateKey"
      },
    "eccCurveFormat": "P224 | P256 | P384 | P521"
    },
    "echoServerConfiguration": {
        "securePortForSecureSocket": 33333, // Secure tcp port used by SecureSocket test. Default value is 33333. Ensure that the port configured isn't blocked by the firewall or your corporate network
        "insecurePortForSecureSocket": 33334, // Insecure tcp port used by SecureSocket test. Default value is 33334. Ensure that the port configured isn't blocked by the firewall or your corporate network
        "insecurePortForWiFi": 33335 // Insecure tcp port used by Wi-Fi test. Default value is 33335. Ensure that the port configured isn't blocked by the firewall or your corporate network
    },
    "otaConfiguration": {
        "otaFirmwareFilePath": "{{testData.sourcePath}}/relative-path-to/ota-image-generated-in-build-process",
        "deviceFirmwareFileName": "ota-image-name-on-device",
        "otaDemoConfigFilePath": "{{testData.sourcePath}}/relative-path-to/ota-demo-config-header-file",
        "codeSigningConfiguration": {
            "signingMethod": "Amazon | Custom",
            "signerHashingAlgorithm": "SHA1 | SHA256",
            "signerSigningAlgorithm": "RSA | ECDSA",
            "signerCertificate": "arn:partition:service:region:account-id:resource:qualifier | /absolute-path-to/signer-certificate-file",
            "signerCertificateFileName": "signerCertificate-file-name",
            "compileSignerCertificate": boolean,
            // ***********Use signerPlatform if you choose aws for signingMethod***************
            "signerPlatform": "AmazonFreeRTOS-Default | AmazonFreeRTOS-TI-CC3220SF",
            "untrustedSignerCertificate": "arn:partition:service:region:account-id:resourcetype:resource:qualifier",
            // ***********Use signCommand if you choose custom for signingMethod***************
            "signCommand": [
                "/absolute-path-to/sign.sh {{inputImageFilePath}} {{outputSignatureFilePath}}"
            ]
        }
    },
    // ***********Remove the section below if you're not configuring CMake***************
    "cmakeConfiguration": {
        "boardName": "board-name",
        "vendorName": "vendor-name",
        "compilerName": "compiler-name",
        "frToolchainPath": "/path/to/freertos/toolchain",
        "cmakeToolchainPath": "/path/to/cmake/toolchain"
    },
    "freertosFileConfiguration": {
        "required": [
            {
                "configName": "pkcs11Config",
                "filePath": "{{testData.sourcePath}}/vendors/vendor-name/boards/board-name/aws_tests/config_files/core_pkcs11_config.h"
            },
            {
                "configName": "pkcs11TestConfig",
                "filePath": "{{testData.sourcePath}}/vendors/vendor-name/boards/board-name/aws_tests/config_files/iot_test_pkcs11_config.h"
            }
        ],
        "optional": [
            {
                "configName": "otaAgentTestsConfig",
                "filePath": "{{testData.sourcePath}}/vendors/vendor-name/boards/board-name/aws_tests/config_files/ota_config.h"
            },
            {
                "configName": "otaAgentDemosConfig",
                "filePath": "{{testData.sourcePath}}/vendors/vendor-name/boards/board-name/aws_demos/config_files/ota_config.h"
            },
            {
                "configName": "otaDemosConfig",
                "filePath": "{{testData.sourcePath}}/vendors/vendor-name/boards/board-name/aws_demos/config_files/ota_demo_config.h"
            }
        ]
    }
}

The following lists the attributes used in userdata.json:

IDT for FreeRTOS variables

The commands to build your code and flash the device might require connectivity or other information about your devices to run successfully. Amazon IoT Device Tester allows you to reference device information in flash and build commands using JsonPath. By using simple JsonPath expressions, you can fetch the required information specified in your device.json file.

Path variables

IDT for FreeRTOS defines the following path variables that can be used in command lines and configuration files: