Build

Clone the repository recursively git clone https://github.com/cryptoadvance/specter-diy.git --recursive

bootloader folder contains a secure bootloader that you can customize with your own firmware signing keys.

Prerequisites for the Nix build

There are multiple ways to get all necessary tools. The recommended way is to use the Nix flake with direnv. If that's too complicated for you, you can use the traditional nix-shell or install the tools manually (which mighty be tricky to get the dependencies right).

Install Nix on Ubuntu 24.04

sudo apt update
sudo apt install nix

Enable the required experimental features for flakes and the new CLI:

sudo mkdir -p /etc/nix
echo "experimental-features = nix-command flakes" | sudo tee -a /etc/nix/nix.conf

Add your user to the nix-users group so you can access the Nix store:

sudo usermod -aG nix-users "$USER"
newgrp nix-users

The easiest way to get all necessary tools is to use the Nix flake from the root of the repository. You need to have Nix (on Mac use determinate) with flakes enabled. This only works with Nix >2.7 (check with nix --version). Install direnv with brew install direnv (on Mac) or sudo apt install direnv (on Linux). direnv automatically loads and unloads the environment described in .envrc when you enter or leave the repository, so the development tooling is ready without extra commands.

Make sure that flakes are enabled in your Nix config. On Linux systems, your user might need to be added to the nix-users group.

# Enter development shell
nix develop

# Or use with direnv for automatic activation
direnv allow

Nix shell

Alternatively, you can use the traditional shell.nix:

nix-shell

You'll need to have Nix installed as well.

Prerequisities (Manually): Board

To compile the firmware for the board you will need arm-none-eabi-gcc compiler.

Debian/Ubuntu:

sudo apt-get install build-essential gcc-arm-none-eabi binutils-arm-none-eabi gdb-multiarch openocd

Archlinux:

sudo pacman -S arm-none-eabi-gcc arm-none-eabi-binutils openocd base-devel python-case

You might need change default gcc flag settings with CFLAGS_EXTRA="-w". Export it or set the variable before of make to avoid warnings being raised as errors.

MacOS:

brew tap ArmMbed/homebrew-formulae
brew install arm-none-eabi-gcc

On Windows: Install linux subsystem and follow Linux instructions.

Prerequisities (Manually): Simulator

You may need to install SDL2 library to simulate the screen of the device.

Linux:

sudo apt install libsdl2-dev

MacOS:

brew install sdl2

Windows: - sudo apt install libsdl2-dev on Linux side. - install and launch Xming on Windows side - set export DISPLAY=:0 on linux part

Build

All build commands might need a prefix like nix develop -c or need to be run from nix develop shell. If you use direnv, you don't need to do anything, apart from an initial direnv allow.

Starting the build

After entering the development shell (either with nix develop or via direnv), start the default firmware build with:

make disco

This produces bin/specter-diy.bin, which can be flashed by dragging the file onto the board's virtual mass-storage drive or by using programming tools such as STM32CubeProgrammer.

To build custom bootloader and firmware that you will be able to sign check out the bootloader doc on self-signed firmware. To wipe flash and remove protections on the device with the secure bootloader check out this doc.

To build an open firmware (no bootloader and signature verifications) run make disco. It also produces the bin/specter-diy.bin image ready for flashing via the board's virtual drive or external programming tools.

To build a simulator run make unix - it will compile a micropython simulator for mac/unix and store it under bin/micropython_unix.

To launch a simulator either run bin/micropython_unix simulate.py or simly run make simulate.

If something is not working you can clean up with make clean

Run Unittests

Currently unittests work only on linuxport, and there are... not many... Contributions are very welcome!

make test