Jump to main content

##

# 1.10 TCP/IP TCP Server

The TCP/IP TCP Server configuration demonstrates creating a network server that uses the MPLAB Harmony TCP API to create a TCP/IP echo server on port 9760.

## Description

The TCP/IP TCP Server application is based on MPLAB® Harmony 3 TCP/IP Stack.

The Harmony TCP/IP stack is a collection of different network protocols.

The source files of Harmony 3 TCP/IP stack is available here.

The demo is created with MPLAB X IDE and MCC plugin.

MCC Project Graph - TCP/IP TCP Server

The following Project Graph shows the Harmony components included in the TCP/IP TCP Server demo application.

Figure 1-28.Project Graph

TCP sockets calculate the ISN using the wolfSSL crypto library.

FreeRTOS component is required for RTOS application. For bare-metal (non-RTOS) FreeRTOS component should not be selected.

TCP/IP Configuration - TCP/IP TCP Server

The TCP/IP modules enabled for the demo is shown in the TCP/IP Configuration Overview.

More details of TCP/IP Configuration plugin is available here.

Figure 1-29.SAM9X60-Curiosity

The Application Layer modules enabled in the demo are as follows:

- Application Layer Modules
  - Announce to discover the Microchip devices within a local network.
  - DHCP Client to discover the IPv4 address from the nearest DHCP Server.
  - DNS Client provides DNS resolution capabilities to the stack.

## Downloading and Building the application

To clone or download this application from Github, go to the main page of this repository and then click Clone button to clone this repository or download as zip file.

This content can also be downloaded using content manager by following these instructions.

Path of the application within the repository is apps\tcpip_tcp_server\firmware.

To build the application, refer to the following list of demo configurations and open the project using MPLAB X IDE.

Table 1-10.Demo Configurations
Project Name | Target Device | Development Board | Description
--- | --- | --- | ---
sam_9x60_curiosity.X | SAM9X60D1G | SAM9X60-Curiosity | TCP/IP TCP Server with an on-board KSZ8081 PHY - Bare Metal
sam_9x60_curiosity_freertos.X | SAM9X60D1G | SAM9X60-Curiosity | TCP/IP TCP Server with an on-board KSZ8081 PHY - FreeRTOS

## Hardware Setup - SAM9X60-Curiosity

The target board for running the application is SAM9X60-Curiosity.

This section provides essential hardware configuration of this target board to run TCP/IP applications.

Figure 1-30.SAM9X60-Curiosity Development Board

Board Setup

To set up the hardware, refer to the section Board Setup in SAM9X60-Curiosity User's Guide.

- Connect the micro-USB cable from the computer to connector J1 (USB_A port) on the SAM9X60-Curiosity Development Board.
- Connect a USB-UART converter from the computer to J11 (UART DEBUG port) on the SAM9X60-Curiosity Development Board.
- Connect a debugger/programmer(like MPLAB® ICD) from the computer to the J12 (JTAG connector) on the SAM9X60-Curiosity Development Board.
- Establish a connection between the router/switch with the SAM9X60-Curiosity Development Board through the RJ45 connector.

## Setting up at91bootstrap loader

To load the application binary onto the target device, we need to use at91bootstrap loader.

Refer to the at91bootstrap loader documentation for details on how to configure and run/debug the application using MPLABX and booting application using an SD Card.

## Running the Application

1. Open a terminal application on the host computer (like Hyper-terminal or Tera Term).
2. Configure the terminal application for serial port connected to USB-UART converter.
3. Set baud rate as 115200 in the terminal application.
4. Build and download the application project on the target board.
5. Verify the TCP/IP Stack initialization console messages.

Console Start up

If DHCP client is enabled in the demonstration, wait for the DHCP server to assign an IP address for the development board.

This will be printed on the console. Otherwise, the default static IP address will be assigned to the board.

By entering the command netinfo, the response is obtained as shown above.

TCP Server Test

For TCP Server test, a TCP Client application is required to run on the host computer (SocketTest, PacketSender, etc).

In this demonstration, we use SocketTest utility.

- Send a TCP packet to the IP address of the hardware board, port 9760, from TCP Client application (SocketTest) running on the computer. See the following screenshot of test.
- The TCP Server running on the hardware board will echo back the message it receives. See the console screenshot of test below.