1.11 TCP/IP WEB NET Server NVM MPFS

Description

The TCP/IP WEB NET Server NVM 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 WEB NET Server NVM

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

wolfSSL component is added for secure connection which supports TLS.

wolfCrypt module enabled with MD5 and SHA authentication

FILE SYSTEM is added to select Memory module with Microchip file system (MPFS).

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

NOTE - The above diagram contains FreeRTOS component and that is required for RTOS application. For bare-metal(non-RTOS) FreeRTOS component shouldn't be selected.

TCP/IP Configuration - TCP/IP WEB NET Server NVM

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

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

• Application Layer Modules
  • HTTPNET SERVER enables the target board to act as a Web Server.
  • DHCP Client to discover the IPv4 address from the nearest DHCP Server.
  • DNS Client provides DNS resolution capabilities to the stack.
  • ANNOUNCE to discover the Microchip devices within a local network.
  • NBNS, NetBIOS Name Service protocol associates host names with IP addresses. This assign of human-name host names to access boards on the same subnet.
  • SMTP CLIENT let applications send e-mails to any recipient worldwide.
  • SNTP, Simple Network Time Protocol updates its internal time periodically using a pool of public global time servers.

Downloading and Building the application

To clone or download this application from Github, go to the repository and search for this device 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\web_net_server_nvm_mpfs\firmware .

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

Hardware Setup

The target board for running the application is PIC32CX SG41 Curiosity Ultra.

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

Board Setup

To set up the hardware, refer to the section Board Setup in PIC32CX SG41 Curiosity Ultra User Guide.

• Connect the micro USB cable from the computer to the DEBUG USB connector on the PIC32CX SG41 Curiosity Ultra Evaluation Board.
• Establish a connection between the router/switch with the PIC32CX SG41 Curiosity Ultra Evaluation Board through the RJ45 connector.

Running the Application

The HTTPNET server module uses Microchip Proprietary File System (MPFS) to read web pages from the Non-Volatile Memory (NVM). The Non-Volatile Memory (NVM) is one of the memory media is used to store the web server pages.

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 debug port of the board.
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.

GMAC - 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.

Web Server Test

• Open a web browser (like Google Chrome, etc).
• Type the board URL in the address bar of web browser (for example, https://mchpboard_c).
• The web browser display following web page
  

Application features are:

• Dynamic Variables and Real-time Hardware Control - Pressing Switches on target board toggles buttons on web page. Similarly, Clicking on LED symbol in web page can toggle LEDs on target board.
• Form Processing - Input can be handled from the client by the GET and POST methods.
• Authentication - Shows an example of the commonly used restricted access feature.
• Cookies - Shows an example of storing small text strings on the client side.
• Server Side Includes - An example of how SSI can be used to support dynamic content.
• File Uploads - Shows an example of a file upload using the POST method. The HTTP server can accepta user-defined MPFS/MPFS2 image file for web pages.
• Send E-mail - Shows simple SMTP POST methods
• Dynamic DNS - Exercises Dynamic DNS capabilities
• Network Configuration - The MAC address, host name, and IP address of the evaluation kit can be viewed in the Network Configuration page and some configurations can be updated
• MPFS Upload - A new set of web pages can be uploaded to the web server using this feature, which is accessed through http://mchpboard_c/mpfsupload