The nRF5 SDK documentation includes descriptions and other reference material to help you understand the various components of the SDK. Examples are provided for development purposes only and should always be tested with your design.
See Getting Started for instructions on how to run the provided examples. If you are migrating from SDK v13.0.0, see the Migration guide.
This version of the SDK supports the following SoftDevices:
To download a copy of the SDK documentation for offline use, go to developer.nordicsemi.com.
SDK Release Notes:
nRF5 SDK v14.0.0
------------------------
Release Date: Week 31, 2017
Highlights:
- Added nRF52810 peripheral driver support.
- Added support for the latest SoftDevice (S132 v5.0.0).
- Added a new BLE example, Object Transfer Service, that shows how to set up and use the L2CAP Connection Oriented Channels feature of S132 v5.0.0.
- Updated Direct Test Mode (DTM) to support the new features of Bluetooth 5.
- Added a new NFC example: ISO-DEP raw mode.
- Buttonless DFU feature is now in production quality.
- Added USB CDC as a transport layer for DFU (Experimental, only nRF52840).
- Added a library and examples that show how to integrate and use the Infineon OPTIGA Trust E hardware security module.
- Refactored the logging system (nrf_log) to support multiple independent backends and dynamic logs filtering.
- Refactored the console (nrf_cli). The console can now act as one of the logger backends. Bluetooth UART is now a supported transport (using the ble_nus service).
The following toolchains/devices have been used for testing and
verification:
- ARM: MDK-ARM version 5.18a
- GCC: GCC ARM Embedded 4.9 2015q3
- IAR: IAR Workbench 7.80.4
Supported SoftDevices:
- S132 v5.0.x
- S140 v5.0.0-2.alpha
- S212 v4.0.x
Supported boards:
- PCA10040
- PCA10056 (limited support; see the "Scope for the nRF52840 chip" section)
- Dynastream's D52DK1 (only for ANT examples)
For other devices and boards, see the SDK documentation, section "Using
the SDK with other boards".
*** Scope for the nRF52840 chip
********************************
All examples and libraries for the new chip must be treated as
experimental.
Some examples have not been ported to run on nRF52840. Check the
existing example projects to see which targets are supported.
The following SDK features are supported on the new nRF52840 chip:
- IEEE 802.15.4 stack library with an example
- Most BLE, hardware peripheral, and NFC examples (with some
exceptions; see the available example projects for details)
- Peripheral HAL and drivers (both for existing and new peripherals)
- Cryptography library including CryptoCell CC310 backend
- NFC Type 2 Tag and Type 4 Tag
- Secure DFU (only with micro-ecc backend)
- DTM including support for the new Bluetooth 5 features
The following SDK features are not supported on the new nRF52840 chip:
- ANT
- ESB and Gazell
- FreeRTOS
- Eddystone
- Serialization of the S140 SoftDevice v5.0.0-2.alpha
*** New features
*****************
** Common **
- SoftDevice Handler:
- Can now register 'state event observers' that are notified when the SoftDevice state changes.
- Can now register 'request event observers' that are notified when a change of the SoftDevice state is requested.
- Console:
- Advanced cooperation with the Logger module (nrf_log). Console can work as a logger backend.
- Added support for static and dynamic subcommands.
- Easy-to-use macros for creating commands and subcommands.
- Added a smart auto-completion feature for commands and subcommands.
- Added a convenient help handler.
- Added support for multiline commands.
- Added support for text edition using the following keys: Left, Right, End, Home, and Insert.
- Implemented transport layers include: Bluetooth, USB CDC ACM, UART, RTT.
** BLE **
- Added support the for the latest SoftDevice (S132 v5.0.0).
- Object Transfer Service added as experimental. The Object Transfer service uses L2CAP Connection Oriented Channels to transfer data between devices.
- Client implementation added to components\ble\ble_services.
- Server implementation added to components\ble\ble_services.
- Central client example application added to examples\ble_central\experimental\ble_ots_c.
- Peripheral server example application added to examples\ble_peripheral\experimental\ble_app_ots.
- GATT Service client added as experimental. The GATT Service client is used to receive Service Changed indications from the connected peer.
- Services featured in the Proximity example are now also accessible as stand-alone service examples.
- Immediate Alert Service client example application added as experimental.
- Immediate Alert Service server example application added as experimental.
- Link Loss Service server example application added as experimental.
- Added BLE transport Command Line Interface. An example "ble_app_cli" can be found in the 'experimental' folder.
** NFC **
- Added a new example showing how to use the NFC Type 4 Tag library in raw ISO-DEP mode: NFC UART Example.
- Added a new pairing mode in the NFC BLE pairing library that supports OOB pairing in both "Secure Connections" and "Legacy" modes.
- Added flash support in the Writable NDEF Message Example - after the NDEF update operation, the new tag content is stored in flash.
** DFU **
- Added production quality buttonless bootloader with support for bond sharing.
- Added configurable inactivity timeout timer that automatically resets the device in case no new commands are received before the timeout triggers. Default value is 120 seconds.
- Added support for USB CDC as a new transport layer for DFU (Experimental, only for nRF52840).
** DTM **
- Added support for new Bluetooth 5 features LE 2M and LE Coded PHY.
- Added support for nRF52840 devices.
** Drivers and libraries **
- Added a new example that demonstrates strong cryptographic authentication using the Infineon OPTIGA Trust E hardware security module.
This example uses the following two new libraries located in the 'external' folder:
- Infineon OPTIGA Trust E command library that provides a high-level API to access cryptographic and security-related functions.
- Infineon I2C Protocol Stack library that enables communication with Infineon OPTIGA Trust E and is placed on top of the TWI transaction manager (app_twi).
- Added Stack guard module that allows for enabling stack violation control.
- Added Task Manager module, a simple co-operative scheduler.
- Added fprintf module that can be used for writing C strings.
- Added Ring Buffer module that provides functions to manage a ring buffer.
- Added Memory Object module that allows for creating and managing memory object pools.
*** Changes
************
** Common **
- All examples are modified to use the new SoftDevice Handler (nrf_sdh).
** BLE **
- BLE Connection Parameter module supports multiple peripheral links.
- BLE ATT MTU example uses nrf_cli for the user interface.
** NFC **
- Improved the Type 4 Tag library interoperability (added support for fragmented command APDUs and fixed DID field handling).
- NDEF record and message definition macros are defined as automatic data (used to be static).
** DFU **
- Serial DFU has been updated to be production quality.
** Proprietary **
- ESB: Added workarounds for several anomalies that were impacting performance for certain addresses.
- ESB: Added functionality to update certain radio parameters while ESB is running:
- uint32_t nrf_esb_set_retransmit_delay(uint16_t delay);
- uint32_t nrf_esb_set_retransmit_count(uint16_t count);
- uint32_t nrf_esb_set_bitrate(nrf_esb_bitrate_t bitrate);
- uint32_t nrf_esb_reuse_pid(uint8_t pipe);
- Gazell: Released in production quality, added workarounds for RADIO anomalies.
** Serialization **
- Added S132 v5.0.0 support. Removed support for S140 5.0.0-2.alpha.
** Drivers and libraries **
- Reworked and improved the fstorage library (now called nrf_fstorage).
- Now supports operation with no SoftDevice.
- Now supports operation when the SoftDevice is present and its state changes.
- Refactored nrf_log to support multiple backends. Each backend has independent, dynamic filtering of logs.
- Refactored nrf_cli to act as the logger backend. Improved user interface with smart auto-completion and easy commands addition.
- Updated drivers to work with the nRF52810 device.
- Updated Flash data storage (FDS).
- Can now work with no SoftDevice by using the nrf_fstorage_nvmc backend.
- The 'Chunk' functionality has been removed.
*** Bugfixes
****************
** BLE **
- Fixed a bug where the multiperipheral example would not be able to connect to more than one link.
** NFC **
- Implemented several fixes in Type 2 and Type 4 libraries (fixed nfc_t4t_parameter_set function, removed nRF52 startup code and FPU support from library compilation).
** Drivers and libraries **
- Fixed potential overflow in the watchdog timer (WDT) driver initialization.
- Fixed wrong header guard in nrf_nvic.h (https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/question/121041/incorrect-header-guard-in-nrf_nvich/).
- Fixed a bug where nrf_drv_spi_uninit did not clear an event (https://devzone.nordicsemi.com/question/116308/spi-init-triggers-old-nrf_spim_event_end).
- Implemented a fix for nrf_drv_spi - no pulldown on MISO line.
*** Known Issues
****************
** Overall **
- In the UART peripheral example, only a line feed (LF) is output on startup and when resetting the board.
- Serialized Direct Test Mode does not report RX packet count correctly.
** BLE **
- It is possible that the Peer Manager may return corrupt data when attempting to read the GATT attributes table under some circumstances when FDS CRC checks are enabled.
- In the Multiperipheral Example, LED 3 will toggle when writing any non-zero value to it. Also, two notifications instead of one are received on the Button Characteristic (0x1524) when pressing Button 1.
- For all serialized applications, the MTU size (NRF_SDH_BLE_GATT_MAX_MTU_SIZE in sdk_config.h) should be kept at the default level. Changing this value makes the application non-functional as the connectivity application uses static size buffers.
- Eddystone Beacon Application - LED indication might differ from what is described in documentation under the Testing section.
** ANT **
- Most ANT examples do not have the nrf_log backend in the project files, so enabling logging does not have any effect.
** NFC **
- NFC Type 2 and Type 4 Tag HAL modules require using TIMER4 on nRF52832.
- Some mobile phone apps cannot write Type 4 Tag (the "NFC Tools" app seems to
be okay to use).
- BLE peripheral examples with NFC pairing work as expected only with Android 7.1.2.
** DFU **
- Downgrading from nRF5 SDK v14.0.0 to nRF5 SDK v13.0.0 has been observed to cause the v13.0.0 bootloader to corrupt itself (Upgrading works as expected).
- The S140 SoftDevice currently does not support updating of the bootloader.
- The CTX pin (P0.07) should be grounded to run the Serial Secure DFU on both nRF52832 and nRF52840 boards.
- BLE/Serial Secure DFU only supports nrfutil 2.3.0.
- For nRF52840, a combined SoftDevice and application update on Serial transport fails when using nrfutil 2.3.0. Running a single SoftDevice and application update sequentially works as expected.
** USB **
- USB driver Anomaly 104 solution is very unstable in IAR compilation with high optimization level.