8 Basics of JTAG and ICSP
The JTAG interface is a very low-level way of communicating with a microcontroller, either for debugging or for initial programming at the device factory.
JTAG consists of four mandatory signals: TDI, TDO, TCK, and TMS. TDI and TDO (Test Data In/Out) ferry data in and out of a chip, while TCK provides a clock for that data and TMS (Test Mode Select) directs the state of a chip. An optional fifth signal, TRST, can reset the testing logic.
There are also some reduced-pin variants of JTAG, such as single wire debug (SWD) for ARM and spy-bi-wire for MSP430. These are convenient in that they require fewer pins, and are sometimes easier to implement than the 4-wire variants of the protocols.
I won’t yet dig into the intricate ...
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