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remote_probe_access.md

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Remote probe access

PyOCD provides a server and client for sharing and accessing debug probes across a TCP/IP network connection. This can be used to provide shared debug access for multiple developers, to simplify CI configurations, or simply to enable multiple applications or tools to simultaneously access a probe.

Here are some example use cases for remote probe access.

  1. Debug a device that is in your office across a VPN connection from home.

  2. Access a device from across the room while using a laptop on your couch.

  3. While connected with pyOCD commander, upload new target firmware using the pyocd flash subcommand.

Server

The server side is quite simple. The pyocd server subcommand starts the server running for the specified probe.

The probe is selected via the usual connection-related command line arguments, such as --uid. Also as usual, a console menu will be printed to allow you to choose a probe to serve if multiple are available an a unique ID is not specified.

The probe server's default port number is 5555. You can change the port by passing the --port argument. The port the server uses will appear in the log when the server starts running.

By default, the server allows remote connections. That is, other devices on the network can connect to the server. If the server is connected to the wider Internet, then any node on the Internet can connect to the server, so take appropriate caution. You may want to ensure that your network's firewall blocks the port being used (default 5555). If you don't need remote access to the server, for example if you are only connecting from other processes running on the same computer as the server, then you can use the --local-only argument to restrict access to local connections (localhost).

Example command line to start the server and allow only localhost connections:

$ pyocd server --local-only

This command does not specify a unique ID for a probe, so it will show the console probe selection menu if there is more than one available.

Client

Access to remote probes is available from all pyOCD commands. When using a remote probe, the behaviour should be exactly as if the probe were being controlled directly. Of course, there may be additional latency depending on network performance. For localhost-served probes, the connection is nearly transparent.

The remote probe is selected by specifying a unique ID with a prefix of "remote:", followed by the server IP address or domain name. For instance, to connect to a probe being served on the same computer, pass --uid=remote:localhost on the command line.

Important: Currently you must always specify the target type for the remote device, even in cases where the target type is automatically detected when you use the probe directly. To do this, pass the --target argument followed by the target type. See Target support for more information about target types.

Note that remote probes will not appear in the list when you run pyocd list --probes.

Example command line for running the gdbserver locally for a probe on a remote machine:

$ pyocd gdbserver -uremote:myserver.example.com