Monitor and debug

The Monitor keeps serial output, debugger state, and instrument captures beside your code and chat. Start with the symptom, then choose the observation that can confirm or reject a cause. Follow Debugging and RCA for an investigation from reproduction through hardware/software diagnosis, correction, and regression checks.

Start an investigation

Open the project with source and firmware artifacts that match the target.
Run /debug when you need GDB, target-state inspection, or bounded instruction and coverage captures.
Run Embedder: Open Embedder Monitor.
Ask Embedder to check the connected devices and complete any required setup.
Describe the symptom and the state you need to preserve.

The device stopped logging when the radio started. Read the existing UART
history, then attach with GDB without programming or resetting the target.

Hardware scripts and ordinary instrument measurements can also run in Act mode.

Choose the evidence

Serial: boot output and device commands through UART, RTT, ITM, or xSCOPE.
CAN: bus frames and application signals.
Plots: live numeric signals and calculated channels.
GDB and registers: stack, memory, execution, and peripheral state.
Logic analyzer: digital edges and protocol decoding.
Power analyzer: current and energy during a workload.
Oscilloscope: analog waveforms and signal measurements.
Coverage and trace: executed paths and source coverage.
Bluetooth: BLE advertisements, services, and notifications.
Dashboard: a reusable view of related readings and controls.

Name the instrument, physical channels, duration, and expected result in a capture request.

Open your tool’s guide

Each integration has its own setup, usage, and troubleshooting page. Choose by the tool connected to your board or host:

Serial: UART, SEGGER RTT, ITM/SWO, and XMOS xSCOPE.
CAN adapters: SLCAN and mjbots fdcanusb.
Debuggers: SEGGER J-Link, OpenOCD, TI CCS and XDS, and XMOS xTAG and xgdb.
Logic and analog instruments: Saleae Logic, Digilent WaveForms, PicoScope, and Siglent.
Power instruments: Nordic PPK2 and Joulescope. Digilent’s supply and analog measurement features are on its own page.
Trace and simulation: SEGGER J-Trace and XMOS xsim. RTT, ITM, and xSCOPE guides also cover their event-recording prerequisites.
Wireless: Bluetooth Low Energy.
Programming and remote hardware: probe-rs, AURIX ADS and Flasher, flashing firmware, and remote bridges.

Check model-specific limits before choosing a capture or output function. Detection, catalog coverage, and support for a particular operation are separate checks.

Test one hypothesis

Check whether SDA rises too slowly. Capture SDA on scope channel 1 at the
current I2C speed, report the rise time, and compare it with the bus requirement.

Save the original capture before changing settings. After a fix, repeat the original condition and compare the result. Use a hardware script for a repeatable sequence or a combined workflow when several observations are needed.

Preserve the target

A normal GDB connection can program and reset the board. Bounded J-Trace instruction and coverage captures also reset and run it. When the existing fault or RAM state matters, review the attachment precautions before opening a new debugger connection.

State restrictions such as “do not reset,” “do not transmit on CAN,” or “keep the supply below 3.3 V.” Check /hardware-queue if another session is using the board. The terminal UI supports investigations and saved results, but the full Monitor is available in VS Code.

Get started

Core concepts

Complex workflows