This project shows how to make use of the timer interrupts on the MSP430 series microcontrollers to blink the two LEDs that can be found on the Launchpad. For the sake of making it compile over a wide number of devices, the ta0compat.h file is provided in order to map the Timer0 A0 functionality from the devices that have more than one timer to the defines present in single-timer devices.

The magic happens in the ISR at the bottom of main.c where the Uint8 global variable "twink" will toggle between 1 and 0, and in effect light up either LED1 or LED2.

The code in main() is responsible for setting up the timers and enable global interrupts so that the ISR occur when they hit the target value.

To compile this project you need a MSP430-based device and programmer. It is designed to be used with the Launchpad, but the binaries should be universal and can be programmed onto any compatible device with any programmer.

• mspdebug is needed to identify the device as well as program it
• msp430-gcc is needed to compile the project

The makefile is based on the mspdev skeleton makefile and thus prvides the following actions:

• all - Build all the source files, link the binary and then call on mspdebug to program the device. This is the default action, and thus just calling make will instantly deploy the project on the microcontroller, just like with the picdev makefile.

• bin - Build all the source files and link the binary in elf and hex format. No programming is done here.

• prog - Program the device with the binary.

• clean - Clean the build environment and remove all temporary files.

• listing - Generate assembly source listings from the .c files.

• identify - Identify the attached microcontroller using mspdebug.