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7470/7471/7477/7478 GROUP USER’S MANUAL

2-54

APPLICATION

2.9 Countermeasures against noise

7470

7471

7477

7478

2.9.6 Providing of watchdog timer function by software

If a microcomputer runs away because of noise or others, it can be detected by a software watchdog timer

and the microcomputer can be reset to normal operation. This is equal to or more effective than program

runaway detection by a hardware watchdog timer. The following shows an example of a watchdog timer

provided by software.

In the following example, to reset a microcomputer to normal operation, the main routine detects errors

of the interrupt processing routine and the interrupt processing routine detects errors of the main routine.

This example assumes that interrupt processing is repeated multiple times in a single main routine

processing.

q Assigns a single byte of RAM to a software watchdog timer (SWDT) and writes the initial value

N in the SWDT once at each execution of the main routine. The initial value N should satisfy the

following condition:

N + 1

Q (Counts of interrupt processing executed in each main routine)

As the main routine execution cycle may change because of an interrupt processing or others, the

initial value N should have a margin.

q Watches the operation of the interrupt processing routine by comparing the SWDT contents with

counts of interrupt processing count after the initial value N has been set.

q Detects that the interrupt processing routine has failed and determines to branch to the program

initialization routine for recovery processing in the following cases:

If the SWDT contents do not change after interrupt processing.

q Decrements the SWDT contents by 1 at each interrupt processing.

q Determins that the main routine operates normally when the SWDT contents are reset to the initial

value N at almost fixed periods (at the fixed interrupt processing count).

q Detects that the main routine has failed and determines to branch to the program initialization

routine for recovery processing in the following case:

When the contents of the SWDT reach 0 or less by continuative decrement without initializing to

the initial value N.

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7477 Datasheet(PDF) 289 Page - Renesas Technology Corp