WWDG internal peripheral

Applicable for

STM32MP15x lines, STM32MP21x lines, STM32MP23x lines, STM32MP25x lines

---

1. Article purpose

The purpose of this article is to:

• briefly introduce the WWDG peripheral and its main features,
• indicate the peripheral instances assignment at boot time and their assignment at runtime (including whether instances can be allocated to secure contexts),
• list the software frameworks and drivers managing the peripheral,
• explain how to configure the peripheral.

2. Peripheral overview

The WWDG peripheral is a watchdog unit that can be used to protect the Cortex^®-M based coprocessor firmware from endless loops or to monitor some real-time activities. This peripheral is clocked by the bus on which it is connected, thus it is frozen as soon as the system goes to Stop or Standby low power mode (except if the Stop emulation mode is enabled via DBGSTOP bit in DBGMCU_CR register). This block has an early interrupt feature that allows to get an interrupt (on GIC or NVIC) one cycle before reaching the final reset: this can allow to trigger a recovery mechanism on Cortex^®-M or on Cortex^®-A.
On WWDG expiration, a MCU reset is generated, reseting Cortex^®-M sub-system and the WWDG itself. This MCU reset also generates an interrupt on GIC thanks to EXTI. This allows Cortex^®-A to detect Cortex^®-M crashed and to recover it by stopping associated services, reloading Cortex^®-M firmware and restarting Cortex^®-M.

Refer to the STM32 MPU reference manuals for the complete list of features, and to the software frameworks and drivers, introduced below, to see which features are implemented.

3. Peripheral usage

This chapter is applicable in the scope of the OpenSTLinux BSP running on the Arm^® Cortex^®-A processor(s), and the STM32CubeMPU Package running on the Arm^® Cortex^®-M processor.

3.1. Boot time assignment

3.1.1. On STM32MP21x lines 

Click on to expand or collapse the legend...

Check boxes illustrate the possible peripheral allocations supported by OpenSTLinux BSP:

• ⬚ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given boot time context, but this configuration is not supported in OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ☐ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given boot time context.
• ☑ means that the peripheral is assigned by default to the given boot time context and that the peripheral is mandatory for the OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ✓ is used for system peripherals that cannot be unchecked because they are hardware connected in the device.

The present chapter describes STMicroelectronics recommendations or choice of implementation. Additional possibilities might be described in STM32 MPU reference manuals.

Domain	Peripheral	Boot time allocation				Comment
		Instance	Cortex-A35 secure (ROM code)	Cortex-A35 secure (TF-A BL2)	Cortex-A35 nonsecure (U-Boot)
Core/Watchdog	WWDG	WWDG1

3.1.2. On STM32MP23x lines 

Click on to expand or collapse the legend...

Check boxes illustrate the possible peripheral allocations supported by OpenSTLinux BSP:

• ⬚ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given boot time context, but this configuration is not supported in OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ☐ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given boot time context.
• ☑ means that the peripheral is assigned by default to the given boot time context and that the peripheral is mandatory for the OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ✓ is used for system peripherals that cannot be unchecked because they are hardware connected in the device.

The present chapter describes STMicroelectronics recommendations or choice of implementation. Additional possibilities might be described in STM32 MPU reference manuals.

Domain	Peripheral	Boot time allocation				Comment
		Instance	Cortex-A35 secure (ROM code)	Cortex-A35 secure (TF-A BL2)	Cortex-A35 nonsecure (U-Boot)
Core/Watchdog	WWDG	WWDG1

3.1.3. On STM32MP25x lines 

Click on to expand or collapse the legend...

Check boxes illustrate the possible peripheral allocations supported by OpenSTLinux BSP:

• ⬚ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given boot time context, but this configuration is not supported in OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ☐ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given boot time context.
• ☑ means that the peripheral is assigned by default to the given boot time context and that the peripheral is mandatory for the OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ✓ is used for system peripherals that cannot be unchecked because they are hardware connected in the device.

The present chapter describes STMicroelectronics recommendations or choice of implementation. Additional possibilities might be described in STM32 MPU reference manuals.

Domain	Peripheral	Boot time allocation				Comment
		Instance	Cortex-A35 secure (ROM code)	Cortex-A35 secure (TF-A BL2)	Cortex-A35 nonsecure (U-Boot)
Core/Watchdog	WWDG	WWDG1
		WWDG2

3.2. Runtime assignment

3.2.1. On STM32MP15x lines 

Click on to expand or collapse the legend...

STM32MP15 internal peripherals

Check boxes illustrate the possible peripheral allocations supported by STM32 MPU Embedded Software:

• ⬚ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given runtime context, but this configuration is not supported in STM32 MPU Embedded Software distribution.
• ☐ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given runtime context.
• ☑ means that the peripheral is assigned by default to the given runtime context and that the peripheral is mandatory for the STM32 MPU Embedded Software distribution.
• ✓ is used for system peripherals that cannot be unchecked because they are hardware connected in the device.

Refer to How to assign an internal peripheral to an execution context for more information on how to assign peripherals manually or via STM32CubeMX.
The present chapter describes STMicroelectronics recommendations or choice of implementation. Additional possiblities might be described in STM32MP15 reference manuals.

Domain	Peripheral	Runtime allocation				Comment
		Instance	Cortex-A7 secure (OP-TEE)	Cortex-A7 non-secure (Linux)	Cortex-M4 (STM32Cube)
Core/Watchdog	WWDG	WWDG			☐

3.2.2. On STM32MP21x lines 

Click on to expand or collapse the legend...

STM32MP21 internal peripherals

Check boxes illustrate the possible peripheral allocations supported by OpenSTLinux BSP:

• ⬚ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given runtime context, but this configuration is not supported in OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ☐ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given runtime context.
• ☑ means that the peripheral is assigned by default to the given runtime context and that the peripheral is mandatory for the OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ✓ is used for system peripherals that cannot be unchecked because they are hardware connected in the device.

Refer to How to assign an internal peripheral to an execution context for more information on how to assign peripherals manually or via STM32CubeMX.
The present chapter describes STMicroelectronics recommendations or choice of implementation. Additional possibilities might be described in STM32MP21 reference manuals.

Domain	Peripheral	Runtime allocation					Comment
		Instance	Cortex-A35 secure (OP-TEE / TF-A BL31)	Cortex-A35 nonsecure (Linux)	Cortex-M33 secure (TF-M)	Cortex-M33 nonsecure (STM32Cube)
Core/Watchdog	WWDG	WWDG1			⬚

3.2.3. On STM32MP23x lines 

Click on to expand or collapse the legend...

STM32MP23 internal peripherals

Check boxes illustrate the possible peripheral allocations supported by OpenSTLinux BSP:

• ⬚ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given runtime context, but this configuration is not supported in OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ☐ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given runtime context.
• ☑ means that the peripheral is assigned by default to the given runtime context and that the peripheral is mandatory for the OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ✓ is used for system peripherals that cannot be unchecked because they are hardware connected in the device.

Refer to How to assign an internal peripheral to an execution context for more information on how to assign peripherals manually or via STM32CubeMX.
The present chapter describes STMicroelectronics recommendations or choice of implementation. Additional possibilities might be described in STM32MP23 reference manuals.

Domain	Peripheral	Runtime allocation					Comment
		Instance	Cortex-A35 secure (OP-TEE / TF-A BL31)	Cortex-A35 nonsecure (Linux)	Cortex-M33 secure (TF-M)	Cortex-M33 nonsecure (STM32Cube)
Core/Watchdog	WWDG	WWDG1			⬚	☐

3.2.4. On STM32MP25x lines 

Click on to expand or collapse the legend...

STM32MP25 internal peripherals

Check boxes illustrate the possible peripheral allocations supported by OpenSTLinux BSP:

• ⬚ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given runtime context, but this configuration is not supported in OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ☐ means that the peripheral can be assigned to the given runtime context.
• ☑ means that the peripheral is assigned by default to the given runtime context and that the peripheral is mandatory for the OpenSTLinux BSP.
• ✓ is used for system peripherals that cannot be unchecked because they are hardware connected in the device.

Refer to How to assign an internal peripheral to an execution context for more information on how to assign peripherals manually or via STM32CubeMX.
The present chapter describes STMicroelectronics recommendations or choice of implementation. Additional possibilities might be described in STM32MP25 reference manuals.

Domain	Peripheral	Runtime allocation						Comment
		Instance	Cortex-A35 secure (OP-TEE / TF-A BL31)	Cortex-A35 nonsecure (Linux)	Cortex-M33 secure (TF-M)	Cortex-M33 nonsecure (STM32Cube)	Cortex-M0+ (STM32Cube)
Core/Watchdog	WWDG	WWDG1			⬚	☐
		WWDG2					☐

4. Software frameworks and drivers

Below are listed the software frameworks and drivers managing the WWDG peripheral for the embedded software components listed in the above tables.

As there is only one WWDG counter cycle between the WWDG early interrupt and the WWDG reset generation, ST preconizes to allocate the WWDG early interrupt to Cortex^®-M for a better reactivity and not to Cortex^®-A.

• STM32Cube: WWDG HAL driver and header file of WWDG HAL module

5. How to assign and configure the peripheral

The peripheral assignment can be done via the STM32CubeMX graphical tool (and manually completed if needed).
This tool also helps to configure the peripheral:

• partial device trees (pin control and clock tree) generation for the OpenSTLinux software components,
• HAL initialization code generation for the STM32CubeMPU Package.

The configuration is applied by the firmware running in the context in which the peripheral is assigned.

Cortex^®

Microcontroller unit (MCUs have internal flash memory and are intended to operate with a minimum amount of external support ICs. They commonly are a self-contained, system-on-chip (SoC) designs.)

Board support package

Arm^® is a registered trademark of Arm Limited (or its subsidiaries) in the US and/or elsewhere.

Read only memory

Trusted firmware for Arm^® Cortex^®-A

Boot loader stage 2

Das U-Boot -- the universal boot loader (see U-Boot)

Open portable trusted execution environment

Linux^® is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds.

Hardware abstraction layer