If your board needs new firmware ...

Nothing could be easier than downloading new firmware into a board. Actually, many things could be easier. I thought only board parents would ever have to do this, so I didn't make it user-friendly at all.

1. Find a Linux machine on which you can be root; be root.
2. Place the following line in your /etc/fstab file:

   none /proc/bus/usb usbfs devmode=0660,devgid=600 0 0

   but change devgid=600 to your group ID.
3. Say mount /proc/bus/usb/; if mount complains (which is unlikely on modern systems) you will have to go to step 4 and rebuild your kernel; otherwise, go to step 5.
4. If you need to recompile your kernel because you determined in step 3 that your kernel does not have usbfs support, make sure you have a recent 2.4-series kernel (2.4.26 works on our SURFing machine at LBL); then look for the section of the .config file that contains the CONFIG_USB flags and add the flag CONFIG_USB_DEVICEFS=y; recompile your kernel and repeat step 3.
5. Build and load the EZ-USB firmware download module from http://ezusb2131.sourceforge.net.
6. Remove the jumper on the i2c SDA line (J4) on the SURF board to prevent the EZ-USB from loading the current EEPROM contents.
7. Powercycle the SURF board. Note the power should be on at the end of this step.
8. Replace the SDA jumper; place a jumper on the EEPROM WP line (JP2) to disable EEPROM write protection.
9. In the jboard/firm directory type cat i2c_firm.ihx > /proc/ezusb/dev0; at this point the DEBUG LED on the SURF board should be flashing.
10. Get libusb from http://libusb.sourceforge.net, release 0.1.8 or later.
11. Get the Perl interface to libusb from http://www.linuxhelp.com.au/people/anthony/perl-libusb/.
12. Either follow the instructions in steps 13 through 14 (to build your own firmware) or skip to step 15 (if someone built the firmware for you).
13. Get the Small Device C Compiler (http://sdcc.sourceforge.net/), release 2.4 or later.
14. In the jboard/firm directory say make SN=board serial number; this will produce a file called firm.ee. You can ignore compiler complaints about missing 8051.h. Remember that the board serial number needs to be in the format yyyymmxxxnnn (year, month, birthplace, three-digit number).
15. In the same directory type ./eeprom.pl -d /proc/bus/usb/xxx/yyy -w -i firm.ee; xxx is the bus on which the board is attached (001, 002), and yyy is the device number. When a device is attached to the USB, it is given a device number between 1 and 127; to figure out the device number of the 8051 on the SURF board, plug the board in and check which device in /proc/bus/usb/xxx/ is the most recent. Note that the number will change every time you power cycle the SURF board (same effect as unplugging the cable).
16. Remove the WP jumper and powercycle the SURF board; then check with surf_print_boards() from an AMBUSH that the board has the intended serial number and firmware revision.