LED blinking with STM32 Black Pill and STM Cube IDE

In this tutorial we are going to blink an external LED with STM32 black pill and STM Cube IDE using HAL programming.

The STM32 BlackPill is a well-known development board that features an STM32 microcontroller from STMicroelectronics. It provides an affordable and flexible platform for embedded systems development, with various peripherals and GPIO pins for interfacing with external components.

Introduction: LED blinking is a common exercise in embedded systems development, often referred to as the "Hello, World!" program. It is a fundamental task for beginners to grasp the basics of microcontroller programming. This article will explore the process of LED blinking on the STM32 BlackPill development board using CubeIDE, an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) offered by STMicroelectronics.

Getting Started with CubeIDE: CubeIDE is an Eclipse-based IDE created by STMicroelectronics specifically for STM32 microcontrollers. It offers a comprehensive set of tools for code development, debugging, and project management.

To begin, download and install CubeIDE from the official STMicroelectronics website. Once installed, open CubeIDE and create a new STM32 project targeting the STM32 microcontroller on the BlackPill board.

Hardware Required:

STM32 black pill board with in-built LED

USB –Type C cable

LED

Bread-board

Configuring GPIO: LED blinking requires changing the state of a GPIO pin connected to an LED. Configuring GPIO pins in CubeIDE is simple:

1. Access the Pinout & Configuration tab.

2. Choose the GPIO pin linked to the onboard LED (typically PC13).

3. Set the Pin Mode to Output push-pull.

4. Save the changes.

Writing the Blinking Code: CubeIDE provides a basic project structure with essential startup code and configuration files.

Now, let's write the code to alternate the LED state at regular intervals: {

HAL_GPIO_WritePin(GPIOC, GPIO_PIN_13, 0);

HAL_Delay(1000);

HAL_GPIO_WritePin(GPIOC, GPIO_PIN_13, 1);

HAL_Delay(500);

This code initializes the GPIO pin connected to the LED as an output and alternates its state in a continuous loop with a delay of 500 milliseconds between each change.

Building and Flashing the Project: Once the code is written, build the project in CubeIDE. This process compiles the code and generates a binary file that can be flashed onto the STM32 BlackPill board.