Importing hardware specific libraries into KEIL STUDIO CLOUD

Using the ONLINE MBED compiler, it is relatively easy to add hardware libraries to projects. For example, in our courses we use a lot of GROVE devices like the BACKLIT LCD. Using the MBED COMPILERS, you simply search for the library, and add it to your project.
There is no way I am aware of to do this using JUST Keil Studio Cloud. The work around I have is to create a SKELETON program that has an empty main(), but has all the required libraries in it using the MBED ONLINE COMPILER. Then I import this into Keil Studio Cloud.
However, if I wish to use other Grove devices (or devices from another vendor), when I no longer have access to the MBED COMPILER, then I have no way of adding to the SKELETON program.
I have 500 students a year in my MBED course at Seneca College, so please address this issue before denying access to the MBED ONLINE COMPILER.

David Elmo Ross
Professor, School of Electronics and Mechanical Engineering Technology
Seneca College of Applied Arts and Technology
1750 Finch Ave East, North York (Toronto)
Ontario Canada, M2J2X5

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Hello,

It is possible to manage Mbed libraries from Keil Studio Cloud.

Have you read the following:
https://developer.arm.com/documentation/102497/1-5/Work-with-Mbed-projects/Manage-an-Mbed-project-and-its-libraries/Mbed-OS-5-or-6-project/Import-an-Mbed-library

You can also watch this short video aimed at Mbed developers who use Keil Studio (check at 2:36 minutes):

Please let us know if you have more questions.

Thank you.

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Hi David. Here’s a very quick video (no audio) showing the Mbed library interface and the import of a Grove LCD library.

Let us know how you get on.

Thank you for your incredibly fast and helpful response.

However, there is one issue that seems to be ongoing.

During Lab tests students sometimes have to wait for 10 minutes or more for a program to
compile using Keil Studio Cloud.

I have 500 students a year that are now using Keil Studio Cloud. Is there something that can be done
to increase throughput. Long compile times for simple projects should not happen. And in view of
switching to Keil Studio, you should really address this issue to make KSC the useful tool it is
meant to be.

Dave Ross

Keil Studio Cloud uses the same build system as the Online Compiler (exactly the same web service) - do you see the same behaviour in the Online Compiler?

The slowness still has to be addressed regardless.

Dave Ross

Hi Will,

I started to watch the video, and it worked but had to leave for a class. Tried watching it again later but it would not
run. When I pushed the play button, it would not start.

Dave Ross

Hmm. Strange :smile:

You could try the direct link: Mbed library import

https://streamable.com/hem2i5

Thanks Will,

As always, thank you for your incredibly fast response, it is greatly appreciated.

There does seem to be an issue with the speed of online compilation using KEIL.
During a test, it took some students over 10 minutes to compile a very simple project.
They had a couple of projects to modify and compile during this test. Some students
had their projects compile in a minute or so, but several had over 10 minute compile time.

Will the compile times be an issue as more and more people access KEIL STUDIO CLOUD?

Dave Ross

@David_Ross could you share the project you tested the compilation time with? We’ll take a look from our side and see if there’s any obvious reason why it would take longer than expected to compile.

Hi Will,

The compile times seems to vary from student station to student station. However, here are a couple of programs that you can try:

https://github.com/DavidElmoRoss/lab5b
https://github.com/DavidElmoRoss/Lab5C
https://github.com/DavidElmoRoss/KS_lab3b_pushbutton

Dave Ross

Thanks for sharing these.

I just tested each of them and got reasonably good results: < 1 minute for a clean build and < 10 seconds for subsequent builds. This was on a relatively slow internet connection (4G hotspot).

The slow builds are probably the result of load on the system - lots of students requesting builds at around the same time. I’ve added something to our backlog to look at scalability but I can’t give any firm delivery date for this.

Thank you for your incredibly fast response , it is greatly appreciated.

Dave Ross

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