An issue has been identified for users of the 11.1 Qsys tool, when generating flash files for the application selector reference design. The n2c3.sh script file supplied with the board generates software flash files that are incompatible with the ready-to-run application on the Nios® II NEEK and Cyclone® III Development boards. The symptom of the issue is that the hardware portion of the FPGA design will successfully load, however the software (elf) image will fail with the following error:
"Error loading Application <application name>"
The issue stems from the inclusion of an S7 record by the nios2-elf tools at the end of the software flash file generated by the n2c3.sh script. The S7 record indicates the starting address for the elf program, however this information is not correctly read or used by the ready-to-run application selector.
To resolve this issue, modify the _sw.flash file as follows:
- Open the file in a text editor, and locate the last line of the file
- If the last line starts with the characters "S7", remove all text in that line
- Ensure that the carriage return is not deleted, and the last line of the file is blank
This issue is not planned to be fixed in a later version of the tool.