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Software NEXT firmware

Zephyr RTOS

Last updated Jul 10, 2026

Zephyr is the alternative firmware path for HealthyPi 5. It is what drives the on-board display, and it’s the right base for a production port that needs an RTOS, a devicetree, and Zephyr’s driver ecosystem.

For everything else — including learning the board, running the production firmware, and writing your own signal processing — use the Arduino path, which is the default.

When to choose Zephyr

  • You have the display add-on. The Arduino NEXT firmware doesn’t drive the LCD in this release. See Display Add-On Module.
  • You want to fetch SD recordings over BLE from the OpenView 2 mobile app.
  • You’re building a product on an RTOS and want Zephyr’s scheduler, devicetree, power management, and driver model.

The workflow at a glance

  1. Install Zephyr and the Zephyr SDK.
  2. Fetch the HealthyPi 5 firmware workspace.
  3. Build the variant that matches your display panel.
  4. Flash by UF2 drag-and-drop, or via a Raspberry Pi Debug Probe.

1. Install Zephyr and the SDK

Follow the official Zephyr Getting Started guide — there’s no HealthyPi-specific deviation:

  1. Update your OS and install Zephyr’s host dependencies.
  2. Set up the Zephyr environment and Python dependencies.
  3. Install the Zephyr SDK — the toolchain bundle for each supported architecture.

2. Fetch the workspace

west init -m https://github.com/Protocentral/protocentral_healthypi5_zephyr --mr main hpi5-workspace
cd hpi5-workspace
west update

west update clones Zephyr itself and every module in the manifest. Expect a few gigabytes and 5–10 minutes the first time. Confirm it worked:

ls app

You should see main.c and a CMakeLists.txt.

3. Build

Pick the build that matches your display panel. Each script wraps a single west build.

./scripts/make_ili9488.sh     # ILI9488 — white display panel
./scripts/make_st7796.sh      # ST7796  — black display panel
./scripts/clean.sh            # clean build

Equivalent manual commands:

# ILI9488
west build -b healthypi5 app 
  -DEXTRA_CONF_FILE='overlay-display-ili9488.conf;overlay-logger-sd.conf' 
  -DEXTRA_DTC_OVERLAY_FILE='healthypi5_rp2040_display_ili9488.overlay'

# ST7796
west build -b healthypi5 app 
  -DEXTRA_CONF_FILE='overlay-display-st7796.conf;overlay-logger-sd.conf' 
  -DEXTRA_DTC_OVERLAY_FILE='healthypi5_rp2040_display_st7796.overlay'

For a headless board, ./scripts/make_nolvgl.sh builds without the LVGL UI and ./scripts/make_minimal.sh builds a minimal image.

The artefact lands at build/zephyr/zephyr.uf2.

One image per panel — not per feature

Earlier releases split the firmware into Basic, BLE, Display, and Logger builds. They’ve been merged. The only build-time choice left is which display driver to compile in.

4. Flash

Option A — drag and drop

Put the board into UF2 mode (hold the RP2040 boot button while powering on — full sequence on the Welcome page). Drop build/zephyr/zephyr.uf2 onto the RPI-RP2 drive.

Option B — Raspberry Pi Debug Probe (OpenOCD)

The proper development setup: flashes are atomic, serial logs appear in the same terminal, and you can attach a debugger.

Install OpenOCD. On macOS, brew install openocd. On Windows, download from gnutoolchains.com, copy the bin and share folders into C:Program FilesOpenOCD, and add C:Program FilesOpenOCDbin to your PATH.

Wire it up:

  1. UART jumper — Debug Probe UART port → the RP2040 UART connector on HealthyPi 5, just below the SpO₂ port.
  2. SWD jumper — Debug Probe Debug port → the RP2040 Debug connector, below the RP2040 port.
  3. Connect the Debug Probe to your host via USB-B.

Raspberry Pi Debug Probe wired to the HealthyPi 5 RP2040 UART and Debug ports

Flash:

west flash

This builds if needed, programs the firmware, resets the device, and starts streaming UART logs.

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