zmk/docs/docs/dev-guide-usb-logging.md

id	title
dev-guide-usb-logging	USB Logging

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Overview

If you are developing ZMK on a device that does not have a built in UART for debugging and log/console output, Zephyr can be configured to create a USB CDC ACM device and the direct all printk, console output, and log messages to that device instead.

Kconfig

The following KConfig values need to be set, either by copy and pasting into the app/prj.conf file, or by running west build -t menuconfig and manually enabling the various settings in that UI.

# Turn on logging, and set ZMK logging to debug output
CONFIG_LOG=y
CONFIG_ZMK_LOG_LEVEL_DBG=y

# Turn on USB CDC ACM device
CONFIG_USB=y
CONFIG_USB_DEVICE_STACK=y
CONFIG_USB_CDC_ACM=y
CONFIG_USB_CDC_ACM_RINGBUF_SIZE=1024
CONFIG_USB_CDC_ACM_DEVICE_NAME="CDC_ACM"
CONFIG_USB_CDC_ACM_DEVICE_COUNT=1

# Enable serial console
CONFIG_SERIAL=y
CONFIG_CONSOLE=y
CONFIG_UART_INTERRUPT_DRIVEN=y
CONFIG_UART_LINE_CTRL=y

# Enable USB UART, and set the console device
CONFIG_UART_CONSOLE=y
CONFIG_USB_UART_CONSOLE=y
CONFIG_UART_CONSOLE_ON_DEV_NAME="CDC_ACM_0"
CONFIG_USB_UART_DTR_WAIT=n

Viewing Logs

After flashing the updated ZMK image, the board should expose a USB CDC ACM device that you can connect to and view the logs.

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On Linux, this should be a device like /dev/ttyACM0 and you can connect with minicom or tio as usual, e.g.:

sudo tio /dev/ttyACM0

On Windows, you can use the Arduino IDE which contains a built-in Serial Monitor. Download and install it from their website, then connect your board and under Tools select "Serial Monitor".

From there, you should see the various log messages from ZMK and Zephyr, depending on which systems you have set to what log levels.