Use Rust#

By default, the generated project uses keyboard.toml to configure the RMK keyboard firmware. If you want to customize your firmware using Rust, there are several steps you need to follow to make the generated firmware project compile.

Update memory.x#

memory.x is the linker script of a Rust embedded project; it's used to define the memory layout of the microcontroller. RMK enables the memory-x feature for embassy-stm32, so if you're using STM32, you can just ignore this step.

For other ARM Cortex-M microcontrollers, you only need to update the LENGTH of FLASH and RAM for your microcontroller.

If you're using nRF52840, ensure that you have Adafruit_nRF52_Bootloader flashed to your board. Most nice!nano compatible boards have it already. As long as you can open a USB drive for your board and update the uf2 firmware by dragging and dropping, you're all set.

You can check either your microcontroller's datasheet or an existing Rust project for your microcontroller for the correct values.

Update main.rs#

The generated main.rs needs to be updated as well to use Rust code. You can copy the code from RMK's Rust example, such as https://github.com/HaoboGu/rmk/blob/main/examples/use_rust/rp2040/src/main.rs to src/main.rs to get started.

Next, check src/main.rs and make sure the bound USB interrupt is correct. Different microcontrollers have different USB peripherals, which means the interrupt bindings will also differ. Your best resource is to check Embassy's examples for your chip family to see how to bind the USB interrupt correctly.

For example, if you're using STM32F4, there is a USB serial example there. The code for binding the USB interrupt is at lines 15-17:

bind_interrupts!(struct Irqs {
    OTG_FS => usb::InterruptHandler<peripherals::USB_OTG_FS>;
});

Add your own layout#

The next step is to add your own keymap layout for your firmware. RMK supports the Vial app, an open-source cross-platform (Windows/macOS/Linux/web) keyboard configurator. The Vial-like keymap definition needs to be imported into the firmware project.

Fortunately, RMK does most of the heavy lifting for you. All you need to do is create your own keymap definition and convert it to vial.json following Vial's documentation here, and place it at the root of the firmware project, replacing the default one. RMK will handle all the rest for you.

Add your default keymap#

After adding the layout of your keyboard, the default keymap should also be updated. The default keymap is defined in src/keymap.rs. Update the keyboard matrix constants and add a get_default_keymap() function that returns the default keymap of your keyboard.

RMK provides a bunch of useful macros to help you define your keymap. Check out the keymap configuration chapter for more details. You can also check the src/keymap.rs files in the https://github.com/HaoboGu/rmk/blob/main/examples/use_rust examples for reference.

Some KeyActions are not supported by the macros; plain KeyActions also work, for example: KeyAction::TapHold(Action::Key(KeyCode::Kc1), Action::Key(KeyCode::Kc2))

Define your matrix#

Next, you're going to change the I/O pins of the keyboard matrix to make RMK run on your own PCB. Generally, I/O pins are defined in src/main.rs. RMK will generate a helper macro to help you define the matrix. For example, if you're using RP2040, you can define your pins using config_matrix_pins_rp!:

let (row_pins, col_pins) = config_matrix_pins_rp!(
    peripherals: p,
    input: [PIN_6, PIN_7, PIN_8, PIN_9],
    output: [PIN_19, PIN_20, PIN_21]
);

input and output are lists of used pins; change them accordingly.

If your keys are directly connected to the microcontroller pins, you can define your pins like this:

let direct_pins = config_matrix_pins_rp! {
        peripherals: p,
        direct_pins: [
            [PIN_0, PIN_1,  PIN_2],
            [PIN_3, _,  PIN_5],
        ]
    };

So far so good, you've done all necessary modifications of your firmware project. You can also check TODOs listed in the generated README.md file. Happy coding!