How To Configure Debian to Use The Tiny Programmer ISP Board

Posted by Craige McWhirter on
Last edited

So, you've gone and bought yourself a Tiny Programmer ISP, you've plugged into your Debian system, excitedly run avrdude only to be greeted with this:

% avrdude -c usbtiny -p m8


avrdude: error: usbtiny_transmit: error sending control message: Operation not permitted
avrdude: initialization failed, rc=-1
         Double check connections and try again, or use -F to override
         this check.


avrdude: error: usbtiny_transmit: error sending control message: Operation not permitted

avrdude done.  Thank you.

I resolved this permissions error by adding the following line to /etc/udev/rules.d/10-usbtinyisp.rules:

SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="1781", ATTR{idProduct}=="0c9f", GROUP="plugdev", MODE="0660"

Then restarting udev:

% sudo systemctl restart udev

Plugged the Tiny Programmer ISP back in the laptop and ran avrdude again:

% avrdude -c usbtiny -p m8

avrdude: AVR device initialized and ready to accept instructions

Reading | ################################################## | 100% 0.00s

avrdude: Device signature = 0x1e9587
avrdude: Expected signature for ATmega8 is 1E 93 07
         Double check chip, or use -F to override this check.

avrdude done.  Thank you.

You should now have avrdude love.

Enjoy :-)