If you’re building firmware on Nordic hardware, we’ve been working on something we that we hope will make your life a lot easier. The Temboo Agent (our AI-driven embedded programming agent) now supports Nordic Semiconductor hardware and integrates directly into Nordic’s VS Code workflow.

This update is for especially for developers using nRF hardware and the accompanying nRF Connect SDK, and our hope is that using the Temboo Agent will help you avoid classic embedded programming pitfalls and make progress much more efficiently.

Why build an AI Agent for Nordic?

Generative AI has completely changed how software gets written. Models like Claude, Gemini, and ChatGPT produce good code quickly and help developers move a lot faster. But when you bring those same tools into the embedded development space, the results aren’t as good as they should be.

“General-purpose AI models don’t know the hardware you’re developing for.“

General-purpose AI models don’t know the hardware you’re developing for. They don’t understand the structure of the nRF Connect SDK, how Kconfig and devicetree interact, how peripherals should really be configured, or what your toolchain and build system are doing under the hood. At best, you get answers that are decent, and at worst, you get confident-looking suggestions that don’t compile or don’t behave the way you expect when they hit your MCU.

The gap between “AI that can write code” and “AI that actually understands the realities of embedded development” is what the Temboo Agent is aiming to fill.

Built for Nordic Developers

The Temboo Agent is purpose-built for people who develop on top of Nordic hardware. It understands nRF SoCs, the nRF Connect SDK, and the practical realities of building and debugging firmware on constrained devices.

Because the Temboo Agent runs inside VS Code, it has access to project context like your source code, your configuration files, and your build output. This allows it to give you answers that are directly relevant to your project, rather than generic or misleading suggestions.

If you’d like the broader backstory on why we built the Temboo Agent and how it differs from general-purpose AI coding tools, you can find it here:
[LINK TO INTRO POST]. In the rest of this post, we’ll focus on what the Temboo Agent can do for Nordic developers today, and how you can start using it in your own projects.

In Action: The Temboo Agent for Nordic Hardware

The Temboo Agent is a chat-based AI agent that helps you write, debug, and refactor firmware for Nordic devices. The goal is for it to feel less like “prompting an AI” and more like collaborating with an experienced embedded engineer who knows your hardware platform and who you enjoy working with.

“The goal is for it to feel like collaborating with an experienced embedded engineer.”

The Temboo Agent understands how Nordic projects are structured, how the SDK works, and how your configuration choices impact your toolchain’s behavior. It can help you reason about peripherals, drivers, power modes, and build errors without forcing you to tab between code, documentation, and forum posts.

Just as importantly, you don’t have to change where you work. The Temboo Agent integrates into your existing Nordic VS Code workflow, so it can see your project structure, reference your files directly, and respond to your prompts with information that is specific and actionable.

Let’s look at a few concrete examples.

Examples of the Temboo Agent in Action

1. Generating Nordic-specific application code

Interacting with the Temboo Agent is straightforward – you describe what you want to build, and it responds with code, configs, and setup advice tailored to Nordic hardware.

For example, you might ask it something like:

“I want to configure a GPIO interrupt on an nRF52840 using the nRF Connect SDK. Trigger on falling edge and wake the device from sleep. Please give me a complete example.”

The Temboo Agent will return the relevant application code and config details needed to make that work, all mapped to the SDK and tools you’re actually using.

2. Debugging build errors and odd behavior

Because it’s built into VS Code, when you hit a build error, the Temboo Agent will automatically detect it and offer to help diagnose the problem. For more subtle issues, you can share additional context like code files, configuration files, or error logs, and work through the issue collaboratively.

Because the agent understands Nordic’s build system and configuration model, it can reason about problems that stem from Kconfig settings, devicetree mismatches, or SDK assumptions that aren’t always obvious.

3. Hardware-aware guidance, not generic advice

Many embedded programming problems aren’t simply syntax issues, they’re related to nuanced choices and tradeoffs. Power consumption, sleep states, peripheral usage, and timing constraints all require deep hardware-specific knowledge.

The Temboo Agent can help you think through those tradeoffs in a Nordic-specific way. For example, if you’re trying to reduce power consumption on a battery-powered nRF design, the agent can talk you through the sleep modes, peripheral choices, and SDK options that actually apply to your situation.

This isn’t guesswork. This advice you get is grounded in Nordic documentation, nRF Connect examples, and established patterns from across the Nordic ecosystem. The agent focuses only on what’s real and what matters to Nordic development, and ignores everything else.

The Future of AI-Assisted Embedded Development

What we’re making available today for Nordic is only the beginning of our journey. Our longer-term goal is to make AI-assisted embedded development feel less like fighting against toolchain and more like working alongside someone who really understands your embedded hardware, your codebase, and your goals.

Beyond code generation and build error diagnosis, we’re actively working on support for runtime debugging, power and memory optimization, peripheral behavior analysis, and lots more. The idea is to take embedded toolchains from being a source of friction to being an active and indespensible part in the firmware development process. Ultimately, we see the future as one in which the your embedded toolchain ceases becoming a point of friction, and starts being an active development partner.

Try the Temboo Agent for Nordic Now

If you’re building on Nordic hardware, we’d love you to try the Temboo Agent today.

Sign up, install the VS Code extension, and experience what embedded development can feel like when the AI actually understands the hardware platform you’re working with.

As always, your feedback is incredibly important to us. If there are Nordic-specific workflows you’d like deeper support for, or areas in which you think the Temboo Agent could do more, we’d love to hear from you.