How to fix ESP32 FreeRTOS error: too few arguments to function 'void vPortEnterCritical(portMUX_TYPE*)'

Problem:

On FreeRTOS on the ESP32, you want to use a critical zone like this:

portENTER_CRITICAL();
// Your critical code goes here!
portEXIT_CRITICAL();

but while compiling the procject, you see an error message like

src/main.cpp: In function 'void MyFunc(size_t, int16_t)':
/home/uli/.platformio/packages/framework-arduinoespressif32@src-f2ea83e2545300b10a69ff44ef9dc6cd/tools/sdk/esp32/include/freertos/port/xtensa/include/freertos/portmacro.h:476:75: error: too few arguments to function 'void vPortEnterCritical(portMUX_TYPE*)'
 #define portENTER_CRITICAL(mux)                     vPortEnterCritical(mux)

Solution

You need to use portENTER_CRITICAL() and portEXIT_CRITICAL() with a spinlock, i.e.

portENTER_CRITICAL(&mySpinlock);
// TODO Your critical code goes here!
portEXIT_CRITICAL(&mySpinlock);

In order to see a full example on how to initialize a spinlock in FreeRTOS and use it for critical zones, see our previous post ESP32 critical zone example using FreeRTOS / PlatformIO