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OpenEmbedded on the Simputer


Nov 26, 2006
FOSS.in, Bangalore

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by

Harald Welte <laforge@gnumonks.org>

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OpenEmbedded
About the Speaker

Who is speaking to you?
		an independent Free Software developer
		one of the authors of Linux kernel packet filter
		busy with enforcing the GPL at gpl-violations.org
		working on Free Software for smartphones (openezx.org)
		...and Free Software for RFID (librfid)
		...and Free Software for ePassports (libmrtd)
		...among other things ;)
		who is not a member of the OpenEmbedded project
		... but a proud owner of an Amida Simputer


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OpenEmbedded
The Problem (A)

What is the Problem? (Variant A)
	You build an embedded device
	You decide to run linux
	You do your own embedded distribution
		which is a lot of work in the first place
		which will cause even more work for maintainance
		in the end, you will not provide security updates
		and you end up having a 'one time throw away' product
	Your users will not get your full build system (if there is such a thing)

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OpenEmbedded
The Problem (B)

What is the Problem? (Variant B)
	You build an embedded device
	You decide to run linux
	You license a commercial embedded Linux variant
		you will most likely end up with something stale like kernel 2.4.x
		you will have to spend a lot of money on it
		you will still require quite a bit of porting
	Your users will never get the source packages ("SRPMS") to it


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OpenEmbedded
The Problem (Summary)

	Summary of the situation
		You exclude the FOSS community from your product
		You end up with low-quality code and lots of maintenance work
		Your customers get a suboptimal product with limited feature set

	Result of that situation
		Your customers will start their own embedded distributions
			OpenWRT
			OpenEZX
			OpenZaurus
			Familiar
			...

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OpenEmbedded
Introduction to OE

What is OpenEmbedded (OE)
	Not a distribution, but distribution building framework
	Not a software program
	Consists of thousands of rules
		Rules for definition of a machine type (78)
		Rules for definition of a distribution (32)
		Rules for individual packages (4095)
	Plus a program to interpret those rules
		bitbake
	"One system to rule them all" 

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OpenEmbedded
Introduction to OE

	What does OpenEmbedded (OE) do for you?
		Build a toolchain 
			specifically for your target device
			with the optimizations you need
			for your host platform (I crosscompile from quad G5!)
		Build a kernel image
			your preferred version with your patches
		Build a distribution
			with the packages you want
			with the initial configuration / fs layout you want
		Build distribution images
			using rootfs of your choice (cramfs, jffs2, ...)
			matching for direct flash writing
			optionally in your own firmware update image format
		Build thousands of individual packages
			using the package manager of your choice (.ipk, .deb)
			packages can be later installed
			package repositories can be published as 'feed' (apt-get like)
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OpenEmbedded
Who uses OpenEmbedded

Who uses OpenEmbedded
	Until 07/2006, only community projects
		OpenZaurus, OpenEZX, etc.
	Since 07/2006, the first commercial user
		FIC-sponsored OpenMoko.org (Linux GSM phone)
			OpenMoko distribution
			Neo1973 machie
			QT2410 machine
			.. more devices in 2007!

	Why not more commercial users
		as usual: not all that much documentation about the system
		but: OE core team members available for consultancy
		not many commercial embedded vendors interested in sustainable, long-term development

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OpenEmbedded
The heart of OE: bitbake

What is bitbake
	Program to interpret
		local configuration (.conf files)
		package specification (.bb files)
		machine/distro configuration (.conf files)
	Can be used to
		build individual native (host) and target packages
		build tasks (task == set of packages)
		build ready-made firmware images

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OpenEmbedded
Devices ('machines')

Overview of built-in device support
		Motorola A780 / E680
		HTC Blueangel
		Various Sharp Zaurus models
		VIA EPIA boards
		iPAQ H1910, H1940, H2200, H3600, H3900, H4000, H5xxx, H6300
		HP Jornada 6xx, 7xx
		i.MX31 ADS
		Nokia 770
		Linksys NSLU2, WRT54g
		Asus WL-500g
		QEMU/ARM (for testing)
		Samsung SMDK 2440
		PC-Engines WRAP
		Amida Simputer (not yet mainline)
		...

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OpenEmbedded
OE Packages

An OE package is...
	a .bb (bitbake) file containing
		description
		license
		section
		maintainer
		dependencies
		source code + patch URI's (local or remote)
	so it is basically similar to a RPM spec file or debian 'rules'

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OpenEmbedded
OE Distributions

An OE distribution is
	a .conf file that indicates
		name (DISTRO_NAME)
		version (DISTRO_VERSION)
		how to build the crosscompiler
		which package format to use (INHERIT += package_ipk)		
		which images to build by default (IMAGE_FSTYPES)
		preferred versions of many packages

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OpenEmbedded
OE Tasks

Tasks are virtual packages
	You can find OE Tasks in
		openembedded/packages/tasks
	Commonly used tasks are
		task-bootstrap (all packages for basic userspace with login)
		task-xterminal (boostrap + x11 + xterm)
		gpe-image (xterminal + GPE project)
		opie-image (OPIE project)

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OpenEmbedded
OE Images

An OE Image is
	a set of OE packages pre-installed into a root filesystem
	again implemented as virtual package
	OE Image rules are found in openembedded/packages/images
	result provided as .tar.gz, .tar.bz2, cramfs or jffs
	Commonly-used images:
		bootstrap-image (basic system with console access)
		xterminal-image (bootstrap + X11 + xterm)
		e-image (xterminal + enlightenement e11)
		gpe-image (xterminal + GPE)
		opie-image (QtEmbedded, OPIE, no X11)

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OpenEmbedded
OE Build Setup

OE Build Setup
	create a 'build/conf/local.conf' file
		TMPDIR - directory with lots of space (30G)
		MACHINE - the device you want to build for
		DISTRO - the distro you want to build
		BUILD_ARCH - the native architecture of the host PC (optional)
	install bitbake into

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OpenEmbedded
OE Build Tree

OE Build Tree layout
		my-oe/openembedded
			the openembedded rules checked out via monotone (mtn)
		my-oe/openembedded/packages
			package rule files
		my-oe/openembedded/conf/machine
			machine rule files
		my-oe/openembedded/conf/distro
			distro rule files
		my-oe/build/conf
			local.conf configuration
		my-oe/build/tmp/work
			work directory of build process
		my-oe/build/tmp/deploy/ipk
			completed ipk packages
		my-oe/build/tmp/deploy/images
			completed filesystem images

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OpenEmbedded
The Amida Simputer

The Amida simputer is a device with
	Intel SA-1100 StrongARM Processor
	64 MB RAM
	32 MB Flash
	USB Host port
	USB Device port
	Serial port (console)
	Smart Card Reader
	...

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OpenEmbedded 
OE for the Amida Simputer

Adding a new device to OE
	is extremely easy
		in most cases, architecture / SoC support already there
	you just create a "conf/machine/foobar.conf" rule file
	content of the file
		size of root flash image
		which rootfs format to create (jffs2, ...)
		which kernel to build
		which compiler architecture + flags to use
	see following example for Amida 4200

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OpenEmbedded 
OE for the Amida Simputer

Which strategy to go
	oeputer
		use old compiler
		use original kernel
		try to maintain binary compatibility with existing apps
		this was the initial attempt, now abandoned
	oeputer-ng
		use latest toolchain (compiler, ...)
		use latest versions of libraries, X11 server, ...
		use current kernel
		this is the current approach, esp. after Alchemy is becoming Free Software
			which means we can theoretically re-compile it
			in practise, there's probably quite a bit of porting needed
			volunteers? (see next presentation on OpenAlchemy!)


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OpenEmbedded 
OE for the Amida Simputer

oeputer
	create kernel package with original kernel tree from amida
		see example
	create bootloader package with original bootloader tree from amida
		this is optional
			we could just leave the existing bootloader
			if we want to do modifications, create pacakge
	use existing glibc, zlib, ... packages
		works if the versio is compatible with what simputer uses
		in most cases, simputer software versions are too old

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OpenEmbedded 
OE for the Amida Simputer

oeputer-ng
	kernel
		initially, use oeputer kernel package
		later, port drivers/machine support to mainline and use 2.6.x
	bootloader
		just leave as-is or use oeputer package
	userspace
		just use most current (stable) versions of everything in OE
			glibc-2.4
			gcc-4.1.1
			x11-kdrive from X11R7.1
			...

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OpenEmbedded
OE Build Timeline

OE Build Timeline (bitbake bootstrap-image)
	Build Order:
		some native (host) libraries/tools 
			autotools
			coreutils
			ipkg
			libxml
			m4
			fakeroot
		the cross-toolchain
			binutils
			gcc
		the basic packages (from task-bootstrap)
			linux-libc-headers, glibc, module-init-tools
			zlib, ncurses, util-linux, kernel
		the boostrap-image (from bootstrap-image.bb)
			all packages from task-bootstrap
			create jffs / tar.bz2

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OpenEmbedded 
Status of OE on Simputer

Status of OE on Simputer
	Proof-of-concept bootstrap-image exists
	Project is stalled because of lack of time
		Did I mention how many projects I'm involved in?
	Volunteers wanted
		If there are no volunteers taking it further, it will probably be still-born
		Talk to Anush Shetty!
	OpenAlchemy
		will make the whole project even more interesting
		the idea is to create bitbake rules for OpenAlchemy
		which can then be built for 'oeputer-ng'
		but also for many (all?) other OE supported systems!

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OpenEmbedded
Links 

Links
	The OpenEmbedded project
		http://openembedded.org/
	Getting Started with OpenEmbedded
		http://www.openembedded.org/wiki/GettingStarted
	The Amida Simputer
		http://www.amidasimputer.com/
	OE on Simputer project
		http://simputer.gnumonks.org/ 
	OpenMoko project
		http://www.openmoko.org/