VAR-SOM-MX7 Yocto Jethro R1 build

VAR-SOM-MX7 - Yocto fsl-4.1.15 Yocto Jethro R1 Build

Installing required packages

Follow the link below and install all required packages on your machine.

www.yoctoproject.org/docs/latest/yocto-project-qs/yocto-project-qs.html

Please make sure you host PC is running Ubuntu 14.04 and install the following packages:

sudo apt-get install gawk wget git-core diffstat unzip texinfo gcc-multilib build-essential chrpath socat libsdl1.2-dev
sudo apt-get install autoconf libtool libglib2.0-dev libarchive-dev
sudo apt-get install python-git xterm sed cvs subversion coreutils texi2html
sudo apt-get install docbook-utils python-pysqlite2 help2man make gcc g++ desktop-file-utils libgl1-mesa-dev
sudo apt-get install libglu1-mesa-dev mercurial automake groff curl lzop asciidoc u-boot-tools mtd-utils

Documentation

Documentation are available for Download from FreescaleJethroDocuments

Download Yocto Jethro for i.MX7 Freescale source

$ git config --global user.name "Your Name"
$ git config --global user.email "Your Email"

$ mkdir ~/bin (this step may not be needed if the bin folder already exists)
$ curl http://commondatastorage.googleapis.com/git-repo-downloads/repo > ~/bin/repo
$ chmod a+x ~/bin/repo
$ export PATH=~/bin:$PATH

$ mkdir ~/var-mx6ul-mx7-yocto-jethro
$ cd ~/var-mx6ul-mx7-yocto-jethro
$ repo init -u git://git.freescale.com/imx/fsl-arm-yocto-bsp.git -b imx-4.1.15-1.0.0_ga
$ repo sync

Download Yocto Jethro with Meta Variscite VAR-SOM-MX7 support

$ cd ~/var-mx6ul-mx7-yocto-jethro/sources
$ git clone https://github.com/varigit/meta-variscite-mx6ul-mx7 -b imx_4.1.15_ga-var01
$ cp meta-variscite-mx6ul-mx7/scripts/var-setup-release.sh ../
$ patch -p1 < meta-variscite-mx6ul-mx7/patch/Fix-FSL-multi-patch-append-bugs.patch

Setup and build Yocto

The following images can be built:

• fsl-imx-x11 - Only X11 graphics
• fsl-imx-wayland - Wayland weston graphics
• fsl-imx-xwayland - Wayland graphics and X11. X11 applications using EGL are not supported
• fsl-imx-fb - Frame Buffer graphics - no X11 or Wayland

Note: refer to ftp://customerv:Variscite1@ftp.variscite.com/VAR-SOM-MX6/Software/Linux/Yocto/fsl-yocto-imx-4.1.15_1.0.0-docs/Freescale_Yocto_Project_User's_Guide.pdf
Page 7 for further information.

Sample build scenarios:

• Build X11 GUI image without Qt content
• Build opensource QT5 image

Build X11 GUI image without Qt content

$ cd ~/var-mx6ul-mx7-yocto-jethro
$ MACHINE=imx7-var-som DISTRO=fsl-imx-x11 source var-setup-release.sh -b build_x11

Optional: Direct downloads to /opt/yocto_downloads, make sure directory exists and all permissions are set

$ sudo mkdir /opt/yocto_downloads
$ sudo chmod 777 /opt/yocto_downloads/
$ sed -i 's/DL_DIR ?= "${BSPDIR}\/downloads/DL_DIR = "\/opt\/yocto_downloads/g' conf/local.conf

launch bitbake:

$ bitbake fsl-image-gui

Build opensource QT5 image

$ cd ~/var-mx6ul-mx7-yocto-jethro
$ MACHINE=imx7-var-som DISTRO=fsl-imx-fb source var-setup-release.sh -b build-fb

Optional: Direct downloads to /opt/yocto_downloads, make sure directory exists and all permissions are set

sed -i 's/DL_DIR ?= "${BSPDIR}\/downloads/DL_DIR = "\/opt\/yocto_downloads/g' conf/local.conf

launch bitbake:

$ bitbake fsl-image-qt5

Build Results

The resulted images are located in tmp/deploy/images/imx7-var-som:

File Name	Description
fsl-image-gui-imx7-var-som.sdcard	This image is for SD card boot. It can be flashed as-is on an SD card that can then be used to boot your system. For detailed information refer to the Create a bootable SD card section below.
fsl-image-gui-imx7-var-som.tar.bz2	Tarball with rootfs files. Can be used to create an NFS root file system on the host. See the Setup TFTP/NFS Yocto system section for more info. Also used to create our extended SD card. See the Create a bootable SD card section below.
fsl-image-gui-imx7-var-som.ubi	A complete UBI image containing a UBIFS volume, for writing to NAND flash.
zImage	Linux kernel image, same binary for SD card/eMMC/NAND flash.
u-boot.imx-sd	U-Boot built for SD card/eMMC.
u-boot.imx-nand	U-Boot built for NAND Flash.
zImage-imx7d-var-som-emmc.dtb	Device tree blob for SOMs with eMMC.
zImage-imx7d-var-som-nand.dtb	Device tree blob for SOMs with NAND flash.

Create a bootable SD card

SD card structure

The first unallocated 4MiB are saved for U-Boot. It can be replaced using the dd command as described in "U-Boot out of tree" section below.
The first partition is formatted with FAT16 and contains the Linux image and device tree blobs. You can copy them as described in the Linux out of tree section.
The second partition is formatted with ext4 and contains the file system (including the kernel modules).

Yocto pre-built bootable SD card

The Yocto build products contains many files as explained in Build Results section above including a ".sdcard" file. For example fsl-image-gui-imx6ul-var-dart.sdcard. This is a complete image to be flashed directly to an SD card.
Example usage:

$ cd ~/var-mx6ul-mx7-yocto-jethro/build_x11
$ sudo dd if=tmp/deploy/images/imx6ul-var-dart/fsl-image-gui-imx6ul-var-dart.sdcard of=/dev/sdX bs=1M
Replace sdX with the right device name.

Drawbacks of the native .sdcard yocto-built image:

• The second partition size doesn't use the entire SD card.
• The second partition is not labeled as rootfs.
• The NAND and eMMC flashing scripts are not included.

Create an extended SD card

Variscite provides var-create-yocto-sdcard.sh script that makes use of the .sdcard image mentioned above, extends the partitions of the SD card to the maximum available space, and copies the NAND flash burning scripts and relevant binaries for your convenience.
Later, you will be able to follow DART-6UL NAND Flash Burning do burn your images to NAND flash or eMMC
See usage below:

$ cd ~/var-mx6ul-mx7-yocto-jethro/build_x11
$ sudo ../sources/meta-variscite-mx6ul-mx7/scripts/var_mk_yocto_sdcard/var-create-yocto-sdcard.sh /dev/sdX
Replace sdX with the right device name.

The script assume fsl-image-qt5-minimal build was used. It is very easy to modify it and adopt it to your requirements.

Boot board with a bootable SD card

Setting the BOOT SELECT DIP switches

Make sure the BOOT SELECT DIP switches on the carrier board are set correctly before you power on the board.

SW1-SW2
 0 - 0 : Boot from SD card
 1 - 0 : Boot from eMMC
 0 - 1 : Boot from NAND flash
 1 - 1 : Illegal

Note: The VAR-SOM-MX7 SOM comes with either NAND or eMMC, but not both.

Automatic Device Tree selection in U-Boot

As shown in the Build Results table above, we have different kernel device trees, corresponding to our different H/W configurations (sometimes they are renamed without the "uImage-" prefix).
We implemented a script in U-Boot's environment, which sets the fdt_file environment variable based on the detected hardware.

Enable/Disable Automatic Device Tree selection

To enable the automatic device tree selection in U-Boot (already enabled by default):

$ setenv fdt_file=undefined
$ saveenv

To disable the automatic device tree selection in U-Boot, set the device tree file manually:

$ setenv fdt_file=YOUR_DTB_FILE
$ saveenv

Flash images to NAND/eMMC

Please refer to DART-6UL NAND Flash Burning

QT5/Embedded runtime

Environment Variables

The QT5/Embedded require environment variables to run correctly. DART6Ul support QT Embedded over Linux Frame Buffer. For example /etc/profile.d/tslib.sh can be edited. The following example enable touch, mouse and keyboard:

export TSLIB_TSEVENTTYPE='INPUT'
export TSLIB_TSDEVICE='/dev/input/touchscreen0'
export TSLIB_CALIBFILE='/etc/pointercal'
export TSLIB_CONFFILE='/etc/ts.conf'
export TSLIB_CONSOLEDEVICE='none'
export TSLIB_FBDEVICE='/dev/fb0'
export TSLIB_PLUGINDIR='/usr/lib/ts'

export QT_QPA_PLATFORM=linuxfb:fb=/dev/fb0:size=800x480:mmSize=800x480
export QT_QPA_EVDEV_TOUCHSCREEN_PARAMETERS='/dev/input/touchscreen0'
export QT_QPA_GENERIC_PLUGINS='tslib:/dev/input/touchscreen0,evdevmouse:/dev/input/event5,evdevkeyboard:/dev/input/event3'

Running Application

$ cd /usr/share/qt5/examples/
$ touch/dials/dials --platform linuxfb
$ gui/rasterwindow/rasterwindow --platform linuxfb
$ touch/fingerpaint/fingerpaint  --platform linuxfb
$ widgets/mainwindows/mainwindow/mainwindow --platform linuxfb

UBIFS

The UBIFS image we create by default is for 512MiB NAND flash.
You can change the size by editing ~/var-mx6ul-mx7-yocto-jethro/sources/meta-variscite-mx6ul-mx7/conf/machine/imx7-var-som.conf and comment/uncomment the relevant section.

Next steps

In sections 1-6 we explained how to build Yocto for DART-6UL. We explained the results for NAND (UBI) and for SD card. At this point you should have a bootable SD card with UBI images on it. You should be able to boot from the SD card using the boot select button and flash the NAND. Next steps:

• Build and deploy the compiler and tools.
• Fetch U-Boot and compile it out of Yocto tools.
• Fetch Linux kernel and compile it out of Yocto tools.

Update Yocto Jethro i.MX6UL Meta Variscite DART-6UL support

From time to time we will post updates to meta-variscite-mx6ul-mx7. This will include improve features and bug fix. You can track the history log in the previous page to see if such an update was posted. In such a case follow the instructions below to update your tree.

$ cd ~/var-mx6ul-mx7-yocto-jethro/sources/meta-variscite-mx6ul-mx7/
$ git fetch origin
$ git pull
Set your enviroment
$ cd ~/var-mx6ul-mx7-yocto-jethro
$ MACHINE=imx6ul-var-dart DISTRO=fsl-imx-x11 source var-setup-release.sh -b build_x11
In order to update the kernel
$ bitbake -c cleanall linux-variscite
$ bitbake  -c cleanall u-boot-variscite
and build your image
$ bitbake fsl-image-gui

Useful Bitbake commands

Bitbake Cheat Sheet

Useful bitbake commands

i.MX Yocto Project: ltib versus bitbake