Barebox
Barebox is an attempt to work around the limitations that U-Boot shows through its age. Originally dubbed U-Boot v2, it now has a different name because its design goals are different.
Barebox now support support arm, powerpc, mips, nios2, blackfin, x86
U-Boot-v2 Presentation from CELF Embedded Linux Conference Europe Grenoble, 2009-10-16 (pdf)
Booting Linux Fast & Fancy (pdf)
Sandbox
One of the great thinks with barebox, it's the sandbox.
Basically you can develop and debug generic feature
1) compile it
for other arch than x86 or ppc you need to use the next branch or the mainline
As I just recently fix the support for all host
ARCH=sandbox make sandbox_defconfig
ARCH=sandbox make
now just start it
# ./barebox
barebox 2011.10.0-00119-gad62fdb-dirty (Oct 15 2011 - 11:38:46)
Board: sandbox
Malloc space: 0x7f679f24b010 -> 0x7f679fa4b010 (size 8 MB)
Open /dev/env0 No such file or directory
no valid environment found on /dev/env0. Using default environment
running /env/bin/init...
barebox:/
barebox:/ ls -al /dev/
ls: invalid option -- a
cr-------- 18446744073709551615 zero
crw------- 8249 defaultenv
crw------- 4294967295 mem
crw------- 2198 fd0
barebox:/ devinfo
devices:
`---- hostfile0
`---- console0
`---- cs0
`---- ramfs0
`---- devfs0
`---- mem0
`---- 0x00000000-0x00002038: /dev/defaultenv
`---- mem1
`---- 0x00000000-0xfffffffe: /dev/mem
`---- tap0
`---- eth0
drivers:
console
ramfs
devfs
tap
mem
cramfs
hostfile
barebox:/
barebox:/ help
. - alias for source
? - alias for help
[ - alias for test
addpart - adds a partition table to a device
boot_config - Boot Menu
boot_menu - Boot Menu
cat - concatenate file(s)
cd - change working directory
clear - clear screen
cp - copy files
crc32 - crc32 checksum calculation
delpart - delete partition(s)
devinfo - Show information about devices and drivers.
dhcp - invoke dhcp client to obtain ip/boot params
echo - echo args to console
edit - Usage: (s)edit <file>
ethact - set current ethernet device
exit - exit script
export - export environment variables
false - do nothing, unsuccessfully
go - start application at address or file
help - print online help
linux_exec - Execute a command on the host
loadenv - Load environment from ENVFS into DIRECTORY (default: /dev/env0 -> /env).
login - login
ls - list a file or directory
md - memory display
md5sum - md5 checksum calculation
memcmp - memory compare
memcpy - memory copy
meminfo - print info about memory usage
memset - memory fill
menu - Menu Management
mkdir - make directories
mount - Mount a filesystem of a given type to a mountpoint or list mounted filesystems.
mw - memory write (fill)
passwd - passwd
ping - ping <destination>
printenv - Print value of one or all environment variables.
pwd - print working directory
readline - prompt for user input
reset - Perform RESET of the CPU
rm - remove files
rmdir - remove directorie(s)
saveenv - save environment to persistent storage
sedit - alias for edit
sh - run shell script
sha1sum - sha1 checksum calculation
sha224sum - sha224 checksum calculation
sha256sum - sha256 checksum calculation
sleep - delay execution for n seconds
source - execute shell script in current shell environment
test - minimal test like /bin/sh
tftp - Load file using tftp protocol
time - measure execution time of a command
timeout - wait for a specified timeout
true - do nothing, successfully
umount - umount a filesystem
version - print monitor version
barebox:/
Menu
It's on ather great featues
Add Menu Framework
Introduce a menu framework that allow us to create list menu to simplify barebox and make it more user-frendly
This kind of menu is very usefull when you do not have a keyboard or a serial console attached to your board to allow you to interract with barebox
For the develloper part, The framework introduce two API
1) C that allow you to create menu, submenu, entry and complex menu action
2) Command that allow you as the C API to create menu, submenu, entry and complex menu action but this time the actions will be store in a function and then be evaluated and excecuted at runtime.
barebox:/ help menu Usage: menu [OPTION]... Manage Menu -m menu -l list -s show Advanced -e menu entry -a add -r remove -S select How to Show menu (-A auto select delay) (-d auto select description) menu -s -m <menu> [-A delay] [-d auto_display] List menu menu -l Add a menu menu -a -m <name> -d <description> Remove a menu menu -r -m <name> Add an entry (-R for do no exit the menu after executing the command) (-b for box style 1 for selected) (and optional -c for the command to run when we change the state) menu -e -a -m <menu> -c <command> [-R] [-b 0|1] -d <description> Add a submenu entry (-R is not needed) (-b for box style 1 for selected) (and -c is not needed) menu -e -a -m <menu> -u submenu -d [-b 0|1] <description> Remove an entry menu -e -r -m <name> -n <num> Select an entry menu -m <menu> -S -n <entry num starting at 1> List menu menu -e -l [menu] Menu example menu -a -m boot -d "Boot Menu" menu -e -a -m boot -c boot -d "Boot" menu -e -a -m boot -c reset -d "Reset" menu -s -m boot
An example
menu -a -m boot -d "Welcome on Barebox Boot Sequence" menu -e -a -m boot -c boot -d " 1: linux_2_6_36" menu -e -a -m boot -c boot -d " 2: linux_2_6_39" menu -e -a -m boot -c boot -d " 3: linux_3_0_0" menu -e -a -m boot -c boot -d " 4: installer" menu -e -a -m boot -c clear -d " 5: shell" menu -e -a -m boot -c reset -d " 6: reset" menu -s -m boot
The screen is clear and show
Welcome on Barebox Boot Sequence
1: linux_2_6_36
2: linux_2_6_39
3: linux_3_0_0
4: installer
5: shell
6: reset
Auto Select in 1
