BeagleBoardUbuntu

This page is about running a (ARM EABI) Ubuntu distribution at BeagleBoard. BeagleBoard will boot the (ARM EABI) Ubuntu distribution from SD card.

Note: for the best experience, make sure you have an LCD attached to the HDMI port, 2GB/4GB/8GB SD card, and a known good usb2.0 hub with mouse and keyboard.

= Help =

If you need any help:


 * Kernel related help:
 * Email Beagleboard user group *Recommended method
 * #beagle: Beagle irc on freenode, accessible also by web interface (logs)
 * Launchpad Project "Beagleboard Kernel"
 * Launchpad Stable Kernel 2.6.32 src
 * Launchpad Development Kernel 2.6.32 src
 * Launchpad Mainline Kernel git src
 * Unless you know what your doing, do NOT use the 2.6-mainline branch...
 * Kernel Testing Results


 * Ubuntu related help:
 * #ubuntu-arm: Ubuntu's arm irc on freenode (logs -> year -> month -> day -> #ubuntu-arm.html)


 * When asking for help, please provide some debugging information:
 * U-Boot Version installed on board
 * Kernel Version: uname -a
 * pastebin dmesg
 * Copy from serial port or use "dmesg | pastebinit" (sudo apt-get install pastebinit)

= Recommended Beagle Software =
 * Recent x-loader/MLO
 * Rev C2/3/4 Boards are fine and do not need an upgrade
 * Old Rev Bx Boards should upgrade there MLO from here: http://www.angstrom-distribution.org/beagleboard-demo-image-available


 * Recent U-Boot with 'boot.scr' scripts enabled
 * u-boot.bin from here: http://www.angstrom-distribution.org/beagleboard-demo-image-available
 * Or this one I've archived: U-Boot 2009.08+r37 Upgrade
 * Version 2009.01 (factory installed on C2/3's) and earlier will not work with this guide
 * Version 2009.11-rc1-00601-g3aa4b51 (factory installed on C4's) works fine with this guide

= Ubuntu Rootfs Install = This section describes how you create a Ubuntu root file system for your BeagleBoard.

Note:
 * Jaunty, aka Ubuntu 9.04, is the old-stable version (armv5 optimized)
 * Karmic, aka Ubuntu 9.10, is the recent stable version (armv6 optimized)
 * Lucid, aka Ubuntu 10.04 is the upcoming Ubuntu version, not released yet (in Feb 2010). Therefore it is listed here as 'testing'. (armv7 optimized)

Build Image
rootstock is Ubuntu's new name for Oliver's depreciated build-arm-rootfs script.

Note: Use latest debootstrap, if the one posted here is no longer available.

Requirements:

Jaunty (9.04) and Debian: sudo apt-get install qemu wget http://ports.ubuntu.com/pool/main/d/debootstrap/debootstrap_1.0.20~jaunty1_all.deb sudo dpkg -i debootstrap_1.0.20~jaunty1_all.deb wget http://launchpad.net/project-rootstock/trunk/0.1/+download/rootstock-0.1.3.tar.gz tar xf rootstock-0.1.3.tar.gz cd rootstock-0.1.3

Karmic (9.10) sudo apt-get install rootstock

Useful Packages: linux-firmware,wireless-tools :wifi adapters.. ntpdate :sync real time clock from network

GUI's xfce4: xfce4,gdm,xubuntu-gdm-theme,xubuntu-artwork

WiFi Hints: http://elinux.org/BeagleBoardUbuntuNetwork

Rootstock Command line: sudo ./rootstock --fqdn --login --password --imagesize \ --seed --dist  --serial  --kernel-image

Basic Karmic (9.10) Beagleboard xfce4 image: sudo ./rootstock --fqdn beagleboard --login ubuntu --password temppwd --imagesize 2G --dist karmic \ --serial ttyS2 --seed xfce4,gdm,xubuntu-gdm-theme,xubuntu-artwork \ --kernel-image http://rcn-ee.net/deb/kernel/beagle/karmic/v2.6.32.7-x7.1/linux-image-2.6.32.7-x7.1_1.0karmic_armel.deb

Upon Completion, you should have: armel-rootfs- .tgz -> Root file System, dump to ext2/3 partition of SD card vmlinuz-2.6. -> Boot Image, use mkimage to create uImage and dump to the first fat16 partition of SD card

Lucid (10.04) Testing:

Major Changes:

gcc-4.4: https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/lucid/+source/gcc-4.4 gcc -v: --with-arch=armv7-a --with-tune=cortex-a8 --with-float=softfp --with-fpu=vfpv3-d16

Basic Lucid (10.04) Beagleboard image: sudo ./rootstock --fqdn beagleboard --login ubuntu --password temppwd --imagesize 2G --dist lucid \ --script fixup.sh --serial ttyS2 \ --kernel-image http://rcn-ee.net/deb/kernel/beagle/lucid/v2.6.32.7-l7.1/linux-image-2.6.32.7-l7.1_1.0lucid_armel.deb
 * latest rootstock: bzr branch lp:project-rootstock
 * fixup script: wget http://rcn-ee.net/deb/tools/fixup.sh && sudo chmod +x fixup.sh
 * Kernel: http://rcn-ee.net/deb/kernel/beagle/lucid/v2.6.32.7-l7.1/linux-image-2.6.32.7-l7.1_1.0lucid_armel.deb

Proxy Info:

If you are behind a corporate firewall, an extra configuration is needed since the http_proxy variable is not passed to qemu during the final stage of the image creation. There is a quick workaround for this problem: simply add this in the rootstock script when it generates the 'installer' script:

... cat > $BUILDDIR/installer < If it works, I'll bug Oliver to merge it... Issue came up on irc, but my tester disappeared...

GeethaT: Karmic build terminated while entering into the second stage due to proxy issues. The above change to the script made it work. Thanks!

Karmic 9.10
Built with:

sudo ./rootstock --fqdn beagleboard --login ubuntu --password temppwd --imagesize 2G \ --seed wget,nano,linux-firmware,wireless-tools,usbutils --dist karmic --serial ttyS2 \ --kernel-image http://rcn-ee.net/deb/kernel/beagle/karmic/v2.6.31.6-x6.0/linux-image-2.6.31.6-x6.0_1.0karmic_armel.deb

Get prebuilt image:

wget http://rcn-ee.net/deb/rootfs/ubuntu-9.10-minimal-armel-1.1.tar.7z  (Mirror's welcome)

or from mirror:

wget http://ynezz.ibawizard.net/beagleboard/ubuntu-9.10-minimal-armel-1.1.tar.7z

Unpack it:

7za x ubuntu-9.10-minimal-armel-1.1.tar.7z tar xf ubuntu-9.10-minimal-armel-1.1.tar

md5sum: 574a61b92481b1c86246e018ceb76fd6 ubuntu-9.10-minimal-armel-1.1.tar.7z

History 1.1 - Switched to 2.6.31.6 based kernel

Lucid 10.04 (alpha-3)
Requirements to Build on your own:
 * latest rootstock: bzr branch lp:project-rootstock && sudo apt-get install dctrl-tools
 * fixup script: wget http://rcn-ee.net/deb/tools/fixup.sh && sudo chmod +x fixup.sh

Built with: sudo ./rootstock --fqdn beagleboard --login ubuntu --password temppwd --imagesize 2G \ --seed wget,nano,linux-firmware,wireless-tools,usbutils --dist lucid --serial ttyS2 --script fixup.sh \ --kernel-image http://rcn-ee.net/deb/kernel/beagle/lucid/v2.6.32.9-l9.1/linux-image-2.6.32.9-l9.1_1.0lucid_armel.deb

Get prebuilt image:

wget http://rcn-ee.net/deb/rootfs/ubuntu-lucid-alpha3.1-minimal-armel.tar.7z (Mirror's welcome)

or from mirror:

wget http://ynezz.ibawizard.net/beagleboard/ubuntu-lucid-alpha3.1-minimal-armel.tar.7z

Unpack it:

7za x ubuntu-lucid-alpha3.1-minimal-armel.tar.7z tar xf ubuntu-lucid-alpha3.1-minimal-armel.tar cd ubuntu-lucid-alpha3.1-minimal-armel

md5sum: 57dd370ca7660f55ae809d631b3e89c8 ubuntu-lucid-alpha3.1-minimal-armel.tar.7z

Development PC: Format SD Card
You will need a 1GB SD card or greater. Standard Console System : ~286MB + Desktop environment (lxde,gdm) : ~479MB

Starting with an empty SD card and using gparted, create: 50 MiB Primary Partition, fat16/fat32 Rest as ext2/ext3

Gparted Example: http://nishanthmenon.blogspot.com/2008/08/how-to-boot-beagle.html

For Reference: Disk /dev/sdd: 2038 MB, 2038431744 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 247 cylinders Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes Disk identifier: 0x0008e471 Device Boot     Start         End      Blocks   Id  System /dev/sdd1              1           6       48163+   6  FAT16 /dev/sdd2              7         247     1935832+  83  Linux

Development PC: Setup SD Partition's
Requirements:

sudo apt-get install uboot-mkimage

Create uImage for U-Boot
U-Boot needs a compatible kernel image to boot. To do this, we are using mkimage from (uboot-mkimage) to create an image from the vmlinuz kernel file.

mkimage -A arm -O linux -T kernel -C none -a 0x80008000 -e 0x80008000 -n "Linux" -d ./vmlinuz-* ./uImage

Create U-Boot boot image
The version of U-Boot installed or recommended to install uses boot scripts by default. This allows users to easily switch between multiple SD cards with different OS's with different parameters installed. Ubuntu/Debian requires a slight modification to the bootargs line vs. Angstrom, 'ro' vs 'rw'.

Add/Edit ubuntu.cmd setenv bootcmd 'mmc init; fatload mmc 0:1 0x80300000 uImage; bootm 0x80300000' setenv bootargs 'console=ttyS2,115200n8 console=tty0 root=/dev/mmcblk0p2 rootwait rootfstype=ext3 ro vram=12M omapfb.mode=dvi:1280x720MR-16@60' boot

Note: If you created an ext2 root filesystem then change "ext3" above to "ext2"

Use mkimage create to actual *.scr file for U-Boot:

mkimage -A arm -O linux -T script -C none -a 0 -e 0 -n "Ubuntu 9.10" -d ./ubuntu.cmd ./ubuntu.scr

Copy uImage and boot.scr
Mount your SD card fat32 partition (assuming /dev/sdX1) and copy the uImage and boot.scr to the first partition.

Note: if your system automounts the mmc card, just issue "sudo umount /dev/sdX1 && sudo umount /dev/sdX2"

mkdir -p ./tmp sudo mount /dev/sdX1 ./tmp sudo cp ./uImage ./tmp/uImage sudo cp ./ubuntu.scr ./tmp/boot.scr sudo umount ./tmp

Copy the Ubuntu rootfs
Mount your SD card's ext3 partition (assuming /dev/sdX2) and 'untar' the rootfs into it.

mkdir -p ./tmp sudo mount /dev/sdX2 ./tmp sudo tar xfp armel-rootfs-*.tgz -C ./tmp sudo umount ./tmp

Karmic: (9.10) boot fixup
util-linux-ng 2.16 causes this

Edit /etc/fstab mkdir -p ./tmp sudo mount /dev/sdX2 ./tmp sudo gedit ./tmp/etc/fstab add: /dev/mmcblk0p2  /   ext3   errors=remount-ro   0   1

Note change the above "ext3" to "ext2" if the root filesystem is ext2

Add/Edit /etc/e2fsck.conf sudo gedit ./tmp/etc/e2fsck.conf

[problems] 0x000031 = { preen_ok = true preen_nomessage = true } 0x000032 = { preen_ok = true preen_nomessage = true }
 * 1) Superblock last mount time is in the future (PR_0_FUTURE_SB_LAST_MOUNT).
 * 1) Superblock last write time is in the future (PR_0_FUTURE_SB_LAST_WRITE).

Add karmic updates to /etc/apt/sources.list

sudo gedit ./tmp/etc/apt/sources.list

deb http://ports.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-ports karmic-updates main universe

Finally cd ./tmp sync cd .. sudo umount ./tmp

You can now place the SD card into the BeagleBoard and start up the BeagleBoard.

Please be patient as the first boot can take a couple of minutes.

You should be presented with a x-window login screen. If you logged into X windows but do not get a full desktop with window management then execute the command "x-session-manager" at the terminal.

Enable Network Access
Modify /etc/network/interfaces auto eth0 iface eth0 inet dhcp

Manual: From the Command line sudo ifconfig eth0 up sudo dhclient eth0

or: sudo ifconfig -a sudo dhclient ethX

Additional Network Setup Information can be found HERE

= Advanced =

Script File
Every Kernel upload going further on rcn-ee.net will now have an 'install-me.sh' file in the same directory..

example: http://www.rcn-ee.net/deb/kernel/beagle/karmic/v2.6.32.7-x7.1/ wget http://rcn-ee.net/deb/kernel/beagle/karmic/v2.6.32.7-x7.1/install-me.sh sudo /bin/bash install-me.sh

Note: vmlinuz symbolic link (yes  no)...

Reboot with your new uImage

Upgrade U-Boot
Using gparted, create a new 50MB Primary fat32 Partition on a blank SD card, or use your existing fat32 partition.

cd /media/XXXX-XXXX sudo wget http://rcn-ee.net/deb/tools/u-boot-beagleboard-2009.08+r37+gitr1590f84007e2b50ad346a482fff89195cb04ff4e-r37.bin sudo mv u-boot-beagleboard-2009.08+r37+gitr1590f84007e2b50ad346a482fff89195cb04ff4e-r37.bin u-boot.bin

Tested --RobertCNelson 22:18, 2 December 2009 (UTC) RevB5 & RevC2

Insert SD Card, boot Beagleboard and stop U-Boot from booting mmc init (or if an old u-boot) mmcinit fatload mmc 0:1 0x80300000 u-boot.bin nand unlock (old command, removed in later u-boot's) nandecc sw nand erase 80000 160000 nand write 0x80300000 80000 160000 nand erase 260000 20000  (Clear old U-boot environment, this enables 'boot.scr' scripts) reset

Tested --Dingo_aus 5 December 2009 - C3 factory 2009.1 uses "mmc init" not "mmcinit" and no need for "nand unlock"

SGX Video Acceleration
Use a "corporate email" and download the latest (3.01.00.02): http://software-dl.ti.com/dsps/dsps_public_sw/sdo_sb/targetcontent/gfxsdk/latest/index_FDS.html

Kernel Modules
Use the "build_sgx_module.sh" script in 2.6-stable, module source is now in the *.bin

https://code.launchpad.net/~beagleboard-kernel/+junk/2.6-stable

Directions: bzr branch lp:~beagleboard-kernel/+junk/2.6-stable cd 2.6-stable . build_kernel.sh . build_sgx_modules.sh

Copy uImage and modules from the deploy directory to your SD card.

Copy the GFX_Linux_SDK.tar.gz examples to either your SD card or another media (large file) then boot your omap board.

Run depmod: sudo depmod -a omaplfb

Tweak System Libraries: sudo ln -sf /usr/lib/libXdmcp.so.6.0.0 /usr/lib/libXdmcp.so.0 sudo ln -sf /usr/lib/libXau.so.6.0.0 /usr/lib/libXau.so.0

Startup Script
For 3.01.00.02

Copy /opt/pvr/pvr script:

Jaunty: sudo cp /opt/pvr/pvr /etc/rcS.d/S60pvr.sh sudo chmod +x /etc/rcS.d/S60pvr.sh

Karmic: sudo cp /opt/pvr/pvr /etc/init.d/pvr sudo chmod +x /etc/init.d/pvr sudo update-rc.d pvr defaults

Note, if your updating.. cat /opt/pvr/pvr | sudo tee /etc/init.d/pvr > /dev/null

Test SGX with a DEMO
In GFX_Linux_SDK: cd OGLES/SDKPackage/Binaries/CommonX11/Demos/ChameleonMan ./OGLESChameleonMan

Trouble Shooting
sudo rm /etc/powervr-esrev sudo depmod -a omaplfb sudo /etc/init.d/pvr restart

DSP
This is still a major work in progress...

Xorg omapfb Drivers
By default Ubuntu will try to use the FBDEV video driver, however for the beagleboard we can take advantage of a more software optimized driver (still not using the sgx video hardware) using the NEON extensions of the Cortex-A8 core.

cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep FBDEV (II) FBDEV: driver for framebuffer: fbdev (II) FBDEV(0): using default device (II) FBDEV(0): Creating default Display subsection in Screen section (==) FBDEV(0): Depth 16, (==) framebuffer bpp 16 (==) FBDEV(0): RGB weight 565

Login into Ubuntu and open a new terminal, xorg has to be running..

xvinfo -display :0.0 X-Video Extension version 2.2 screen #0 no adaptors present

Drivers
Note: Backport from Karmic

Note: These are built with neon optimizations: http://git.debian.org/?p=collab-maint/xf86-video-omapfb.git;a=blob;f=debian/rules;h=c2f0d5391c96c5abb60b1e691ad86bb27e0c17d8;hb=HEAD (line 48/49)

Jaunty: wget -c http://rcn-ee.homeip.net:81/dl/deb-sbuild/jaunty/xorg-drivers/xserver-xorg-video-omap3_0.1.1-2_armel.deb sudo dpkg -i xserver-xorg-video-omap3_0.1.1-2_armel.deb

Karmic: sudo apt-get install xserver-xorg-video-omap3

xorg.conf
/etc/X11/xorg.conf

Section "Monitor" Identifier "Configured Monitor" EndSection Section "Screen" Identifier "Default Screen" Device "Configured Video Device" #Limited by SGX? DefaultDepth 16 EndSection Section "Device" Identifier "Configured Video Device" Driver "omapfb" Option "fb" "/dev/fb0" EndSection

To verify it was correctly installed, reboot and:

cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log | grep omapfb (II) LoadModule: "omapfb" (II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers//omapfb_drv.so (II) Module omapfb: vendor="X.Org Foundation" (II) omapfb: Driver for OMAP framebuffer (omapfb) and external LCD controllers: (WW) Error opening /sys/devices/platform/omapfb/ctrl/name: No such file or directory (II) omapfb(0): VideoRAM: 1800KiB (SDRAM) (II) omapfb(0): Creating default Display subsection in Screen section (**) omapfb(0): Depth 16, (--) framebuffer bpp 16 (==) omapfb(0): RGB weight 565 (==) omapfb(0): Default visual is TrueColor (--) omapfb(0): Virtual size is 1280x720 (pitch 1280) (**) omapfb(0): Built-in mode "current" (==) omapfb(0): DPI set to (96, 96) (II) omapfb(0): DPMS enabled (II) omapfb(0): Video plane capabilities: (II) omapfb(0): Video plane supports the following image formats: (II) omapfb(0): XVideo extension initialized

Login into Ubuntu and open a new terminal, xorg has to be running..

xvinfo -display :0.0 X-Video Extension version 2.2 screen #0 Adaptor #0: "OMAP XV adaptor" number of ports: 1 port base: 56 operations supported: PutImage supported visuals: depth 16, visualID 0x21 number of attributes: 1 etc..

S-Video
Sorry I don't have an S-Video TV, and this is documented in the source, so it would be really great if someone could fill this section in... --RobertCNelson 21:32, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

NTSC
Please use v2.6.29-oer44.1:

PAL
Please use v2.6.29-oer44.1:

Building Kernel
https://launchpad.net/~beagleboard-kernel

Register on launchpad.net, install bzr sudo apt-get install bzr

Download SRC bzr branch lp:~beagleboard-kernel/+junk/2.6-stable (2.6.32) bzr branch lp:~beagleboard-kernel/+junk/2.6-dev (2.6.32)

Build Kernel . build_kernel.sh

Build SGX Modules . build_sgx_modules.sh

Build Deb File . build_deb.sh

= Bugs & Workarounds =

Karmic
Root on external USB, fsck always errors's on boot, fsck.ext3 never fixes it, and no real time clock on board (Rev Bx and C2 (C3 has backup battery hookup))

mount -o remount,rw /

Script found here:

nano /etc/e2fsck.conf [problems] 0x000031 = { preen_ok = true preen_nomessage = true } 0x000032 = { preen_ok = true preen_nomessage = true }
 * 1) Superblock last mount time is in the future (PR_0_FUTURE_SB_LAST_MOUNT).
 * 1) Superblock last write time is in the future (PR_0_FUTURE_SB_LAST_WRITE).