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Course Outline

  1. Getting started
    1. Obtaining Buildroot
    2. Build system requirements
    3. Cross-compiler terminology: build, host, target, sysroot
    4. Selecting the correct target
    5. Building and booting a minimal embedded system
    6. Contents of the resulting filesystem image
    7. Parallel builds
    8. Full and partial rebuilds
  2. Design goals of Buildroot
  3. Key choices
    1. C library: glibc, uClibc, or musl?
    2. Init system: busybox, sysVinit, or systemd?
    3. Managing device nodes in /dev
    4. Selecting additional packages
  4. Understanding build instructions
    1. Syntax of Kconfig (Config.in) files
    2. GNU Make features utilised by Buildroot Makefiles
    3. Style guide for Config.in and *.mk files
    4. How to add a simple Autotools-based package
    5. Differences between staging and target directories
    6. The necessity of host packages
    7. Expressing dependencies and optional features
    8. Support for languages other than C and build systems other than Autotools
    9. Debugging Makefiles
    10. Rebuilding a single package
  5. Analysing build results
    1. What consumed the most build time?
    2. What consumed the most disk space?
    3. Why was this package built?
  6. Organising external package trees
  7. Workflow for application developers
    1. How to use a local source directory
    2. Overriding build instructions
    3. Debugging your application
    4. Accelerating rebuilds
    5. Viewing build logs
  8. Addressing common cross-compilation issues
    1. How to write software that is friendly to cross-compilers
  9. Workflow for kernel developers
    1. How the kernel boots on an embedded system
    2. Modifying configuration options and applying patches
    3. Module loading mechanisms
  10. Delivering a finished product
    1. Running daemons at startup
    2. Providing custom configuration files
    3. Available firmware update mechanisms
    4. Upgrading to a new Buildroot version
    5. Complying with open-source licenses

Requirements

  • The participant must have built a kernel at least once for a traditional desktop (non-embedded) Linux system.
  • Must understand the components that constitute the Linux userspace on a desktop system.
  • Must know how to generate and apply patches.
  • Must be able to explain the concepts of GNU Make, Autotools, and other existing build systems.
  • Ideally, maintains at least one Linux package, either as an upstream author or within a traditional Linux desktop distribution.
  • Prior experience with embedded development is not required, nor does it substitute for the knowledge of traditional Linux desktops specified above.
 7 Hours

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Buildroot
Buildroot