xref: /openbmc/docs/yocto-development.md (revision c7c7c866)
1# Yocto in OpenBMC
2
3The Yocto Project is an open source collaboration project that provides
4templates, tools and methods to help you create custom Linux-based systems for
5embedded products regardless of the hardware architecture.
6
7OpenBMC uses the Yocto tools to manage configuration and creation of BMC
8images.
9
10## Developing with Yocto
11
12There are two main use-cases for Yocto in OpenBMC:
13
141. Building from master or existing tags
152. Developing changes for submission to master
16
17The first is the easy case, and largely involves picking the system
18configuration to build before invoking `bitbake`. Examples for
19[Palmetto](cheatsheet.md#building-for-palmetto) and
20[Zaius](cheatsheet.md#building-for-zaius) are in the
21[cheatsheet](cheatsheet.md).
22
23The second case can be helped with Yocto's `devtool`. After running
24`.  openbmc-env`, a tool called `devtool` will be in your path, and can be
25applied in several ways.
26
27If you have an existing source tree you'd like to integrate, running
28`devtool modify -n ${PACKAGE} ${SRCTREE}` first creates a new Yocto layer in
29your build directory where devtool stores recipe modifications. It then
30constructs a `.bbappend` for the package recipe and uses the
31`externalsource` class to replace the download, fetch, and patch steps with
32no-ops. The result is that when you build the package, it will use the local
33source directory as is. Keep in mind that the package recipe may not perform a
34clean and depending on what you are doing, you may need to run `${PACKAGE}`
35build system's clean command in `${SRCTREE}` to clear any built objects. Also
36if you change the source, you may need to run
37`bitbake -c cleansstate ${PACKAGE}` to clear BitBake's caches.
38
39Alternatively, if you don't already have a local source tree but would still
40like to modify the package, invoking `devtool modify ${PACKAGE}` will handle
41the fetch, unpack and patch phases for you and drop a source tree into your
42default workspace location.
43
44When you are all done, run `devtool reset ${PACKAGE}` to remove the `.bbappend`
45from the devtool Yocto layer.
46
47Further information on [devtool][0] can be found in the [Yocto Mega Manual][1].
48
49
50### Adding a file to your image
51
52There are a lot of examples of working with BitBake out there.  The [recipe
53example][2] from OpenEmbedded is a great one and the premise of this OpenBMC
54tailored section.
55
56So you wrote some code.  You've been scp'ing the compiled binary on to the
57OpenBMC system for a while and you know there is a better way.  Have it built
58as part of your flash image.
59
60Run the devtool command to add your repo to the workspace.  In my example I
61have a repo out on GitHub that contains my code.
62
63```
64devtool add welcome https://github.com/causten/hello.git
65```
66
67Now edit the bb file it created for you.  You can just use `vim` but
68`devtool` can also edit the recipe `devtool edit-recipe welcome` without
69having to type the complete path.
70
71Add/Modify these lines.
72
73```
74do_install () {
75        install -m 0755 -d ${D}${bindir} ${D}${datadir}/welcome
76        install -m 0644 ${S}/hello ${D}${bindir}
77        install -m 0644 ${S}/README.md ${D}${datadir}/welcome/
78}
79```
80
81The install directives create directories and then copies the files into them.
82Now BitBake will pick them up from the traditional `/usr/bin` and
83`/usr/shared/doc/hello/README.md`.
84
85The Final Step is to tell BitBake that you need the `welcome` recipe
86
87```
88vim conf/local.conf
89IMAGE_INSTALL_append = " welcome"
90```
91
92That's it, recompile and boot your system, the binary `hello` will be in
93`/usr/bin` and the `README.md` will be in `/usr/shared/doc/welcome`.
94
95
96### Know what your image has
97
98Sure you could flash and boot your system to see if your file made it, but there
99is a faster way.  The `rootfs` directory down in the depths of the `build/tmp`
100path is the staging area where files are placed to be packaged.
101
102In my example to check if README.md was going to be added just do...
103
104```
105ls build/tmp/work/${MACHINE}-openbmc-linux-gnueabi/obmc-phosphor-image/1.0-r0/rootfs/usr/share/welcome/README.md
106```
107
108NXP wrote a few examples of [useful](https://community.nxp.com/docs/DOC-94953)
109commands with BitBake that find the file too
110
111```
112bitbake -g obmc-phosphor-image && cat pn-depends.dot |grep welcome
113```
114
115[0]: https://www.yoctoproject.org/docs/latest/mega-manual/mega-manual.html#using-devtool-in-your-sdk-workflow "devtool"
116[1]: http://www.yoctoproject.org/docs/latest/mega-manual/mega-manual.html "Yocto Mega Manual"
117[2]: http://www.embeddedlinux.org.cn/OEManual/recipes_examples.html "Recipe Example"
118