Embedded module TQMa8MPxS - YOCTO Linux BSP documentation

This page is work in progress and therefore subject to change

Deployment Yocto

BSP Binaries

All binaries are intended for the usage on a STKa8MPxL
The symlinks point to the files of the last build

Yocto Partitions

SD / eMMC image

Sector ¹⁾	Size ²⁾	Contents	Linux (SD-Card)	Linux (eMMC)	Mountpoint
`0x000000 … 0x000000`	`0x0001` sector / 512 B	MBR / Partition Table	unpartitioned area		n/a
`0x000001 … 0x00003F`	`0x003F` sectors / 32256 B	none
`0x000040 … 0x001FFF`	`0x1FC0` sectors / 4064 kiB	bootstream (U-Boot)
`0x002000 … 0x003FFF`	`0x2000` sectors / 4 MiB	U-Boot environment
`0x004000 … 0x023FFF`	`0x20000` sectors / 64 MiB	firmware (Kernel, devicetrees)	mmcblk1p1	mmcblk0p1	/boot
`0x024000 …`	actual size depends on contents of RootFS	RootFS	mmcblk1p2	mmcblk0p2	/

Create SD Card with BSP Image

The Image can be simply written to the SD Card by using the dd shell command in Linux:

$ cd <path to your image>
$ sudo dd if=tq-image-weston-tqma8mpxs-mb-smarc-2-<build Timestamp>.rootfs.wic of=/dev/sdc bs=1M conv=fsync #Assuming the SD card is assigned to /dev/sdc

The image must be written to the RAW device of the SD Card (e.g. /dev/sdc) and not into a partition (e.g. /dev/sdc1) !

To identify the SD card in Linux the shell command dmesg can be used:

Open a new terminal
Execute the following command without plugged SD Card
```
 $ dmesg | tail -n 15
```
Insert SD Card and wait a few seconds
Run the command from step two again

$ dmesg | tail -n 15 
 #plug in SD Card into the reader
$ dmesg | tail -n 15

Updating existing firmware over ethernet

A good approach to update the firmare components U-Boot,Linux kernel and devicetree in a running system it to load them from a tftp server.
This process requires a running TFTP server, please see the following page how to setup TFTP Server. After setting up the TFTP server, the binaries to be updated must be copied into the TFTP directory.

Update Process

1. Setup the Starterkit to boot from eMMC or SD
2. Connect the kit to the network with TFTP server supplying the binaries via ethernet on connector ETH1 (X18)
3. Power up the system and interrupt the boot process in U-Boot

Hit any key to stop autoboot:  0
=>

3. Setup the ethernet interface:

Set network settings manually

Set network settings using DHCP

4. Set U-Boot variable mmcdev according to the drive you want to write to.

=> setenv mmcdev <device_number>

5. Set the file name of the binary to update in U-Boot :

For U-Boot update: ⇒ setenv uboot <filename>
e.g. bootstream.bin
For devicetree update: ⇒ setenv fdt_file <filename>
e.g. fsl-imx8qxp-tqma8xqp-mba8xx.dtb
For Linux kernel update: ⇒ setenv image <filename>
e.g. Image

6. Perform Update by running the update command:

U-Boot update:
```
=> run update_uboot_mmc
```
Device Tree update:
```
=> run update_fdt_mmc
```
Kernel update:
```
=> run update_kernel_mmc
```

The variables can be saved with the command saveenv to keep the values permanently.

Copy Firmware from SD card to eMMC using U-Boot

Write Image to SD card (use dd command under Linux or Win32diskImager under Windows)

The image on the SD card must not be booted, otherwise the initial run once services have already been started.

Set Starterkit to boot from SD, please see DIP Switch Settings
Interrupt the boot process to get to the U-Boot prompt
Use the following commands to copy the SD card to eMMMC

The following commands are based on the default eMMC/SD image partitioning.

2. Save environment U-boot environment (optional):

=> saveenv

3. run the following command to start the update procedure:

=> run install_firmware

Using NFS boot

Prerequisites

To boot the TQMa8MPxS from network you need a working bootloader in eMMC/SD-card or SPI-NOR (placement option on TQMa8MPxS ) which is able to get the kernel image over tftp and to provide the kernel with commandline settings for NFS. The dtb-file and kernel image have to be provided via tftp and the rootfs via nfs.

Configuration of U-Boot Environment

The bootloader environment needs to be modified to work with your tftp-server and your nfs-server.

1. Prepare network interface:

Set network settings manually

Set network settings using DHCP

2. set the Uboot variables for TFTP and NFS:

setenv rootpath <rootpath> (NFS directory has to set in /etc/exports on the Computer that runs the NFS server first)
setenv fdt_file <fdt_file> (name of devicetree file to be downloaded from the tftp server)
setenv image <image> (name of the Linux kernel image to be downloaded from the tftp server)

3. Run the uboot script to boot from nfs:

¹⁾ , ²⁾

sector size = 512 B

NXP UUU (Universal Update Utility)

The UUU (Universal Update Utility is an open source programm provided by NXP, it is the successor of NXP's MFG Tools, intended to download and execute code on i.MX SoC family via the Serial Download Protocol (SDP). Documentation, source code and prebuild releases are available via the NXP mfgtools github repository.

Prerequisites

1. Download the latest release from Universal Update Utility repository or build it from source

2. TQMa8MPxS BSP built following the BSP quickstart instructions.

Download a Prebuild UUU Release Version

A prebuild UUU release version can be downloaded from the UUU git repository.

It is recommended to use the latest avialable release.

Building the Universal Update Utility from source

The Universal Update Utility (UUU) tool can be compiled manually. The build instructions for Linux, Windows are available in the UUU documentation:

U-Boot Binary

A U-Boot binary with the U-Boot configuration mfgtool is required to use the UUU. This particular U-Boot will be built during the TQMa8MPxS Yocto BSP build process and is located in the build directory deploy folder named imx-boot-tqma8mpxl-mba8mpxl-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot.

Usage

The syntax of the UUU tool is identical for Windows and Linux.
In Windows uuu.exe has to be used while in Linux the uuu binary has no file extension.

Prepare Host Computer

For the sake of siplicity, copy the following components to a new folder e.g. in your home directory:

UUU binary (manually compiled or prebuilt release)
U-Boot binary with UUU configuration imx-boot-tqma8mpxl-mba8mpxl-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot
SD / eMMC image for example the default image tq-image-weston-debug-tqma8mpxs-mb-smarc-2.rootfs.wic

The following commands are executed in the folder containing the tool and the binaries.

Prepare STKa8MPxS

Set the STKa8MPxS DIP switches to Serial Downloader Mode (See DIP-Switch Settings)
Connect STKa8MPxS via connector X29 to the Host Computer

List detected devices

After connecting the kit, it should be automatically detected when it is in serial downloader mode. Run the following command to list all detected devices:

uuu -lsusb

Start U-Boot over Serial Downloader

To load the U-boot binary into the RAM and start it from there use the command below:

uuu <u-boot binary>

Example for the STKa8MPxS:

uuu imx-boot-tqma8mpxl-mba8mpxl-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot

Program U-Boot over Serial Downloader

Use the following command to program a U-Boot binary into the eMMC.

uuu -b emmc <u-boot binary>

Example for the STKa8MPxS:

uuu -b emmc imx-boot-tqma8mpxl-mba8mpxl-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot

Program .wic image over Serial Downloader

Follow the command below to load the mfgtool U-Boot and write an image onto the TQMa8MPxS eMMC afterwards.

uuu -b emmc_all <u-boot binary> <wic-image>

Example for the STKa8MPxS:

uuu -b emmc_all imx-boot-tqma8mpxl-mba8mpxl-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot.bin tq-image-weston-debug-tqma8mpxs-mb-smarc-2.rootfs.wic

Attention: By default the bootstream is written to eMMC boot partition and eMMC is configured to use boot partition. To write all firmware components into the eMMC user area a custom update script can be used. The next section shows how to create such an update script.

Use a custom workflow:
For a custom workflow uuu commands can be listed in a cmdlist file. The following example shows how to program a wic image to eMMC user area, without writing the bootstream to the eMMC boot partition.

Following example is tested with uuu version 1.5.4.

Example cmdlist file on STKa8MPxS:

For the sake of simplicity, create the cmdlist file in the same location as the uuu executable. For example uuu.tqma8mpxs

Example command for the STKa8MPxS using custom cmdlist:

uuu -e BOOTSTREAM=<bootstream for uuu> -e WICIMAGE=<wic image for eMMC> uuu.tqma8mpxs

uuu -e BOOTSTREAM=imx-boot-tqma8mpxl-mba8mpxl-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot -e WICIMAGE=tq-image-weston-debug-tqma8mpxs-mb-smarc-2.rootfs.wic uuu.tqma8mpxs

The information provided on this wiki page is subject to change due to circumstances beyond our control. While we strive to keep all details as accurate and up-to-date as possible, it is possible that certain updates or changes may go unnoticed for some time. As a result, some sections of this page may contain outdated information. If you notice any mistakes in the documentation, we kindly ask you to inform the TQ Support through our ticket system.