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=IMAGE-<build Timestamp>.rootfs.wic of=/dev/sdc bs=1M conv=fsync #Assuming the SD card is assigned to /dev/sdc

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

1. Open a new terminal
2. Execute the following command without plugged SD Card

    $ dmesg | tail -n 15

3. Insert SD Card and wait a few seconds
4. Run the command from step two again

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

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.

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. DEVICETREE
• For Linux kernel update: ⇒ setenv image <filename>
  e.g. KERNELIMAGE

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

  
  

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

• 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

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

=> saveenv

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

=> run install_firmware

• How to setup the NFS Server on your Host Computer
• How to setup the TFTP Server on your Host Computer

To boot the TQMa8MxML from network you need a working bootloader in eMMC/SD-card or SPI-NOR (placement option on TQMa8MxML ) 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.

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:

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.

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

• Prebuild releases
• Build from source

2. TQMa8MxML BSP built following the BSP quickstart instructions.

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

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

• Linux
• Windows

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 TQMa8MxML Yocto BSP build process and is located in the build directory deploy folder named imx-boot-tqma8mxml-mba8mxml-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot.

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-tqma8mxml-mba8mxml-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot
• SD / eMMC image for example the default image tq-image-weston-debug-tqma8mxml-mba8mxml.rootfs.wic

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

• Set the STKa8MxML DIP switches to Serial Downloader Mode (See DIP-Switch Settings)
• Connect STKa8MxML via connector X19 to the Host Computer

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

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 STKa8MxML:

uuu imx-boot-tqma8mxml-mba8mxml-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot

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

uuu -b emmc <u-boot binary>

Example for the STKa8MxML:

uuu -b emmc imx-boot-tqma8mxml-mba8mxml-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot

Follow the command below to load the mfgtool U-Boot and write an image onto the TQMa8MxML eMMC afterwards.

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

Example for the STKa8MxML:

uuu -b emmc_all imx-boot-tqma8mxml-mba8mxml-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot.bin tq-image-weston-debug-tqma8mxml-mba8mxml.rootfs.wic

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.

Example cmdlist file on STKa8MxML:

For the sake of simplicity, create the cmdlist file in the same location as the uuu executable. For example uuu.tqma8mxml

Example command for the STKa8MxML using custom cmdlist:

uuu -e BOOTSTREAM=<bootstream for uuu> -e WICIMAGE=<wic image for eMMC> uuu.tqma8mxml

uuu -e BOOTSTREAM=imx-boot-tqma8mxml-mba8mxml-mfgtool.bin-flash_spl_uboot -e WICIMAGE=tq-image-weston-debug-tqma8mxml-mba8mxml.rootfs.wic uuu.tqma8mxml