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OpenFD (Open Firmware Deployer) is an open source tool that helps developers to deploy their firmware to a target board in a variety of ways. Most of the steps required to prepare a bootable SD card, flash programming, and other deployment scenarios, can be simplified and automated using OpenFD.

It is designed for boards that run U-Boot as their bootloader, Embedded Linux as their kernel component, and requires a GNU/Linux host PC.

Supported platforms

TI DaVinci™ supported platforms:

  • DM36x - Leopard Board

Installation modes

1. Attached board on communication port

In this mode, the board is attached to a serial port in your computer, i.e. /dev/ttyUSB0, and OpenFD interacts with U-Boot through that port. This mode is useful to transfer images to RAM memory, that can be then flashed to some NAND or NOR flash memory, or actually booting them immediately from RAM (useful in a development environment).

2. Deploy all the firmware to an SD card

All the firmware to an SD card that can be used to boot your board. Optionally, you can also create an image file that you can use later to write to any SD card.

For a detailed explanation of each installation mode, please refer to the User Guide.

Features Overview

Main features:

  • Based on the concepts of a Memory Map and a Partition, OpenFD’s main input is a file --mmap-file which contains a list of partitions that specify a memory map for the device to install (SD card, NAND, etc.).
  • All parameters are received through command line arguments.
  • Runs interactively (and non-interactively). Configurable to prompt the user before executing a dangerous operation (like repartitioning your SD card) but can also run in non-interactive mode.
  • Dryrun support. OpenFD is able to run without executing any System or U-boot commands, this allows you to see what OpenFD would do before the actual deployment.
  • Robust communication with U-Boot (error handling, timeouts, etc.).
  • Logging support.

From a development point of view:

  • Written 100% in Python.
  • Modular architecture for easier maintenance.
  • Test cases use the pyunit framework.
  • Well documented with Sphinx.
  • Makes use of the rr-python-utils package for general utilities.

Examples

The following examples are a very fast overview of how a successful OpenFD run looks like. For detailed information, please refer to the User Guide.

1. Flashing NAND - Leopard Board DM36x

This example writes the kernel component to NAND.

Command:

$ openfd \
    nand \
    --mmap-file ~/images/nand-mmap.config \
    --serial-port /dev/ttyUSB0 \
    --ram-load-addr 0x82000000 \
    --host-ip-addr 10.251.101.24 \
    --tftp-dir /srv/tftp \
    --nand-blk-size 131072 \
    --nand-page-size 2048 \
    kernel

Output:

  Uboot <= 'echo sync'
Configuring uboot network
  Uboot <= 'ping 10.251.101.24'
  Uboot <= 'printenv serverip'
Installing kernel
  Uboot <= 'printenv kmd5sum'
  Uboot <= 'printenv koffset'
  Uboot <= 'printenv ksize'
  Uboot <= 'printenv kpartitionsize'
  Uboot <= 'setenv autostart no'
  Uboot <= 'tftp 0x82000000 kernel.uImage'
  Uboot <= 'printenv filesize'
  Uboot <= 'setenv autostart yes'
  Uboot <= 'nand erase 0x400000 0x480000'
  Uboot <= 'nand write 0x82000000 0x400000 0x420000'
  Uboot <= 'setenv kmd5sum c0ef71c4d0d84e2f48ddce2bf2b85826'
  Uboot <= 'setenv koffset 0x400000'
  Uboot <= 'setenv ksize 0x420000'
  Uboot <= 'setenv kpartitionsize 0x480000'
  Uboot <= 'saveenv'
Kernel installation complete
  Uboot <= 'printenv autostart'
  Uboot <= 'echo Installation complete'
Installation complete

2. Creating a bootable SD card - Leopard Board DM36x

The following example installs a bootable SD card for the Leopard Board DM36x.

Command:

$ openfd \
    sd \
    --mmap-file ~/images/sd-mmap.config \
    --device /dev/sdb \
    --kernel-file ~/images/kernel.uImage \
    --uflash-bin ~/u-boot-2010.12-rc2-psp03.01.01.39/src/tools/uflash/uflash \
    --ubl-file ~/images/ubl_DM36x_sdmmc.bin \
    --uboot-file ~/images/bootloader \
    --uboot-entry-addr 0x82000000 \
    --uboot-load-addr 0x82000000 \
    --work-dir ~/images \
    --rootfs ~/images/fs/fs \
    --uboot-bootargs "...  mem=83M root=/dev/mmcblk0p2 rootdelay=2 rootfstype=ext3"

Output:

The following partitions from device /dev/sdb will be unmounted:
/media/rootfs
/media/boot

Do you want to continue [Y/n]: y
Creating partitions on /dev/sdb
You are about to repartition your device /dev/sdb (all your data will be lost)
Do you want to continue [Y/n]: y
Formatting partitions on /dev/sdb
Installing uboot
Installing uboot environment
Installing kernel
Installing rootfs
Checking filesystems on /dev/sdb
Installation complete

Installation

  1. Install Python pip:

    sudo apt-get install python-pip

  2. Install rr-python-utils:

    sudo pip install git+https://github.com/RidgeRun/rr-python-utils.git#egg=rrutils

  3. Install OpenFD:

    sudo pip install git+https://github.com/RidgeRun/u-boot-installer.git#egg=openrfd

Code Documentation

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