This project builds packages and images for the NI Linux RT distribution.
NI Linux RT is a Real-Time-scheduling enabled OS, for use on NI's embedded hardware devices. This project uses the OpenEmbedded framework to build and package the kernel, software, images, and installation media which compose NI Linux RT.
Community (non-NI) developers can use this project to build packages for open-source software projects, which are installable to their existing NI Linux RT devices - including custom Linux kernels and kernel modules.
Additional community documentation can be found at https://nilrt-docs.ni.com.
This project currently has three concurrent development mainlines (sorry). They are, in short:
nilrt/master/kirkstone
- the current x64 dev HEADnilrt/master/sumo
- the current arm32 dev HEADnilrt-academic/master/sumo
- a forked arm32 HEAD for FIRST Robotics Competition
This project uses the pyrex tool to transparently provide most of the toolchain requirements needed to run bitbake. However, there are are still a few setup steps.
-
Checkout the source and initialize the project submodules.
git clone https://github.com/ni/nilrt.git cd nilrt git checkout nilrt/$release git submodule init git submodule update --remote --checkout
-
Install the docker engine on your build host. If you can successfully run
docker run hello-world
, then you have everything you should need.Do not use the Docker Desktop product as your docker installation. Docker Desktop uses virtual machine indirection that will interfere with this project's docker scripting. Other users have had success switching to the bare docker engine instead.
-
Build (or pull) the
build-nilrt
pyrex container image.bash ./docker/create-build-nilrt.sh # will tag the image as build-nilrt:${NILRT_codename} # Verification docker images build-nilrt # should print the image you just built
-
Source the
ni-oe-init-build-env
script, using the.
(orsource
) command in your shell. This will automatically setup your OpenEmbedded build environment, and the pyrex container shim that will transparently wrap your bitbake commands.. ./ni-oe-init-build-env [--org] # Verification bitbake --version # If this succeeds, you're done.
If you are building on a virtual machine and do not have nested virtualization enabled on the host, you will need to locally remove the
--device /dev/kvm
entry in the args assignment in the top-level pyrex.ini file.NI builders who are connected to the NI corporate network should specify
-org
in their init script args, to provoke the script into adding theni-org.conf
snippet to your bitbake directory. External builders should not use--org
.If you are building on a
nilrt/master/*
branch ref (rather than a release branch) and if you are building outside of the NI corporate network, you will need to set the version of theni-main
opkg feed to one which has already been published todownload.ni.com
. Do this by setting theNILRT_MAIN_FEED_VERSION
bitbake variable to the latest published release. eg.echo 'NILRT_MAIN_FEED_VERSION = "2022Q3"' >> ./conf/local.conf
-
For example, to build Python, Ruby, and Apache for x64 targets, run the following commands:
bitbake python ruby apache2
To build all supported OpenEmbedded packages in NI's feed, run the following commands to build these packagegroups:
bitbake packagefeed-ni-core bitbake --continue packagefeed-ni-extra
NOTE If a package within a package group is updated, rebuilding the package group will automatically rebuild that package and all package depending on that package.
NOTE The configuration files (build/conf/*.conf) can optionally be changed to reflect the desired build settings instead of setting environment variables.
NOTE Building packages through OpenEmbedded can use significant disk space, on the order of 100s of gigabytes. If you are preparing a virtual machine to build images, make sure to allocate sufficient disk space.
The resulting ipk files that can be installed through opkg exist at the following directory:
tmp-glibc/deploy/ipk/...
-
The NILRT repo has scripting in the
:scripts/pipelines/
directory, which can be used to automate the process of building package feeds. The NI build pipelines use these scripts directly - so they are canonical.# after completing the build setup steps above... bash ../scripts/pipelines/build.core-feeds.sh
These scripts are also a good source for understanding the steps to build a package feed manually. Note that if you are building package feeds manually, you must bitbake the special
package-index
target before using the feed. -
NOTE You must build packagefeed-ni-core and package-index first to build images.
-
Build a safemode image by running the following command:
bitbake nilrt-safemode-rootfs
The resulting root file system images for the NILRT safemode image is located at the following paths:
tmp-glibc/deploy/images/x64/nilrt-safemode-rootfs-x64.tar.gz
You can install this on target by copying the file over to the target and running the following command:
tar xf nilrt-safemode-rootfs-x64.tar.gz -C /boot/.safe/
-
Build a runmode image by running the following command:
bitbake nilrt-base-system-image
The resulting root file system images for the NILRT runmode image is located at the following paths:
tmp-glibc/deploy/images/x64/nilrt-base-system-image-x64.tar.gz
You can install this on target by copying the file over to the target while the target is in safe mode and running the following commands:
tar xf nilrt-base-system-image-x64.tar.gz tar xf data.tar.gz -C /mnt/userfs && ./postinst
-
Build a bootable recovery media by running the following command:
bitbake nilrt-recovery-media
The bootable recovery media, which you can install onto a USB memory stick or burn to a CD, is located at the following path:
tmp-glibc/deploy/images/x64/nilrt-recovery-media-x64.iso
Boot your NI Linux Real-Time compatible hardware from the recovery media and follow on-screen instructions to perform a factory reset.
NOTE By default, National Instruments software is pulled from a feed hosted on ni.com. You can redirect to a mirror by setting IPK_NI_SUBFEED_URI to any URI supported by opkg in your org.conf,site.conf, or auto.conf.
-
-
In order to compile custom packages for NI Linux Real-Time on a host system, a cross-compile toolchain is necessary. This can be built directly from one of the scripts in the
:scripts/pipelines/
directory. By default, it builds for x86_64 Linux hosts.bash ../scripts/pipelines/build.toolchain.sh
During the build, a script is generated at
$BUILDDIR/tmp-glibc/deploy/sdk
, with a name likeoecore-x86_64-core2-64-toolchain-9.2.sh
. The script is a self-extracting archive, and can be copied to and executed on an appropriate host system to install the toolchain.To build the toolchain for an x86_64 Windows host, there is a different script that can be used.
bash ../scripts/pipelines/build.cross-toolchain.sh
During the build, an archive is generated at
$BUILDDIR/tmp-glibc/deploy/sdk
, with a name likeoecore-x86_64-core2-64-toolchain.tar.xz
. This archive can be extracted on a Windows system to to access the toolchain.
Enjoy, and happy hacking!
ni.com/community/