Questions on Image Builder

[Jeff Andich]

Hi,

I had a hard time finding a Debian Jessie console image (.img file) for both BB-X15 and BBB.  I eventually found that here,   https://elinux.org/Beagleboard:BeagleBoneBlack_Debian#Debian_Build_Instructions/ , but it seemed like LXQT images were more readily available. 

But if we needed a console image, it seemed like there were two options (1) do sudo apt-get remove on unnecessary packages or (2) use image builder. 

Regarding option 2, Image Builder.

1) Is Image Builder for everybody to use or mainly for Robert to generate BeagleBone/BeagleBoard images?  I saw an earlier thread (circa 2014) where Robert indicated that it was created mainly for him to use to generate images and referred to it as a "frankenscript."

2) Can Image Builder now run on a host Linux machine with the Linaro toolchain, for instance, or is it still intended to be run on an Armhf device?    

This wiki from 2015 says build on ARMHF: https://elinux.org/BeagleBoneBlack_Rebuild_Debian_Image_Using_image-builder, 

"QEMU is un-reliable, thus no longer supported... Spend some Money and buy a real ARMHF device to run this script."

3) Is the procedure for generating images in image builder still as per https://elinux.org/BeagleBoneBlack_Rebuild_Debian_Image_Using_image-builder or is there an updated wiki now?

Thanks!!

Jeff

     

[Robert Nelson]

On Wed, Oct 4, 2017 at 6:48 PM, Jeff Andich <jeff....@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I had a hard time finding a Debian Jessie console image (.img file) for both
> BB-X15 and BBB. I eventually found that here,
> https://elinux.org/Beagleboard:BeagleBoneBlack_Debian#Debian_Build_Instructions/
> , but it seemed like LXQT images were more readily available.
>
> But if we needed a console image, it seemed like there were two options (1)
> do sudo apt-get remove on unnecessary packages or (2) use image builder.

Like here?

https://elinux.org/Beagleboard:BeagleBoneBlack_Debian

Section 6.1.4.2

https://elinux.org/Beagleboard:BeagleBoneBlack_Debian#microSD.2FStandalone:_.28console.29_.28BeagleBoard-X15.29

Yeah... it's a long list, i'd entertain ideas for how to better show that..

>
> Regarding option 2, Image Builder.
>
> 1) Is Image Builder for everybody to use or mainly for Robert to generate
> BeagleBone/BeagleBoard images? I saw an earlier thread (circa 2014) where
> Robert indicated that it was created mainly for him to use to generate
> images and referred to it as a "frankenscript."

Yeah you can use it.. Just make sure to run it on arm..

./RootStock-NG.sh -c bb.org-debian-jessie-console-v4.4

Generates:

https://rcn-ee.net/rootfs/bb.org/testing/2017-10-02/console/debian-8.9-console-armhf-2017-10-02.tar.xz

and:

sudo ./setup_sdcard.sh --img-1gb
bbx15-debian-8.9-console-armhf-2017-10-02 --dtb am57xx-beagle-x15
--rootfs_label rootfs --hostname BeagleBoard-X15

Generates:

https://rcn-ee.net/rootfs/bb.org/testing/2017-10-02/console/bbx15-debian-8.9-console-armhf-2017-10-02-1gb.img.xz

> 2) Can Image Builder now run on a host Linux machine with the Linaro
> toolchain, for instance, or is it still intended to be run on an Armhf
> device?
>
> This wiki from 2015 says build on ARMHF:
> https://elinux.org/BeagleBoneBlack_Rebuild_Debian_Image_Using_image-builder,
> "QEMU is un-reliable, thus no longer supported... Spend some Money and buy a
> real ARMHF device to run this script."

If your goal is to fix QEMU, and your getting paid lots of money to do
it.. The script is a great "test" script to find broken things in
QEMU...

> 3) Is the procedure for generating images in image builder still as per
> https://elinux.org/BeagleBoneBlack_Rebuild_Debian_Image_Using_image-builder
> or is there an updated wiki now?

I just run this every week:

Thing is with all the images, there's really not "one" script...

I've split it into multiple "builds"...

http://gfnd.rcn-ee.org:8080/view/bb.org-jessie/

http://gfnd.rcn-ee.org:8080/view/bb.org-stretch/

https://github.com/RobertCNelson/omap-image-builder/blob/master/publish/rcn-ee_bb.org-stable.sh

Regards,

--
Robert Nelson
https://rcn-ee.com/

[Jeff Andich]

Thanks Robert!!

Yeah, I guess those images were kind of right under my nose, but images/builds/build instructions are in so many different locations, sometimes it's hard to know where the best place to look is and what the best practices are.  (I know, you're probably tired of hearing that excuse..)

One other potential compelling case for going to image builder (or building everything from source if you know how to do that) is the tags go back way before Jessie (maybe even before Toy Story existed?).  So at some point, when Jessie falls off of the list in https://elinux.org/Beagleboard:BeagleBoneBlack_Debian, looks like you can still get back to a Jessie image through image builder.  Is this a reasonable assumption?

Cheers,

Jeff

[Robert Nelson]

On Thu, Oct 5, 2017 at 8:36 AM, Jeff Andich <jeff....@gmail.com> wrote:
> Thanks Robert!!
>
> Yeah, I guess those images were kind of right under my nose, but
> images/builds/build instructions are in so many different locations,
> sometimes it's hard to know where the best place to look is and what the
> best practices are. (I know, you're probably tired of hearing that
> excuse..)

Some users just watch:

https://rcn-ee.net/rootfs/bb.org/testing/

>
> One other potential compelling case for going to image builder (or building
> everything from source if you know how to do that) is the tags go back way
> before Jessie (maybe even before Toy Story existed?). So at some point,
> when Jessie falls off of the list in
> https://elinux.org/Beagleboard:BeagleBoneBlack_Debian, looks like you can
> still get back to a Jessie image through image builder. Is this a
> reasonable assumption?

My current plan is to continue building Jessie snapshots once a month
(usually around the 1st) till the build breaks.

In the past (Looking at our Wheezy images) this breakage was caused by
nodejs, in our case with Jessie, we have nodejs v4.x installed, so we
should be good till April 2018:

https://github.com/nodejs/Release#release-schedule1

[Dennis Lee Bieber]

On Thu, 5 Oct 2017 08:52:05 -0500, Robert Nelson
<robert...@gmail.com> declaimed the
following:

>
>In the past (Looking at our Wheezy images) this breakage was caused by
>nodejs, in our case with Jessie, we have nodejs v4.x installed, so we
>should be good till April 2018:
>

Oh good -- something for April Fools Day <G>
--
Wulfraed Dennis Lee Bieber AF6VN
wlf...@ix.netcom.com HTTP://wlfraed.home.netcom.com/

[Robert Nelson]

On Thu, Oct 5, 2017 at 10:27 AM, Dennis Lee Bieber
<wlf...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
> On Thu, 5 Oct 2017 08:52:05 -0500, Robert Nelson
> <robert...@gmail.com> declaimed the
> following:
>
>>
>>In the past (Looking at our Wheezy images) this breakage was caused by
>>nodejs, in our case with Jessie, we have nodejs v4.x installed, so we
>>should be good till April 2018:
>>
>
> Oh good -- something for April Fools Day <G>

That's also Easter Sunday.. So yeah, I'll be busy so no images on that
day anyways.. ;)