Toradex NXP® i.MX 6 Computer on Module - Apalis iMX6

Board Integrations Yocto Project
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Board description

The Apalis iMX6 is a small form-factor Computer on Module/System on Module that comes in both quad core and dual core versions based on NXP (formerly Freescale) i.MX 6Q and NXP i.MX 6D SoCs respectively. The Cortex A9 quad core and dual core CPU peaks at 1 GHz for commercial temperature variant, while the industrial temperature variant has a peak frequency of 800 MHz.

The NXP i.MX 6 based Apalis iMX6 System on Module targets a wide range of industrial applications, including: Automotive & Infotainment, Navigation, Industrial Automation, HMIs, Avionics, Robotics, and much more.

The module exposes wide range of industrial interfaces including CAN, UART, I2C, USB, PCIe, SATA, and many more.

URL: NXP/Freescale i.MX 6 Arm based Computer on Module - Apalis iMX6
Wiki: Apalis iMX6

Test results

The Yocto Project releases in the table below have been tested by the Mender community. Please update it if you have tested this integration on other Yocto Project releases:

Yocto Project Build Runtime
zeus (3.0) :test_works: :test_works:
dunfell/Toradex 5.3.0 :test_works: :test_works:

Build Means that the Yocto Project build using this Mender integration completes without errors and outputs images.
Runtime Means that Mender has been verified to work on the board. For U-Boot-based boards, the integration checklist has been verified.

Getting started

Prerequisites

  • A supported Linux distribution and dependencies installed on your workstation/laptop as described in the Yocto Mega Manual
    • NOTE. Instructions depend on which Yocto version you intend to use.
  • Google repo tool installed and in your PATH .

Configuring the build

Setup Yocto environment

Zeus

Using the Zeus branch, we use the standard meta-mender-community repo manifest.

Set the Yocto Project branch you are building for:

# set to your branch, make sure it is supported (see table above)
export BRANCH="zeus"

Create a directory for your mender-toradex setup to live in and clone the
meta information.

mkdir mender-toradex && cd mender-toradex

Initialize repo manifest:

repo init -u https://github.com/mendersoftware/meta-mender-community \
           -m meta-mender-toradex-nxp/scripts/manifest-toradex.xml \
           -b ${BRANCH}

Fetch layers in manifest:

repo sync

Dunfell/Toradex 5.3.0

To build for the Dunfell branch, we use the Toradex 5.3.0 manifest as is done for the other Toradex platforms.

Set the Yocto Project branch you are building for:

Create a directory for your mender-toradex setup to live in and clone the meta information.

mkdir mender-toradex && cd mender-toradex

Initialize repo manifest:

repo init -u https://git.toradex.com/toradex-manifest.git \
    -b refs/tags/5.3.0 \
    -m tdxref/default.xml

Download mender manifest:

wget --directory-prefix .repo/local_manifests \
    https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mendersoftware/meta-mender-community/dunfell/scripts/mender-no-setup-layers.xml

Fetch layers in manifest:

repo sync -j$(nproc)
cd .repo/local_manifests/
ln -sf ../../layers/meta-mender-community/scripts/mender-no-setup-layers.xml .
cd ../..

Setup build environment

Initialize the build environment:

Zeus

source setup-environment toradex-nxp

Apply Mender configuration to build environment:

cat ../layers/meta-mender-community/templates/local.conf.append >> conf/local.conf
cat ../layers/meta-mender-community/meta-mender-toradex-nxp/templates/local.conf.append  >> conf/local.conf

Dunfell/Toradex 5.3.0

. export

Add Mender layers:

bitbake-layers add-layer $(pwd)/../layers/meta-mender/meta-mender-core/
bitbake-layers add-layer $(pwd)/../layers/meta-mender-community/meta-mender-toradex-nxp/

Add optional Mender demo layer:

# Omit this, if you intend to use this build in production
bitbake-layers add-layer $(pwd)/../layers/meta-mender/meta-mender-demo/

Apply Mender configuration to build environment:

cat ../layers/meta-mender-community/templates/local.conf.append >> conf/local.conf
cat ../layers/meta-mender-community/meta-mender-toradex-nxp/templates/local.conf.append  >> conf/local.conf

EULA

NOTE! You need to accept the Freescale EULA at ‘…/sources/meta-freescale/EULA’. Please read it and in case you accept it, add:

ACCEPT_FSL_EULA = "1"

in your local.conf.

Configure Mender server URL (optional)

This section is not required for a successful build but images that are generated by default are only suitable for usage with the Mender client in Standalone deployments, due to lack of server configuration.

You can edit the conf/local.conf file to provide your Mender server configuration, ensuring the generated images and Mender Artifacts are connecting to the Mender server that you are using. There should already be a commented section in the generated conf/local.conf file and you can simply uncomment the relevant configuration options and assign appropriate values to them.

Build for Hosted Mender:

# To get your tenant token:
#    - log in to https://hosted.mender.io
#    - click your email at the top right and then "My organization"
#    - press the "COPY TO CLIPBOARD"
#    - assign content of clipboard to MENDER_TENANT_TOKEN
#
MENDER_SERVER_URL = "https://hosted.mender.io"
MENDER_TENANT_TOKEN = "<copy token here>"

Build for Mender demo server:

# https://docs.mender.io/getting-started/create-a-test-environment
#
# Update IP address to match the machine running the Mender demo server
MENDER_DEMO_HOST_IP_ADDRESS = "192.168.0.100"

Building the image

You can now proceed with building an image:

Zeus

MACHINE=apalis-imx6 bitbake core-image-base

Replace core-image-base with your desired image target.

Dunfell/Toradex 5.3.0

MACHINE=apalis-imx6 bitbake tdx-reference-minimal-image

Using the build output

After a successful build, the images and build artifacts are:

  • tmp/deploy/images/apalis-imx6/core-image-base-apalis-imx6.uefiimg
  • tmp/deploy/images/apalis-imx6/core-image-base-colibri-imx7.mender
  • tmp/deploy/images/apalis-imx6/u-boot.img
  • tmp/deploy/images/apalis-imx6/core-image-base-apalis-imx6.mender_tezi.tar

The disk image (with .uefiimg suffix) is used to provision the device storage for devices without Mender running already.

The u-boot.img file is used to provision the device with a Mender compatible U-Boot.

On the other hand, if you already have Mender running on your device and want to deploy a rootfs update using this build, you should use the Mender Artifact files, which have .mender suffix. You can either deploy this Artifact in managed mode with the Mender server (upload it under Releases in the server UI) or by using the Mender client only in Standalone deployments.

Flash instructions

The core-image-base-apalis-imx6.mender_tezi.tar is a Toradex Easy-installer compatible image. Refer to the Toradex instructions for more details.

References

  • The Mender integration for Toradex Colibri iMX7 Dual 512MB / Colibri iMX7 Solo 256MB can be found in meta-mender
  • The Toradex Colibri iMX7 Dual 512MB / Colibri iMX7 Solo 256MB template files can be found in meta-mender-community.
  • This was tested using a Iris Carrier board
  • The official Mender documentation explains how Mender works. This is simply a board-specific complement to the official documentation.

If this post was useful to you, please press like, or leave a thank you note to the contributor who put valuable time into this and made it available to you. It will be much appreciated!

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