Embox

Embox is a configurable operating system kernel designed for resource constrained and embedded systems.

Getting started

Here's a quick overview on how to build and run Embox.

Required environment:

gcc and make
cross compiler for the target platform

Preparing environment

For Debian-based systems (most packages are installed out of box though):

$ sudo apt-get install build-essential gcc-multilib

Building Embox

First of all:

$ git clone https://github.com/embox/embox.git embox
$ cd embox

Since Embox is highly configurable project, it is necessary to specify modules to be built and params for them. To build the OS make command is used. All commands described below are called from the embox directory, which includes src/, templates/, ...

Configuring the project

For configuring it is needed to specify params and modules supposed to be included into the system. Embox has several templates prepared, to list them use the following command:

$ make confload

The simplest way to load a template is to specify its name in the command:

$ make confload-<template>

For the quick overview you can use one of qemu templates that exist for most architectures, that is, x86/qemu for x86:

$ make confload-x86/qemu

Building the image

After configuring the project just run make to build:

$ make

Notes on Mac OS X build

MacOS's default gcc produces Mach-O binaries, which are unusable outside from MacOS. Crosscompiler should be used in order to build elf. Clone https://github.com/embox/crosstool and make

$ ./crosstool.sh i386

Then modify CROSS_COMPILE variable in conf/build.conf like

CROSS_COMPILE = /path/to/toolchain/bin/i386-elf-

If you've installed toolchain in some directory from $PATH, then CROSS_COMPILE could be just

CROSS_COMPILE = i386-elf-

Running on QEMU

The resulting image can now be run on QEMU. The simplest way is to execute ./scripts/qemu/auto_qemu script:

$ sudo ./scripts/qemu/auto_qemu

sudo is requried to setup a TUN/TAP device necessary to emulate networking. Also the above script uses ethtool util, that should be installed as well:

$ sudo apt-get install ethtool

After the system is loaded, you’ll see the embox> prompt, now you are able to run commands. For example, help lists all existing commands.

To test the connection:

ping 10.0.2.16

If everything's fine, you can connect to the Embox terminal via telnet.

To exit Qemu type ctrl + A and X after that.

Debugging

You can use the same script with -s -S -no-kvm flags for debugging:

$ sudo ./scripts/qemu/auto_qemu -s -S -no-kvm

After running that QEMU waits for a connection from a gdb-client. Run gdb in the other terminal:

$ gdb ./build/base/bin/embox
...
(gdb) target extended-remote :1234
(gdb) continue

The system starts to load.

At any moment in gdb terminal you can type ctrl + C and see the stack of the current thread (backtrace) or set breakpoints (break <function name>, break <file name>:<line number>).

Other architectures

Embox supports the following CPU architectures: x86, ARM, Microblaze, SPARC, PPC, MIPS.

In order to work with architectures other than x86 you'll need a cross compiler. After installing the cross compiler just repeat the step above, starting with configuring:

make confload-<arch>/qemu
make
sudo ./scripts/qemu/auto_qemu

The output is quite the same as in the case of the x86 architecture.

Networking support

Embox supports networking on x86, ARM, and Microblaze.

vitlav/embox