bbappend on top of bbappend

bbappend on top of bbappend

[Paul D. DeRocco]

In meta-oe/recipes-graphics/xinput-calibrator (Danny branch, currently
used by Gumstix), there's a recipe called xinput-calibrator-git.bb, which
installs a script for running a touchscreen calibration app if not already
calibrated.

In
meta-openembedded/meta-systemd/meta-oe/recipes-graphics/xinput-calibrator,
there's a bbappend for this recipe, which declares a local file called
xinput-calibrator.service, which is supposed to run the above script on
startup. It inherits the systemd bbclass, which I assume knows how to
install this service file automagically, since there's no explicit
do_install copying the file anywhere.

The trouble is, on my Gumstix, the service fails because it needs a
DISPLAY environment variable to tell it what display to calibrate. I
figured the simplest thing to do would be to add an Environment=DISPLAY=:0
line to the service unit file.

My shameless hack was to add a ROOTFS_POSTPROCESS_COMMAND that runs sed on
the final copy of this service file in the rootfs, to insert the
Environment= line, and that works. But I'd rather just provide my own
version of the file, and use another .bbappend to prepend its file
location to FILESEXTRAPATHS, overriding the one in the systemd .bbappend
file.

So I tried that, just putting the following two lines into my own
.bbappend:

    FILESEXTRAPATHS_prepend := "${THISDIR}/files:"
    PRINC := "${@int(PRINC) + 1}"

and of course putting the tweaked service file into my files subdirectory.
On starting the build, it almost immediately spat this out:

NOTE:
['/home/pauld/yocto/meta-foo/recipes/xinput-calibrator_git.bbappend',
'/home/pauld/yocto/poky/meta-openembedded/meta-systemd/meta-oe/recipes-gra
phics/xinput-calibrator/xinput-calibrator_git.bbappend'] to
['/home/pauld/yocto/poky/meta-openembedded/meta-systemd/meta-oe/recipes-gr
aphics/xinput-calibrator/xinput-calibrator_git.bbappend']

(That was all on one line, of course.)

The do_rootfs failed, and its log says that xinput-calibrator is an
unknown package, and that it can't satisfy the dependency from
packagegroup-core-x11-base.

I read somewhere that stacked bbappends are handled in the order of layer
priority. Mine is 5, the meta-systemd layer is 7. I don't know which is
"higher", or if one wants a higher or lower priority in order to be the
last one to prepend to the path. But somehow, I think my problem is a
little more fundamental.

Can anyone give me a little guidance here?

-- 

Ciao,               Paul D. DeRocco
Paul                mailto:pderocco@ix.netcom.com 
 

Re: bbappend on top of bbappend

[Paul Eggleton]

Hi Paul,

On Friday 16 August 2013 16:22:00 Paul D. DeRocco wrote:
> In meta-oe/recipes-graphics/xinput-calibrator (Danny branch, currently
> used by Gumstix), there's a recipe called xinput-calibrator-git.bb, which
> installs a script for running a touchscreen calibration app if not already
> calibrated.
> 
> In
> meta-openembedded/meta-systemd/meta-oe/recipes-graphics/xinput-calibrator,
> there's a bbappend for this recipe, which declares a local file called
> xinput-calibrator.service, which is supposed to run the above script on
> startup. It inherits the systemd bbclass, which I assume knows how to
> install this service file automagically, since there's no explicit
> do_install copying the file anywhere.

The systemd.bbclass we now have in OE-Core (as of dylan) does not handle this 
automatically. The old one in meta-systemd does appear to though.

> The trouble is, on my Gumstix, the service fails because it needs a
> DISPLAY environment variable to tell it what display to calibrate. I
> figured the simplest thing to do would be to add an Environment=DISPLAY=:0
> line to the service unit file.

FWIW, when xinput-calibrator was moved over to OE-Core it was determined that 
this shouldn't even be started as a service by systemd, but instead launched 
using Xsession.d. You may have better results if you bring in the recipe from 
OE-Core master and use that instead.

> My shameless hack was to add a ROOTFS_POSTPROCESS_COMMAND that runs sed on
> the final copy of this service file in the rootfs, to insert the
> Environment= line, and that works. But I'd rather just provide my own
> version of the file, and use another .bbappend to prepend its file
> location to FILESEXTRAPATHS, overriding the one in the systemd .bbappend
> file.
> 
> So I tried that, just putting the following two lines into my own
> .bbappend:
> 
>     FILESEXTRAPATHS_prepend := "${THISDIR}/files:"
>     PRINC := "${@int(PRINC) + 1}"
> 
> and of course putting the tweaked service file into my files subdirectory.
> On starting the build, it almost immediately spat this out:
> 
> NOTE:
> ['/home/pauld/yocto/meta-foo/recipes/xinput-calibrator_git.bbappend',
> '/home/pauld/yocto/poky/meta-openembedded/meta-systemd/meta-oe/recipes-gra
> phics/xinput-calibrator/xinput-calibrator_git.bbappend'] to
> ['/home/pauld/yocto/poky/meta-openembedded/meta-systemd/meta-oe/recipes-gr
> aphics/xinput-calibrator/xinput-calibrator_git.bbappend']
> 
> (That was all on one line, of course.)

BitBake will report new appends this way so this is expected. It is ugly 
though.

> The do_rootfs failed, and its log says that xinput-calibrator is an
> unknown package, and that it can't satisfy the dependency from
> packagegroup-core-x11-base.

I don't know why this would happen. It's unlikely to be related to changes 
you've made that are discussed here. Does the package appear under 
tmp/deploy/(ipk|rpm|deb)/ ?

> I read somewhere that stacked bbappends are handled in the order of layer
> priority. Mine is 5, the meta-systemd layer is 7. I don't know which is
> "higher", or if one wants a higher or lower priority in order to be the
> last one to prepend to the path. 

They will be applied in ascending order, so anything in the bbappend from a 
layer with a higher layer priority number takes precedence. FYI you can see 
the appends in effect in your configuration using:

bitbake-layers show-appends

Cheers,
Paul

-- 

Paul Eggleton
Intel Open Source Technology Centre

Re: bbappend on top of bbappend

[Paul D. DeRocco]

> From: Paul Eggleton
> 
> > On Friday 16 August 2013 16:22:00 Paul D. DeRocco wrote:
> > In meta-oe/recipes-graphics/xinput-calibrator (Danny 
> > branch, currently
> > used by Gumstix), there's a recipe called 
> > xinput-calibrator-git.bb, which
> > installs a script for running a touchscreen calibration app 
> > if not already calibrated.
> > 
> > In
> > meta-openembedded/meta-systemd/meta-oe/recipes-graphics/xinput
> > -calibrator,
> > there's a bbappend for this recipe, which declares a local 
> > file called
> > xinput-calibrator.service, which is supposed to run the 
> > above script on
> > startup. It inherits the systemd bbclass, which I assume 
> > knows how to
> > install this service file automagically, since there's no explicit
> > do_install copying the file anywhere.
> 
> The systemd.bbclass we now have in OE-Core (as of dylan) does 
> not handle this 
> automatically. The old one in meta-systemd does appear to though.
> 
> > The trouble is, on my Gumstix, the service fails because it needs a
> > DISPLAY environment variable to tell it what display to calibrate. I
> > figured the simplest thing to do would be to add an 
> > Environment=DISPLAY=:0
> > line to the service unit file.
> 
> FWIW, when xinput-calibrator was moved over to OE-Core it was 
> determined that 
> this shouldn't even be started as a service by systemd, but 
> instead launched 
> using Xsession.d. You may have better results if you bring in 
> the recipe from 
> OE-Core master and use that instead.

Since I'm not running I GUI, but needed an X session, I created a systemd
unit to start a dummy X session, using "sleep" as the dummy client. Then,
I can scribble on the screen from my python scripts run from the root
command line. So I solved it by having the xinput-calibrator service run
after my X session starts. I'll look at putting it in Xsession.d instead,
and see if that is cleaner.

> > But I'd rather just provide my own
> > version of the file, and use another .bbappend to prepend its file
> > location to FILESEXTRAPATHS, overriding the one in the 
> > systemd .bbappend file.
> > 
> > So I tried that, just putting the following two lines into my own
> > .bbappend:
> > 
> >     FILESEXTRAPATHS_prepend := "${THISDIR}/files:"
> >     PRINC := "${@int(PRINC) + 1}"
> > 
> > and of course putting the tweaked service file into my 
> > files subdirectory.

<snip>

> > I read somewhere that stacked bbappends are handled in the 
> > order of layer
> > priority. Mine is 5, the meta-systemd layer is 7. I don't 
> > know which is
> > "higher", or if one wants a higher or lower priority in 
> > order to be the last one to prepend to the path. 
> 
> They will be applied in ascending order, so anything in the 
> bbappend from a 
> layer with a higher layer priority number takes precedence. 

After I did a clean and a clean_sstate, the dual bbappends worked as
expected.

I'm learning from experience to clean things manually, to avoid problems,
but sometimes I'm just waving a dead chicken over it. I don't really know
what these things do, or in what situations they should or shouldn't be
necessary. For instance, I've never found an explanation of what shared
state really is, with sufficient specificity that I can predict, "Oh, for
that I need to clean the sstate, not just the build tree." Second, it
seems like clean_sstate does a clean, but I'm not sure clean doesn't do
something else that clean_sstate doesn't do.

One more thing puzzles me. The original bbappend, which creates a service
unit, contained these six lines:

    FILESEXTRAPATHS_prepend := "${THISDIR}/${PN}:"
    PRINC := "${@int(PRINC) + 2}"
    inherit systemd
    SRC_URI += "file://xinput-calibrator.service"
    SYSTEMD_PACKAGES = "${PN}-systemd"
    SYSTEMD_SERVICE = "${PN}.service"

Since I only wanted to replace the file, I thought it should be sufficient
to put the following in my bbappend:

    FILESEXTRAPATHS_prepend := "${THISDIR}/files:"
    PRINC := "${@int(PRINC) + 1}"

It didn't work, though. I blindly copied all six lines into my bbappend,
and it worked. I suspect the systemd lines were necessary, though. I'm
wondering why adding another copy of the string
"file://xinput-calibrator.service" to SRC_URI is necessary. Or am I
imagining things? I do that sometimes.

-- 

Ciao,               Paul D. DeRocco
Paul                mailto:pderocco@ix.netcom.com 

Re: bbappend on top of bbappend

[Paul Eggleton]

Hi Paul,

On Thursday 22 August 2013 10:58:48 Paul D. DeRocco wrote:
> Paul Eggleton wrote:
> > FWIW, when xinput-calibrator was moved over to OE-Core it was
> > determined that this shouldn't even be started as a service by systemd,
> > but instead launched using Xsession.d. You may have better results if you
> > bring in the recipe from OE-Core master and use that instead.
> 
> Since I'm not running I GUI, but needed an X session, I created a systemd
> unit to start a dummy X session, using "sleep" as the dummy client. Then,
> I can scribble on the screen from my python scripts run from the root
> command line. So I solved it by having the xinput-calibrator service run
> after my X session starts. I'll look at putting it in Xsession.d instead,
> and see if that is cleaner.

I would think it would be cleaner, but probably whatever works in your
situation here is fine.

> > > I read somewhere that stacked bbappends are handled in the
> > > order of layer
> > > priority. Mine is 5, the meta-systemd layer is 7. I don't
> > > know which is
> > > "higher", or if one wants a higher or lower priority in
> > > order to be the last one to prepend to the path.
> > 
> > They will be applied in ascending order, so anything in the
> > bbappend from a
> > layer with a higher layer priority number takes precedence.
> 
> After I did a clean and a clean_sstate, the dual bbappends worked as
> expected.
> 
> I'm learning from experience to clean things manually, to avoid problems,
> but sometimes I'm just waving a dead chicken over it. I don't really know
> what these things do, or in what situations they should or shouldn't be
> necessary. For instance, I've never found an explanation of what shared
> state really is, with sufficient specificity that I can predict, "Oh, for
> that I need to clean the sstate, not just the build tree." Second, it
> seems like clean_sstate does a clean, but I'm not sure clean doesn't do
> something else that clean_sstate doesn't do.

FWIW, we do have this section of the reference manual:

http://www.yoctoproject.org/docs/current/ref-manual/ref-manual.html#shared-state-cache

I guess you already saw since you were part of the thread, but this post and
the ones that followed it may be of interest in terms of describing the
known situations where the system can't automatically know that something
has changed:

https://lists.yoctoproject.org/pipermail/yocto/2013-August/018022.html

> One more thing puzzles me. The original bbappend, which creates a service
> unit, contained these six lines:
> 
>     FILESEXTRAPATHS_prepend := "${THISDIR}/${PN}:"
>     PRINC := "${@int(PRINC) + 2}"
>     inherit systemd
>     SRC_URI += "file://xinput-calibrator.service"
>     SYSTEMD_PACKAGES = "${PN}-systemd"
>     SYSTEMD_SERVICE = "${PN}.service"
> 
> Since I only wanted to replace the file, I thought it should be sufficient
> to put the following in my bbappend:
> 
>     FILESEXTRAPATHS_prepend := "${THISDIR}/files:"
>     PRINC := "${@int(PRINC) + 1}"
> 
> It didn't work, though. I blindly copied all six lines into my bbappend,
> and it worked. I suspect the systemd lines were necessary, though. I'm
> wondering why adding another copy of the string
> "file://xinput-calibrator.service" to SRC_URI is necessary. 

If xinput-calibrator.service genuinely is in the recipe's original SRC_URI
value, It isn't. However there is a difference between the FILESEXTRAPATHS
lines in the two instances - one points to a subdirectory called "files" and
the other to a directory called "${PN}" (substituting the recipe name in
there, of course). That might account for it going from not working to
working depending on where you put the service file next to your bbappend.

Cheers,
Paul

-- 

Paul Eggleton
Intel Open Source Technology Centre