FA526 / CNS2132 / TS-7500 build configuration

FA526 / CNS2132 / TS-7500 build configuration

[R.T. McGee]

The Faraday FA526 core is used in ARM processors like the Semi STR8132
/ Cavium CNS2132 which is in my Technologic Systems TS-7500 board in
addition to some NAS boxes out there. From what I have read, it
basically resembles a ARM920T but has NO thumb interworking support
which makes it not fully EABI compliant (
http://www.mail-archive.com/openocd-development@lists.berlios.de/msg05856.html
). I have build a few tool chains manually that produce working code
using a configuration meant for a OABI style armv4 which makes sense
since it uses NO thumb instructions, but I am not sure this is
optimal.

What is the best way to move forward to setup a OpenEmbedded
distro/machine configuration for something like the TS-7500 or a
general FA526 configuration?  I guess, one option is setup OABI ARMv4
style setup but this was removed from things like angstrom a while
ago. Switching to OABI just to get rid of thumb seems a little silly.

It would be nice to figure out a way to use EABI ARMv4T toolkit but
pass flags like -mapcs-32 -mno-thumb-interwork (just a guess) to GCC
to insure no thumb instructions (other weird things are discussed in
http://wiki.debian.org/ArmEabiPort#Otherscenarios ).  The linker
option -fix-v4bx looks promising for the linker also. A lot of things
are possible solutions, but whats the cleanest way to work it into
OpenEmbedded's build system?

Any suggestion would be helpful. Thanks.

Re: FA526 / CNS2132 / TS-7500 build configuration

[Khem Raj]

On (19/09/10 19:18), R.T. McGee wrote:
> The Faraday FA526 core is used in ARM processors like the Semi STR8132
> / Cavium CNS2132 which is in my Technologic Systems TS-7500 board in
> addition to some NAS boxes out there. From what I have read, it
> basically resembles a ARM920T but has NO thumb interworking support
> which makes it not fully EABI compliant (
> http://www.mail-archive.com/openocd-development@lists.berlios.de/msg05856.html
> ). I have build a few tool chains manually that produce working code
> using a configuration meant for a OABI style armv4 which makes sense
> since it uses NO thumb instructions, but I am not sure this is
> optimal.

eabi is now supported on armv4 architecture and we have OE internal
toolchain also support it from gcc 4.4.x onwards. 

> 
> What is the best way to move forward to setup a OpenEmbedded
> distro/machine configuration for something like the TS-7500 or a
> general FA526 configuration?  

look at any armv4 machines we have in OE e.g. collie and distros like
minimal or angstrom

DISTRO=minimal MACHINE=collie bitbake minimal-image 

I guess, one option is setup OABI ARMv4
> style setup but this was removed from things like angstrom a while
> ago. Switching to OABI just to get rid of thumb seems a little silly.
> 
> It would be nice to figure out a way to use EABI ARMv4T toolkit but
> pass flags like -mapcs-32 -mno-thumb-interwork (just a guess) to GCC
> to insure no thumb instructions (other weird things are discussed in
> http://wiki.debian.org/ArmEabiPort#Otherscenarios ).  The linker
> option -fix-v4bx looks promising for the linker also. A lot of things
> are possible solutions, but whats the cleanest way to work it into
> OpenEmbedded's build system?

its already functional in OE.

> 
> Any suggestion would be helpful. Thanks.
> 


Thx
-Khem

Re: FA526 / CNS2132 / TS-7500 build configuration

[R.T. McGee]

I got this all setup, and I even got openjdk compiled and working. For
anyone who is interested check it out on the wiki
http://wiki.openembedded.net/index.php/TS-7500

Also I posted the machine configurations here
http://mirror.lug.udel.edu/pub/lug-udel/projects/ts7500/  Is this the
right place to request these be added to the openembedded git tree?

On Sat, Oct 9, 2010 at 8:55 PM, R.T. McGee <67800@udel.edu> wrote:
> I got this all setup, and I even got openjdk compiled and working. For
> anyone who is interested check it out on the wiki
> http://wiki.openembedded.net/index.php/TS-7500
>
> Also I posted the machine configurations here
> http://mirror.lug.udel.edu/pub/lug-udel/projects/ts7500/  Is this the
> right place to request these be added to the openembedded git tree?
>
> On Sat, Oct 9, 2010 at 8:47 PM, R.T. McGee <67800@udel.edu> wrote:
>> I got this all setup, and I even got openjdk compiled and working. For
>> anyone who is interested check it out on the wiki
>> http://wiki.openembedded.net/index.php/TS-7500
>>
>> Also I posted the machine configurations here
>> http://mirror.lug.udel.edu/pub/lug-udel/projects/ts7500/  Is this the
>> right place to request these be added to the openembedded git tree?
>>
>> On Sun, Sep 19, 2010 at 7:15 PM, R.T. McGee <67800@udel.edu> wrote:
>>> The Faraday FA526 core is used in ARM processors like the Semi STR8132
>>> / Cavium CNS2132 which is in my Technologic Systems TS-7500 board in
>>> addition to some NAS boxes out there. From what I have read, it
>>> basically resembles a ARM920T but has NO thumb interworking support
>>> which makes it not fully EABI compliant (
>>> http://www.mail-archive.com/openocd-development@lists.berlios.de/msg05856.html
>>> ). I have build a few tool chains manually that produce working code
>>> using a configuration meant for a OABI style armv4 which makes sense
>>> since it uses NO thumb instructions, but I am not sure this is
>>> optimal.
>>>
>>> What is the best way to move forward to setup a OpenEmbedded
>>> distro/machine configuration for something like the TS-7500 or a
>>> general FA526 configuration?  I guess, one option is setup OABI ARMv4
>>> style setup but this was removed from things like angstrom a while
>>> ago. Switching to OABI just to get rid of thumb seems a little silly.
>>>
>>> It would be nice to figure out a way to use EABI ARMv4T toolkit but
>>> pass flags like -mapcs-32 -mno-thumb-interwork (just a guess) to GCC
>>> to insure no thumb instructions (other weird things are discussed in
>>> http://wiki.debian.org/ArmEabiPort#Otherscenarios ).  The linker
>>> option -fix-v4bx looks promising for the linker also. A lot of things
>>> are possible solutions, but whats the cleanest way to work it into
>>> OpenEmbedded's build system?
>>>
>>> Any suggestion would be helpful. Thanks.
>>>
>>
>

Re: FA526 / CNS2132 / TS-7500 build configuration

[Petr Štetiar]

R.T. McGee <67800@udel.edu> [2010-10-09 21:02:23]:

Hi,

> I got this all setup, and I even got openjdk compiled and working. For
> anyone who is interested check it out on the wiki
> http://wiki.openembedded.net/index.php/TS-7500

it's good to see, that another TS board is getting support in OE. Looking
forward to see the patches, mainly the one for kernel.

> Also I posted the machine configurations here
> http://mirror.lug.udel.edu/pub/lug-udel/projects/ts7500/  Is this the
> right place to request these be added to the openembedded git tree?

Yes, but you'll need to send it as patches [1].

1. http://wiki.openembedded.net/index.php/How_to_submit_a_patch_to_OpenEmbedded

-- ynezz