How Flashing Now Works with Debian

Louis_Thiery · March 21, 2014, 5:51pm

Hello,

I’m trying to leverage the flashing process included in the new Debian images to move my own distribution over but I’m confused on the current mechanics.

I did find this page: http://elinux.org/Beagleboard:Updating_The_Software

but perhaps that explains how flashing used to work with Angstrom? I wasn’t able to see the same architecture happening over on the new Debian images which works in 15 minutes instead of 45 minutes.

I did find /opt/scripts/tools/beaglebone-black-eMMC-flasher.sh but I’m not particularly sure of the mechanics.

It seems to me that when the boot button is pressed, the BBB mounts and boots from the eMMC-flasher partition. Somehow this script is executed (I couldn’t find the relevant systemd process) and it copies over everything on that same partition over to the eMMC and then powers off.

Next time, I boot from the eMMC, how does the script knows to not execute, seeing as it can’t really copy the eMMC to the eMMC… How does all this work?

Thanks,
Louis

RobertCNelson · March 21, 2014, 7:11pm

Hello,

I'm trying to leverage the flashing process included in the new Debian
images to move my own distribution over but I'm confused on the current
mechanics.

I did find this page: Beagleboard:Updating The Software - eLinux.org

but perhaps that explains how flashing used to work with Angstrom? I wasn't
able to see the same architecture happening over on the new Debian images
which works in 15 minutes instead of 45 minutes.

yeah, totally different. Angstrom extracted a tar.gz into the new
eMMC. Whereas i'm just using rsync to sync microSD -> eMMC.

I did find /opt/scripts/tools/beaglebone-black-eMMC-flasher.sh but I'm not
particularly sure of the mechanics.

It seems to me that when the boot button is pressed, the BBB mounts and
boots from the eMMC-flasher partition. Somehow this script is executed (I
couldn't find the relevant systemd process) and it copies over everything on
that same partition over to the eMMC and then powers off.

It's actually a classic init script. systemd runs it just fine.

You can view it here:
https://github.com/beagleboard/image-builder/blob/master/target/init_scripts/generic-debian.sh

It's stored here: /etc/init.d/boot_scripts.sh

This script takes care of a few generic tasks, setting the clock,
regenerating ssh keys, before calling a board specific script.
(referenced from /boot/uboot/SOC.sh)

This is the board specific script:

github.com

RobertCNelson/boot-scripts/blob/master/boot/am335x_evm.sh

#!/bin/sh -e
#
# Copyright (c) 2013-2020 Robert Nelson <robertcnelson@gmail.com>
#
# Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
# of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
# in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
# to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
# copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
# furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
#
# The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in
# all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
#
# THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
# IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
# FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
# AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
# LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
# OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN

This file has been truncated. show original

It's stored here: /opt/scripts/boot/am335x_evm.sh

It takes care of flashing blank eeprom, getting the mac address,
setting up the gadget drivers, enablng the local dhcp server, calling
the flasher.sh script, and finishing the microSD resize when needed.

Next time, I boot from the eMMC, how does the script knows to not execute,
seeing as it can't really copy the eMMC to the eMMC... How does all this
work?

That depends:

If the flasher "microSD" is still installed, it WILL flash the eMMC "again"..

If you re-add the "trigger" file:

github.com

RobertCNelson/boot-scripts/blob/master/boot/am335x_evm.sh#L110


      
          fi
          
          cleanup_extra_docs () {
          	#recovers 82MB of space
          	if [ -d /var/cache/doc-beaglebonegreen-getting-started ] ; then
          		echo "${log} Cleaning up: /var/cache/doc-beaglebonegreen-getting-started"
          		rm -rf /var/cache/doc-beaglebonegreen-getting-started || true
          	fi
          	if [ -d /var/cache/doc-seeed-bbgw-getting-started ] ; then
          		echo "${log} Cleaning up: /var/cache/doc-seeed-bbgw-getting-started"
          		rm -rf /var/cache/doc-seeed-bbgw-getting-started || true
          	fi
          }
          
          #original user:
          usb_image_file="/var/local/usb_mass_storage.img"
          
          #*.iso priority over *.img
          if [ -f /var/local/bb_usb_mass_storage.iso ] ; then
          	usb_image_file="/var/local/bb_usb_mass_storage.iso"
          elif [ -f /var/local/bb_usb_mass_storage.img ] ; then

It will attempt the flash the "other" media..

If you look closely, the flasher script doesn't care if it's microSD
or eMMC, it's designed to flash the "other" media:

github.com

RobertCNelson/boot-scripts/blob/master/tools/beaglebone-black-eMMC-flasher.sh#L39


      
          	exit
          fi
          
          unset boot_drive
          boot_drive=$(LC_ALL=C lsblk -l | grep "/boot/uboot" | awk '{print $1}')
          
          if [ "x${boot_drive}" = "x" ] ; then
          	echo "Error: script halting, system unrecognized..."
          	exit 1
          fi
          
          if [ "x${boot_drive}" = "xmmcblk0p1" ] ; then
          	source="/dev/mmcblk0"
          	destination="/dev/mmcblk1"
          fi
          
          if [ "x${boot_drive}" = "xmmcblk1p1" ] ; then
          	source="/dev/mmcblk1"
          	destination="/dev/mmcblk0"
          fi

Regards,

Louis_Thiery · March 21, 2014, 7:22pm

Just to see if it would “just work”, I tried to run the script from my distribution and the scrip is unhappy:

/bin/bash /opt/scripts/beaglebone-black-eMMC-flasher.sh
Error: script halting, system unrecognized…

Louis_Thiery · March 21, 2014, 7:23pm

Oops - just saw your reply. Will study what you describe

RobertCNelson · March 21, 2014, 7:26pm

The "script" assumes a few things, so i have a couple quick system
checks, that make it stop if it doesn't recognize the system..

Regards,

Louis_Thiery · March 21, 2014, 8:59pm

Cool - I don’t think I’ve ever played with such structured scripts before!

I’ve gotten up to the board specific script and I get the following:

Valid EEPROM header found
sed: can’t read /etc/default/udhcpd: No such file or directory
cat: /etc/udhcpd.conf: No such file or directory
/opt/scripts/boot/am335x_evm.sh: line 85: /etc/udhcpd.conf: Read-only file system
/opt/scripts/boot/am335x_evm.sh: line 86: /etc/udhcpd.conf: Read-only file system
/opt/scripts/boot/am335x_evm.sh: line 87: /etc/udhcpd.conf: Read-only file system
/opt/scripts/boot/am335x_evm.sh: line 88: /etc/udhcpd.conf: Read-only file system
/opt/scripts/boot/am335x_evm.sh: line 89: /etc/udhcpd.conf: Read-only file system
/opt/scripts/boot/am335x_evm.sh: line 91: /etc/init.d/udhcpd: No such file or directory
SIOCSIFADDR: No such device
usb0: ERROR while getting interface flags: No such device
SIOCSIFNETMASK: No such device
/opt/scripts/boot/am335x_evm.sh: line 94: /usr/sbin/udhcpd: No such file or directory
Device “usb0” does not exist.
Device “wlan0” does not exist.
sed: couldn’t open temporary file /etc/sedXOJqCd: Read-only file system
/opt/scripts/boot/am335x_evm.sh: line 103: /etc/issue: Read-only file system

It seems that the main issue is that the partition that I’m running is read-only… I don’t know when I set it as such and chmod’ing the whole thing didn’t seem to resolve.

I guess I’ll built my distro over again and try to find out at which point I made it “read-only”

Louis_Thiery · March 22, 2014, 4:48pm

Ah got everything working nicely Thanks for much for the help, Nelson.

I especially like the script located at: /opt/scripts/tools/eMMC/beaglebone-black-make-microSD-flasher-from-eMMC.sh

panos · July 14, 2014, 5:29pm

Hi,

I am getting as well the “Error: script halting, system unrecognized.” when executing beaglebone-black-eMMC-flasher.sh.
The image I have flashed is from here http://elinux.org/BeagleBoardDebian#Flasher https://rcn-ee.net/deb/flasher/wheezy/BBB-eMMC-flasher-debian-7.5-console-armhf-2014-07-06-2gb.img.xz.
When I check with “LC_ALL=C lsblk -l” the mountpoint “/boot/uboot” is missing.

NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
mmcblk1boot0 179:16 0 1M 1 disk
mmcblk1boot1 179:24 0 1M 1 disk
mmcblk0 179:0 0 7.4G 0 disk
mmcblk1 179:8 0 1.8G 0 disk
mmcblk1p1 179:9 0 96M 0 part
mmcblk1p2 179:10 0 1.7G 0 part /

Is there anything that I can do?
What I want to do is clone a beaglebone black to multiple others, is beaglebone-black-eMMC-flasher.sh the best way to do that?
Thanks in advance.

RobertCNelson · July 14, 2014, 5:50pm

So in, 2014-07-06 i rewrote a lot of things...

First, make sure you run:

cd /opt/scripts/tools/
git pull

Next open: /boot/uEnv.txt

Uncomment this line:

#cmdline=init=/opt/scripts/tools/eMMC/init-eMMC-flasher-v2.sh

At this point your microSD card is set to flash the eMMC.. so shutdown
(sudo halt) and get ready to flash stuff..

Regards,

panos · July 17, 2014, 9:05am

Thank you Nelson, everything worked perfectly!
You have been a great help!

Joshua_S · September 21, 2016, 11:54pm

THANKS!!! The git pull saved me ! I couldn’t get the correct loader files to save my life.