You're reading from Mastering Embedded Linux Programming - Third Edition

Product type Book

Published in May 2021

Publisher Packt

ISBN-13 9781789530384

Pages 758 pages

Edition 3rd Edition

Languages

Concepts

Embedded Systems

Authors (2):

Frank Vasquez

Chris Simmonds

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Table of Contents (27) Chapters

Preface

1. Section 1: Elements of Embedded Linux

2. Chapter 1: Starting Out

3. Chapter 2: Learning about Toolchains

4. Chapter 3: All about Bootloaders

5. Chapter 4: Configuring and Building the Kernel

6. Chapter 5: Building a Root Filesystem

7. Chapter 6: Selecting a Build System

8. Chapter 7: Developing with Yocto

9. Chapter 8: Yocto Under the Hood

10. Section 2: System Architecture and Design Decisions

11. Chapter 9: Creating a Storage Strategy

12. Chapter 10: Updating Software in the Field

13. Chapter 11: Interfacing with Device Drivers

14. Chapter 12: Prototyping with Breakout Boards

15. Chapter 13: Starting Up – The init Program

16. Chapter 14: Starting with BusyBox runit

17. Chapter 15: Managing Power

18. Section 3: Writing Embedded Applications

19. Chapter 16: Packaging Python

20. Chapter 17: Learning about Processes and Threads

21. Chapter 18: Managing Memory

22. Section 4: Debugging and Optimizing Performance

23. Chapter 19: Debugging with GDB

24. Chapter 20: Profiling and Tracing

25. Chapter 21: Real-Time Programming

26. Other Books You May Enjoy

Using Mender for local updates

So much for the theory. In the next two sections of this chapter, I want to demonstrate how the principles I have talked about so far work in practice. For these examples, I will use Mender. Mender uses a symmetric A/B image update mechanism, with a fallback in the event of a failed update. It can operate in standalone mode for local updates, or in managed mode for OTA updates. I will begin with standalone mode.

Mender is written and supported by mender.io (https://mender.io). There is much more information about the software in the documentation section of the website. I will not delve deeply into the configuration of the software here since my aim is to illustrate the principles of software updates. Let's begin with the Mender client.

Building the Mender client

The Mender client is available as a Yocto meta layer. These examples use the Dunfell release of the Yocto Project, which is the same one that we used in Chapter 6, Selecting a Build...