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Building ForgeFIRM with kas

The forgefirm repo is the base of the project: it controls the build, the resulting firmware images land here, and all build/install docs live here. It uses kas to manage Yocto layers and drive the build.

Baseline
Yocto release Scarthgap 5.0 LTS
Kernel linux-fslc 6.12 (mainline LTS, from meta-freescale)
Machine glowforge (i.MX6 Solo SOM — Basic/Plus/Pro)
Distro forgefirm
Image forgefirm-image

Layout

openglow-forgefirm/
├── forgefirm/                 ← THIS repo, the base
│   ├── kas/
│   │   ├── forgefirm-glowforge.yml   ← build entry point
│   │   └── README.md                 ← this file
│   ├── meta-forgefirm/        ← the forgefirm layer (this repo)
│   ├── BUILD.md / INSTALL.md / SERIAL.md
│   ├── layers/                ← kas-cloned upstreams (gitignored)
│   ├── build/                 ← bitbake output incl. images (gitignored)
│   ├── downloads/ sstate-cache/       ← caches (gitignored)
│   └── .gitignore
└── meta-openglow/             ← Glowforge BSP layers (local sibling checkout)

meta-openglow is referenced as a local sibling (../meta-openglow), so its in-place edits are what gets built. The commented pinned-remote block in forgefirm-glowforge.yml makes the forgefirm repo fully self-contained when flipped on. The source repos the recipes build (kernel-module-glowforge, grblHAL-glowforge, forgectrl, python3-gfhardware, Glowforge-Utilities) are fetched by pinned SRCREV and are not needed as local checkouts.

Prerequisites

A Linux build host, or WSL2 on Windows (officially supported by Yocto).

WSL2 note: keep this whole tree on the WSL2 native ext4 filesystem (e.g. ~/dev/openglow-forgefirm), not under /mnt/c/.... The Windows mount breaks case-sensitivity/permissions and is very slow for Yocto. Give the WSL2 VM plenty of RAM and disk in .wslconfig.

pipx install kas      # or: pip install kas

Build

Run from the forgefirm repo root so outputs land inside it:

cd forgefirm
kas build  kas/forgefirm-glowforge.yml     # fetch layers + full build
kas shell  kas/forgefirm-glowforge.yml     # interactive bitbake environment
kas dump   kas/forgefirm-glowforge.yml     # print the resolved config

The bootable image lands in build/tmp/deploy/images/glowforge/. Flashing / dual-boot install steps are in ../INSTALL.md.

Container build (optional, reproducible host)

cd forgefirm
kas-container build kas/forgefirm-glowforge.yml

Pinning exact versions (reproducible builds)

The config tracks the scarthgap branch of each upstream layer. To lock every layer to an exact commit:

kas lock kas/forgefirm-glowforge.yml      # writes kas/forgefirm-glowforge.lock.yml

kas auto-loads the lockfile on subsequent runs. Commit it; refresh deliberately.

Push & release order (source-of-truth sequencing)

The build is only reproducible when recipe pins, layer branches, and the kas config move in the right order. The sequence, with current status:

  1. Source repos pushed & pinned — DONE. Every source repo (kernel-module-glowforge, python3-gfhardware, Glowforge-Utilities, grblHAL-glowforge, forgectrl) is on GitHub and its recipe pins an exact SRCREV — no AUTOREV anywhere. Whenever a source repo changes: push it, then bump the recipe SRCREV deliberately (BSP recipes in meta-openglow, ForgeFIRM components in meta-forgefirm) and re-verify with bitbake -c fetch <recipe>.
  2. meta-openglow pushed — DONE. The Scarthgap port lives on the scarthgap branch (Yocto layer convention; the Dunfell-era master is untouched). Development continues on the local sibling checkout; push / fast-forward scarthgap as work lands.
  3. forgefirm pushed with the kas config and a kas lock lockfile pinning the upstream layers (poky, meta-openembedded, meta-freescale, meta-freescale-distro).
  4. At release time:
    • flip meta-openglow in forgefirm-glowforge.yml from the local-sibling block to the pinned-remote block (commented FUTURE block in the file);
    • refresh kas lock, tag all repos, and prove self-containment by building from a fresh clone.
  5. GitHub release: run scripts/release.sh <version> on the build host. It gates (version single-source, rootfs-vs-slot size, installer-embedded pubkey vs the signing key, factory-era fwup verification), builds, packs and signs forgefirm.fw, stages the assets with sha256sums.txt, and prints the gh release create command. Assets and their exact names (the installer and the update manager download them verbatim): forgefirm.fw, sha256sums.txt, forgefirm-image-glowforge.rootfs.wic.gz. The release tag v<version> = FORGEFIRM_RELEASE = the rootfs /etc/forgefirm-version = the .fw meta-version; release.sh enforces the agreement.

All recipes fetch their pinned revision from GitHub, so an image build is reproducible from the repos alone. For fast iteration on a source repo, bump its pin per iteration, or add a local, untracked externalsrc bbappend pointing at a working checkout — never commit one, or released images stop matching the pins.

Scarthgap migration backlog

The kas scaffold + LAYERSERIES_COMPAT bumps let the layers be selected under Scarthgap, but the legacy (Dunfell/Gatesgarth) layers won't build clean until:

  1. Override-syntax migration — DONE. All _append/_prepend/ _remove/_${PN} override syntax converted to the colon form across meta-forgefirm, meta-openglow-core, and meta-glowforge-bsp (22 occurrences).

  2. Kernel forward-port (4.14 → linux-fslc 6.12.20) — the factory NXP vendor kernel (linux-imx 4.14.98) carried 7 out-of-tree changes; these are re-derived against mainline 6.12 in meta-glowforge-bsp/recipes-kernel/linux/linux-fslc_%.bbappend (the forward-port landing zone), not re-applied as the 4.14 patches.

    • Foundation — DONE. linux-fslc 6.12.20 builds for glowforge with a ported device tree (glowforge.dts + openglow_common.dtsi overlaid into arch/arm/boot/dts/nxp/imx/, registered via a Makefile patch) and deploys zImage + glowforge.dtb. Boot-core + mainline-bound peripherals only.
    • Free wins — DONE. bus-freq disable dropped (no mainline busfreq); st,lis2hh12 ×3 + national,lm75b + ti,wl1805 + gpio keys/leds bind to mainline drivers; reg-userspace-consumer enabled via glowforge.cfg. (SPI-delay / PWM-prescaler dispositions are under Motion polish below.)
    • Motion path — DONE and hardware-validated (live-fed pulse stream, real gantry motion, laser fire). The whole chain forward-ports and compiles on 6.12:
      • EPIT API: epit_api.c in arch/arm/mach-imx (CONFIG_MXC_EPIT_API), in vmlinux, symbols exported; &epit1/&epit2 in the DT.
      • SDMA-expose: re-created dma-imx-sdma.h + 0003-imx-sdma-*.patch (un-static survivors, re-added the glowforge helpers, custom int-callback hook); expose symbols in Module.symvers.
      • glowforge.ko: ported across many 6.12 API changes (tasklet_hrtimer→soft hrtimer, timer_setup, LED-trigger API, pwm_get, spi_delay/controller, filelock.h, void .remove, 1-arg i2c probe). Compiles + links, 0 undefined symbols; the recipe fetches the module by pinned SRCREV.
      • DT: glowforge,cnc/thermal/pic/head re-added with pwms/pwm-names phandles; glowforge.dtb compiles with all motion nodes. Motion polish: PWM prescaler (factory 1001) is obsolete — 6.12 pwm-imx27 auto-computes the prescaler from the requested period. The PIC inter-word SPI delay (factory 1005) is a hardware-bring-up TODO: 6.12 spi-imx.c has no PERIODREG/word_delay programming, so re-derive it in spi_imx_setupxfer (write MX51_ECSPI_PERIODREG from t->word_delay, guarded to ECSPI) and verify the wait-states on a scope. pic.c keeps the inter-transfer delay meanwhile. The factory glowforge,imx-pwm-audio (buzzer) driver is not part of ForgeFIRM.
    • Camera — DONE and hardware-validated. The factory ov5648_mipi.c (NXP's removed v4l2_int_device/mxc_v4l2_capture) is replaced by the mainline ovti,ov5648 subdev + imx6 imx-media (IPU CSI)
      • imx6-mipi-csi2 receiver. The factory CAM_SEL MIPI switch is modeled with the mainline video-mux (gpio-mux on gpio7 10): both sensors → video-mux → mipi_csi → IPU CSI. Sensor xvclk is the board's 24 MHz fixed oscillator (matching the factory DTB); avdd/dovdd/dvdd rails are in the DT. Both cameras stream live through forgectrl (MJPEG at 15 fps with VPU JPEG encode, full-resolution snapshots, mux arbitration). HD-unit caveat: the DT lists both ovti,ov5648 (5 MP) and ovti,ov8856 (8 MP) at 0x36 so one image covers both, and the driver matching the chip ID wins — but mainline ov8856 expects a 19.2 MHz xvclk and only warns at 24 MHz, and the capture path is written to ov5648's SBGGR8 2592×1944 format set. 8 MP "HD" modules therefore bind but do not capture; adding 24 MHz PLL modes plus a sensor-aware capture path is the open work.

  3. u-boot — DONE. The glowforge u-boot is a standalone u-boot_2020.01.bb (Scarthgap's poky has no u-boot 2020.01 base recipe to extend). It reuses poky's u-boot-common.inc/u-boot.inc, pins SRCREV to the upstream v2020.01 tag with the matching Licenses/README md5, and overlays the glowforge board support + arch-Kconfig patch. Builds clean under Scarthgap (GCC 13, no source fixes) and deploys u-boot-glowforge.imx. Remaining: move fw_printenv/fw_setenv from u-boot-fw-utils to libubootenv (PREFERRED_PROVIDER_u-boot-fw-utils in glowforge.inc) when the rootfs needs them.

  4. Device tree — DONE. The glowforge .dts is validated against the linux-fslc 6.12 bindings and against the running board (motion, safety readbacks, cameras, sensors all bind and work).

  5. Real-time strategy — decided. The kernel runs CONFIG_PREEMPT=y (factory behavior; imx_v6_v7_defconfig alone gives only PREEMPT_VOLUNTARY). PREEMPT_RT is not selectable on arm32 6.12 (no ARCH_SUPPORTS_RT) and is not needed for the pulse feeder. The argument is about queue depth, not ring size: the ring drains at 1 byte per EPIT tick (≤200 KB/s even at the 200 kHz ceiling), so the live feeder's bounded queue depth of ~150 ms — a few KB in flight — already rides out worst-case scheduling latency with orders of magnitude to spare (measured: 0.2 ms worst write latency under full CPU + I/O load; the underrun bench ran 100 kHz for 120 s with zero underruns). The ring itself is 16 MiB (the ring_mb module parameter, backed by the 16 MiB reserved pool): ~84 s of stream at 200 kHz, ~28 min at the 10 kHz cloud-mode tick — a capacity that matters for the whole-job preload of cloud mode, not for latency. Bounded queue depth + SCHED_FIFO for the feeder is the design; revisit RT only if the underrun bench ever contradicts this arithmetic.

  6. gfui-client → forgectrl — DONE. The stock gfui-client is excluded from forgefirm-image (IMAGE_INSTALL:remove = "gfui-client" in meta-forgefirm/recipes-forgefirm/images/forgefirm-image.bb). Its slot is filled by forgectrl (github.com/ScottW514/forgectrl — the machine-services daemon: web control panel, cameras, telemetry, settings, diagnostics, cooling engine, updates, and controller-mode supervision) plus the two controllers it supervises, grblhal-glowforge (Grbl over TCP:23) and gfcloud (the optional Glowforge web-service client, off unless selected).

Image status: forgefirm-image builds end-to-end on the forward-ported stack and deploys forgefirm-image-glowforge.rootfs.wic.gz (+ zImage, glowforge.dtb, u-boot-glowforge.imx) under build/tmp/deploy/images/glowforge/. Build-time prerequisites baked into the config: ACCEPT_FSL_EULA = "1" (NXP firmware-imx — the image also installs firmware-imx-lic so the EULA text ships beside the blobs) and the kernel default in glowforge.conf. Every LICENSE string in the layers (meta-forgefirm, meta-glowforge-bsp, meta-openglow-core) is SPDX, and the recipes for third-party components that carry more than one license (wlconf, python3-gfhardware) declare each of them with a checksum on its license text. The stack is hardware-validated end to end: motion timing, the laser and safety chain, the camera pipeline, both controller modes, and the A/B install path.

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