Jürgen Beisert - PTXdist for bare metal

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PTXdist is intended as a development environment for Linux based embedded systems. It builds on the host system a full Linux system which includes a kernel and all required application.
But first PTXdist is a development environment which does automatically build software from its sources.
Its main feature is reproducibility. So it is meant for my microcontroller projects to support everyone who wants to build my software.

Preparation

My firmware comes as a source code archive. To compile it we need a toolchain, that means a compiler, assembler and linker. Also we need a basic library to gain access to processor's peripherals.
There are various ways to get a toolchain. Perhaps you can install a binary one from your distribution. Or you can build one by your own. And this way I want to use.
But don't be afraid. I will not boring you with entering endless command lines, configuring, building and installing all parts.

PTXdist

Instead I'm using a tool that does all the required steps for me. This tool is intended to build root file systems for Linux targets from source archives. But it uses always cross toolchains for this job, and it makes no difference if this toolchain creates code for ARM, PorwerPC or Atmega CPUs. So we let it build our Atmega toolchain.

Where to get and how to install?

Its easy to install PTXdist on your linux host. Simply follow this manual.
Or in shortform:

~$ wget http://www.pengutronix.de/software/ptxdist/download/v1.99/ptxdist-1.99.10.tgz
~$ wget http://www.pengutronix.de/software/ptxdist/download/v1.99/ptxdist-1.99.10-patches.tgz
~$ tar xf ptxdist-1.99.10.tgz
~$ tar xf ptxdist-1.99.10-patches.tgz
~$ cd ptxdist-1.99.10
~/cd ptxdist-1.99.10$ ./configure
~/cd ptxdist-1.99.10$ make
~/cd ptxdist-1.99.10$ sudo make install

AVR Toolchain

To get a cross toolchain is also very easy, because PTXdist does it for us. PTXdist works on projects, so now we need a toolchain project. This is called OSELAS.Toolchain. Just follow this manual. And build the

avr/avr_gcc-4.3.2_libc-1.6.2_binutils-2.19.ptxconfig

toolchain instead of the default one.
Or in shortform:

~$ wget http://www.pengutronix.de/oselas/toolchain/download/OSELAS.Toolchain-1.99.2.tar.bz2
~$ tar xf OSELAS.Toolchain-1.99.2.tar.bz2
~$ cd OSELAS.Toolchain-1.99.2
~/OSELAS.Toolchain-1.99.2$ ptxdist select ptxconfigs/avr/avr_gcc-4.3.2_libc-1.6.2_binutils-2.19.ptxconfig
~/OSELAS.Toolchain-1.99.2$ ptxdist go

Now you must be patient. Building a toolchain can take 20 minutes up to several hours. Experts may download/install a binary toolchain from their Linux distribution.
The final toolchain gets installed to /opt/OSELAS.Toolchain-1.99.2. You can remove the local build directory, when building is finished.

~/OSELAS.Toolchain-1.99.2$ cd ..
~$ rm -rf OSELAS.Toolchain-1.99.2

Note: Most of the PTXdist projects do not come with the source archives they are using. Instead they will download them from the web on demand. Thats why you need an internet connection (as fast as possible) and the tool wget.

It can happen that some source archives are no more present at their default location in the web. PTXdist will emit an error and stop. One solution can be to manually search for this archive and download it by hand. Store this archive into the global source archive directory (refer ptxdist setup). Next time PTXdist will use it, instead of trying to download it again. If there are archives gone on their web place, please drop me a note. I can change the URL or store a copy of it on my website instead.

Note: I tested all my AVR projects with exactely this toolchain built by PTXdist. If your are using a different toolchain I can't test and comment any strage behaviour you may see on your system.