// -*- mode:doc; -*- // vim: set syntax=asciidoc: [[adding-board-support]] == Adding support for a particular board Buildroot contains basic configurations for several publicly available hardware boards, so that users of such a board can easily build a system that is known to work. You are welcome to add support for other boards to Buildroot too. To do so, you need to create a normal Buildroot configuration that builds a basic system for the hardware: (internal) toolchain, kernel, bootloader, filesystem and a simple BusyBox-only userspace. No specific package should be selected: the configuration should be as minimal as possible, and should only build a working basic BusyBox system for the target platform. You can of course use more complicated configurations for your internal projects, but the Buildroot project will only integrate basic board configurations. This is because package selections are highly application-specific. Once you have a known working configuration, run +make savedefconfig+. This will generate a minimal +defconfig+ file at the root of the Buildroot source tree. Move this file into the +configs/+ directory, and rename it +_defconfig+. If the configuration is a bit more complicated, it is nice to manually reformat it and separate it into sections, with a comment before each section. Typical sections are _Architecture_, _Toolchain options_ (typically just linux headers version), _Firmware_, _Bootloader_, _Kernel_, and _Filesystem_. Always use fixed versions or commit hashes for the different components, not the "latest" version. For example, set +BR2_LINUX_KERNEL_CUSTOM_VERSION=y+ and +BR2_LINUX_KERNEL_CUSTOM_VERSION_VALUE+ to the kernel version you tested with. It is recommended to use as much as possible upstream versions of the Linux kernel and bootloaders, and to use as much as possible default kernel and bootloader configurations. If they are incorrect for your board, or no default exists, we encourage you to send fixes to the corresponding upstream projects. However, in the mean time, you may want to store kernel or bootloader configuration or patches specific to your target platform. To do so, create a directory +board/+ and a subdirectory +board//+. You can then store your patches and configurations in these directories, and reference them from the main Buildroot configuration. Refer to xref:customize[] for more details. Before submitting patches for new boards it is recommended to test it by building it using latest gitlab-CI docker container. To do this use +utils/docker-run+ script and inside it issue these commands: -------------------- $ make _defconfig $ make -------------------- By default, Buildroot developers use the official image hosted on the https://gitlab.com/buildroot.org/buildroot/container_registry/2395076[gitlab.com registry] and it should be convenient for most usage. If you still want to build your own docker image, you can base it off the official image as the +FROM+ directive of your own _Dockerfile_: ---- FROM registry.gitlab.com/buildroot.org/buildroot/base:YYYYMMDD.HHMM RUN ... COPY ... ---- The current version _YYYYMMDD.HHMM_ can be found in the +.gitlab-ci.yml+ file at the top of the Buildroot source tree; all past versions are listed in the aforementioned registry as well.