Dear bhargavak,

In message 1364124418778-150541.post@n7.nabble.com you wrote:

The problem I'm facing is how do I load my images into eMMC flash.

There is a several ways to do that.

The tftp command the manual uses seems pretty staright forward, but it does require a network connection, doesn't it ?

Yes, indeed TFTP needs a network connection (which, if supported for your hardware, can also be over USB).

I just have a microUSB connecting my PC and board(a device running android on OMAP44xx), how do I proceed ?

If the device is running Android, you definitely also have a network connection, or don't you? Why don't you do the needed formatting of the eMMA< creationof file system and installation f the images under an OS, then?

In U-Boot then you can simply read from that file system.

Best regards,

Wolfgang Denk

Hi,

On Sat, 30 Mar 2013 10:47:08 -0700 (PDT) bhargavak anur.bhargav@gmail.com wrote:

I created a partition in my eMMC, used fastboot to flash a "example.bmp".. How do I get the base address of the partition ?

I have the following partitions on my device running android, has a u-boot bootloader

U-Boot 1.1.4.XTRAVERSION-g6c554dbc-dirty (Mar 26 2013 - 14:26:11 Load address: 0x80e80000 DRAM: 512 MB Flash: 0 kB Using default environment In: serial Out: serial Err: serial efi partition table: ptbl slot: EMMC:(1). 256 128K xloader 512 3M bootloader 6656 512K splash 7680 128K misc 8704 64M efs 139776 16K crypto 139808 16M recovery 172576 8M boot 188960 512M system 1237536 256M cache 1761824 128M apk 2023968 2787M userdata

How do I get the base address of each partition,

you seem to have only one efi partition. What do you need the base address for?

I tried the following commands in u-boot but It either gives me an error or doesn't return anything

1. # flinfo

Bank # 1: missing or unknown FLASH type Bank # 2: missing or unknown FLASH type

This command is for NOR-Flash info, so this output is expected.

2. fsinfo

Device Hangs up

3. # fli

Bank # 1: missing or unknown FLASH type Bank # 2: missing or unknown FLASH type

Please help me find the base address of each of the partition.

For loading files from a partition you do not need to know its base address. Use appropriate commands, "fatload" comes to mind.

HTH,

Anatolij

Hi,

On Sun, 31 Mar 2013 02:30:00 -0700 (PDT) bhargavak anur.bhargav@gmail.com wrote:

Hi

Thank you for that heads up. In one of posts above a reference to the following code fragment is made, it uses a fatload command

...

For example, this is the whole "code" for a slide show demo I've been using on a number of trade shows:

...

   bootdelay=6 
   show_one=fatload mmc 0:2 40001000 slide-${i}.bmp;bmp d 40001000 
   slide_show=while mmc rescan; do for i in 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 ; do run

show_one ; sleep ${delay} ; done ; done bootcmd=run slideshow

Can you please explain the "show_one" and the "slide_show" commands ? And, do I just put this into board config ?

"show_one" and "slide_show" are environment variables containing a sequence of U-Boot commands. These can be executed by "run show_one" or "run slide_show".

When "show_one" is executed, U-Boot runs two commands:

fatload mmc 0:2 40001000 slide-${i}.bmp

and

bmp display 40001000

The first command loads a file (i.e. "slide-0.bmp") into SDRAM memory at address 0x40001000. It loads the file from the MMC/SD-Card which is connected to the first available SD-Card controller. The file is loaded from the second partition on the SD-Card which is a FAT partition (therefore fatload command). The "${i}" in the file name is used to be able to load images with different file names when this command is executed in a loop.

The second command reads the image at address 0x40001000 in SDRAM, decodes the image data and copies it into the frame buffer.

"slide_show" command is a loop which test for SD-Card presence ("mmc rescan") and executes another inner loop in which the "show_one" command is running 8 times with index "i" counting from 1 to 8 (so that 8 different images are loaded into SDRAM while each loop iteration). After each load/display operation in the loop the execution of the next loop iteration is delayed by the amount of seconds specified in the "delay" environment variable.

Note that these loops will only work if U-Boot was built with enabled CONFIG_SYS_HUSH_PARSER in the board configuration.

You normally won't put these commands into board config. You have to setup the environment variables on the U-Boot command line using "setenv" command and save them using "saveenv" command.

HTH,

Anatolij

On Sun, 31 Mar 2013 04:54:35 -0700 (PDT) bhargavak anur.bhargav@gmail.com wrote:

That's a very nice explanation.. Here's what I will do, please tell me if the whole procedure is right.

I have a SD-card partitioned as follows: boot: FAT32, holds a MLO and u-boot.bin through which I boot my device (runs on OMAP4470) rootfs: mostly empty always (ext4 currently), I will format it as FAT32

I copy "slide-0.bmp" into the rootfs partition and define "CONFIG_SYS_HUSH_PARSER".

Note that CONFIG_SYS_HUSH_PARSER is not necessary if you do not use 'for' or 'while' loops (but it won't hurt, an maybe it is already defined in your config file).

Then I stop the bootloader before the kernel starts, do "setenv" as follows, and "saveenv"

...

show_one=fatload mmc 0:2 40001000 slide-${i}.bmp;bmp d 40001000

Note that when Wolfgang showed you this example, it was only for reference how it could be done. You shouldn't blindly input commands without understanding what these commands are supposed to do. You also should read the command documentation in the U-Boot manual and apply common sense. For example the load address 40001000 in the above example is valid only for a particular architecture, starting offset of the DRAM memory and available memory size. Using 40001000 address in your case might be wrong.

In your case only 512 MiB DRAM is available, you need to figure out where the DRAM starts. Use "bdinfo" command and look at the DRAM bank start value, i.e.:

U-Boot > bdinfo ... DRAM bank = 0x00000000 -> start = 0x10000000 -> size = 0x40000000 ...

In this example the memory starts at address 0x10000000, so a reasonable load address could be 10001000 (since the area starting from 10000000 might contain interrupt/exception vectors, we skip 0x1000 sized block at start of DRAM).

for setting the environment variable use

setenv show_one 'fatload mmc 0:2 40001000 slide-0.bmp;bmp d 40001000'

but replace 40001000 address with a valid address for your board. On my board from the above example I could use address 10001000.

Then do the following:

...

run show_one

I should be able to see the image on the screen ?

Provided you used a valid load address and enabled support for "bmp" command and splash screen, yes.

Is there any other configuration options that I should enable ?

I do not know your board and do not have your U-Boot source, so cannot tell for sure. But you need at least

CONFIG_CMD_BMP CONFIG_SPLASH_SCREEN CONFIG_VIDEO CONFIG_CFB_CONSOLE CONFIG_VGA_AS_SINGLE_DEVICE CONFIG_SYS_CONSOLE_IS_IN_ENV

and the config option to enable your video driver.

For some reason "saveenv" was not working for me yesterday, when I tried to experiment with the "splashimage" environment variable. I do not remember the exact error it threw, I could post the error first thing tomorrow from my workplace. As a workaround can I set above variables in my "OMAP" config header ?

Look at the CONFIG_EXTRA_ENV_SETTINGS definition in your config header. It includes additional definitions for embedded environment. You could add your variables in this list, but it is only used if the default environment is used. Your board is not in mainline, so I cannot tell exactly what else might be needed.

My u-boot version is "U-Boot 1.1.4-geb3fa991".

This version is _very_ old, we do not support it.

Thanks,

Anatolij

Anatolij,

Thanks for the direction you gave..

I'm able to move all the images into one partiton and display each of them on need basis by branching to the respective offset addresses.

I need to know the following, can you please give me your suggestion:

I have been asked to find out if u-boot supports displaying images without having to store them into any partition in advance. (Why ? the question here was, what if someone forgets to flash the images ? bizzare ? I don't know.. ;) )

Can we zip a .bmp image and compile it with a u-boot and unzip the archive runtime ? If this is possible, can it be done without increasing the size of the "u-boot.bin" ?

I tried the "xxd -i" command to get a hex dump of the .zip file into a ".h" file, but this method increased the size of the "*.h" file generated. (it is almost the same as the .bmp file inside the .zip)

Can you please give me your suggestions.

Regards Bhargav

On Sun, Mar 31, 2013 at 6:51 PM, Anatolij Gustschin agust@denx.de wrote:

On Sun, 31 Mar 2013 04:54:35 -0700 (PDT) bhargavak anur.bhargav@gmail.com wrote:

...

That's a very nice explanation.. Here's what I will do, please tell me if the whole procedure is right.

I have a SD-card partitioned as follows: boot: FAT32, holds a MLO and u-boot.bin through which I boot my device

(runs

...

on OMAP4470) rootfs: mostly empty always (ext4 currently), I will format it as FAT32

I copy "slide-0.bmp" into the rootfs partition and define "CONFIG_SYS_HUSH_PARSER".

Note that CONFIG_SYS_HUSH_PARSER is not necessary if you do not use 'for' or 'while' loops (but it won't hurt, an maybe it is already defined in your config file).

...

Then I stop the bootloader before the kernel starts, do "setenv" as

follows,

...

and "saveenv"

...

show_one=fatload mmc 0:2 40001000 slide-${i}.bmp;bmp d 40001000

Note that when Wolfgang showed you this example, it was only for reference how it could be done. You shouldn't blindly input commands without understanding what these commands are supposed to do. You also should read the command documentation in the U-Boot manual and apply common sense. For example the load address 40001000 in the above example is valid only for a particular architecture, starting offset of the DRAM memory and available memory size. Using 40001000 address in your case might be wrong.

In your case only 512 MiB DRAM is available, you need to figure out where the DRAM starts. Use "bdinfo" command and look at the DRAM bank start value, i.e.:

U-Boot > bdinfo ... DRAM bank = 0x00000000 -> start = 0x10000000 -> size = 0x40000000 ...

In this example the memory starts at address 0x10000000, so a reasonable load address could be 10001000 (since the area starting from 10000000 might contain interrupt/exception vectors, we skip 0x1000 sized block at start of DRAM).

for setting the environment variable use

setenv show_one 'fatload mmc 0:2 40001000 slide-0.bmp;bmp d 40001000'

but replace 40001000 address with a valid address for your board. On my board from the above example I could use address 10001000.

...

Then do the following:

...

run show_one

I should be able to see the image on the screen ?

Provided you used a valid load address and enabled support for "bmp" command and splash screen, yes.

...

Is there any other configuration options that I should enable ?

I do not know your board and do not have your U-Boot source, so cannot tell for sure. But you need at least

CONFIG_CMD_BMP CONFIG_SPLASH_SCREEN CONFIG_VIDEO CONFIG_CFB_CONSOLE CONFIG_VGA_AS_SINGLE_DEVICE CONFIG_SYS_CONSOLE_IS_IN_ENV

and the config option to enable your video driver.

...

For some reason "saveenv" was not working for me yesterday, when I tried

to

...

experiment with the "splashimage" environment variable. I do not remember the exact error it threw, I could post the error first thing tomorrow from my workplace. As a workaround can I set above variables in my "OMAP" config header ?

Look at the CONFIG_EXTRA_ENV_SETTINGS definition in your config header. It includes additional definitions for embedded environment. You could add your variables in this list, but it is only used if the default environment is used. Your board is not in mainline, so I cannot tell exactly what else might be needed.

...

My u-boot version is "U-Boot 1.1.4-geb3fa991".

This version is _very_ old, we do not support it.

Thanks,

Anatolij