Hello Stefan, 

I was looking for alternate methods of running the program loaded at address 10001000. That was the only motive behind trying go. I kept using bootm till then. I wasn't exactly able to check where u-boot loaded its own memory sections. So instead, I set the load address for the kernel way above at 20000000 where I'm sure nothing else clashed. And loaded the uImage to 20800000. 

While it's still stuck at  'Starting kernel...' , I'll take your previous advice seriously. To use a JTAG debugger or recheck the UART definitions. 

I ran test-printf on linux and this is what I got:

spawn ./core
int main(): --- create local services ---
int main(): --- start init ---
int main(): transferred 17592186044415 MB to init
int main(): --- init created, waiting for exit condition ---
[init] Could not open file "ld.lib.so"
Quota exceeded! amount=4096, size=4096, consumed=4096
[init] upgrading quota donation for SIGNAL session
[init -> test-printf] -1 = -1 = -1
Test succeeded

Am I supposed to get similar messages from core on my board?

Thanks in advance
Aditya


On Mon, Jan 6, 2014 at 3:28 PM, Stefan Kalkowski <stefan.kalkowski@...1...> wrote:
Hi Aditya,

On 01/06/2014 09:18 AM, Aditya Kousik wrote:
> Hello Stefan,
>
> I added the print debug call inside extern "C" void kernel() function as
> you'd suggested. Still no response from the processor.
>
> I checked the address specifications in both Imx31_uart_base.h and also
> base/include/platform/imx6/board_base.h in Nikolay's branch. They are
> correct, to the dot. Even AIPS mapping in board.h in base-hw's core. The
> definitions seem to be fine.
>
> Ideally, what is expected to happen, i.e, the expected course of action? we
> can't load the kernel by running 'bootm' since you say it uses a different
> config. So what do we do with the uImage?

Well, I can't follow your conclusions to not using bootm? You've a
complete scenario packed into an ELF image, which is built to be loaded
at start address 0x10001000. This ELF image is used by u-boot's mkimage
utility to form a uImage file. This uImage can be loaded to some address
above 0x10300000 e.g. via TFTP like you did it.
Assuming you've loaded the uImage to 0x10800000, you should boot the
scenario with "bootm 0x10800000". After that u-boot will interpret the
uImage header at that address, load the ELF image within the uImage to
the appropriated memory sections, prepare the machine registers, and
finally jump to 0x10001000.

>
> 1. I loaded the uImage to 0x10800000 with TFTP as 'tftp 10800000'. It
> succesfully loaded the kernel to that address. At this point, I had changed
> the load address to 10002000 to check if the image was read properly. It
> did.
> 2. As a different approach, ran 'go 10002000'. This was what I got
> "##Application
> started at 0x10002000, Application terminated, rc = 0x100A4004"

Using the 'go XXX' command let u-boot simply load that address into the
ip register. As you've loaded an uImage to the related address, the
machine executes the u-boot image header information, which of course
fails. Even if you load the ELF image by hand to the appropriated memory
sections, it is not recommended to use the 'go' command, as u-boot
doesn't prepare the machine as expected. For instance, the kernel gets
executed with the MMU enabled using u-boot's page-table setup etc.

>
> What is the sequence of events, the programs that are sequentially executed
> to say that the kernel is 'running'?

In your case I assume:

  tftp 0x10800000 <network path to uImage>
  bootm 0x10800000

One further problem might be that u-boot's own memory sections (binary
data, exception vector) clashes with the scenario ones. Unfortunately,
mostly u-boot doesn't warn you if it fails to load the whole image due
to memory clashes. Therefore, it would be good, if it's possible to you,
to analyze the memory layout of the u-boot binary used on your platform,
e.g.: "readelf -S <u-boot binary>"

If there's a clash you can change the "LD_TEXT_ADDR" variable in
"base-hw/mk/spec-hw_imx6.mk" to another non-clashing address.

Regards
Stefan

>
> Thanks in advance
> Aditya Kousik
>
>
> On Thu, Jan 2, 2014 at 4:33 PM, Stefan Kalkowski <
> stefan.kalkowski@...1...> wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> On 01/02/2014 08:52 AM, Aditya Kousik wrote:
>>> Hello all,
>>>
>>> We've tried to run a basic test-printf script on a Freescale i.MX6
>>> sabrelite board. Based on
>>> this<http://sourceforge.net/p/genode/mailman/message/31760885/>,
>>> we implemented the necessary files. We had also come across an i.MX6
>> branch
>>> by Nikolay Golikov stating that he had a preliminary port of i.MX6 here:
>>> https://github.com/decaprox/genode/tree/i.mx6
>>>
>>> We ran RUN_OPT="--target=uboot" make run/printf to see if it does print
>> "-1
>>> = -1 = -1" to the serial console (tested with gtkterm).
>>>
>>> We ran the boot image uImage through TFTP at load address 0x10800000. It
>>> loads the kernel (267.9 kB) but stops at "Loading kernel".
>>
>> Assuming, your resulting kernel image is linked to 0x10001000, and ends
>> at about 0x102cbc55, like the result I got when compiling Nikolay's
>> branch, your load address for the u-boot uImage sounds reasonable.
>> Unfortunately, I can't reproduce your experiments, because I don't have
>> such a board available. The first thing that comes to my mind is, that
>> Nikolay used another board containing the i.MX6 SoC than you with
>> another memory layout of the related peripherals.
>>
>>>
>>> How do we know if the kernel is indeed running, or are we checking the
>>> right UART ports? (we checked UART1)
>>
>> First at all, you should add a printf command like:
>>
>>   PDBG("kernel started!")"
>>
>> at the very beginning of the kernel's execution. In Nikolay's branch I
>> would add it here:
>>
>>
>>
>> https://github.com/decaprox/genode/blob/i.mx6/base-hw/src/core/kernel.cc#L1366
>>
>> If that message isn't printed, very likely your UART definitions aren't
>> correct.
>>
>>>
>>> I gave "console=ttymxc0, 115200" as bootargs in u-boot. Any suggestions
>> on
>>> how to proceed? Because we are literally stuck.
>>
>> Forget about "bootargs" in u-boot. They are specific to booting the
>> Linux kernel. U-boot puts them into the Linux/ARM specific ATAG
>> structure. In Genode that structure isn't used. It's hard coded in the
>> kernel, which UART is used for kernel/core debug messages. In Nikolay's
>> branch, he uses the UART with memory mapped I/O located at 0x02020000,
>> and with the following UART definition:
>>
>>
>>
>> https://github.com/decaprox/genode/blob/i.mx6/base/include/drivers/uart/imx31_uart_base.h
>>
>> Please check whether this corresponds with your board's definitions.
>>
>>>
>>> Also, is there a good debugging tool for testing the genode environment
>> on
>>> direct hardware?
>>
>> Well, there is JTAG of course, which isn't related to Genode
>> specifically. There are other debugging utils available on Genode, like
>> GDB, but that wouldn't help on that low level you're currently working at.
>>
>> Regards
>> Stefan
>>
>>>
>>> Thanks in advance
>>> Aditya Kousik
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>> --
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>> Genode Labs
>>
>> http://www.genode-labs.com/ · http://genode.org/
>>
>>
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>
>
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Genode Labs

http://www.genode-labs.com/ · http://genode.org/

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