Information for ESCHER Developers

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This page contains information regarding things to download, files to plugin, and basic info to be shared among developers for the ESCHER@Berkeley Project.

Please check out the FAQ if you have other questions not answered here.

See also the Gumstix faq. For information on building STLPort for your use, go here.

Modus Operandi for Escher Developers

By far the easiest thing to do is use a crosscompiler which we have built on a local Berkeley machine, and use it to build your sources. There are several possibilities for this:

• ransom.eecs.berkeley.edu

  This is a dual processor Pentium Xeon machine with all of the drivespace and processor space you could want. It is running Microsoft Windows Terminal Server, and can handle arbitrarily many concurrent logins through Remote Desktop (a.k.a. Microsoft Terminal Server Client, mstsc.exe). You must be a member of the permitted users list to use this machine, e-mail sprinkle@EECS in order to gain access.

  On this machine are located several crosscompilers. Use the following steps to select a crosscompiler on that machine, after logging in and starting up a cygwin shell:

  [sprinkle@ransom ~]
$ cd /usr/local/escher/crosscompile

  [sprinkle@ransom /usr/local/escher/crosscompile]
$ source select_crosscompiler

  See the crosscompiler page for more information on this tool.

• bruce.eecs.berkeley.edu

This is an Apple Mac Mini machine, with IBM PowerPC processor, running Terrasoft Yellow Dog Linux (YDL), and can handle arbitrarily many concurrent logins through ssh. If you feel more comfortable with SSH, you can use this machine, and its several crosscompilers. You must be a member of the permitted users list to use this machine, e-mail sprinkle@EECS in order to gain access.

Use the following steps to select a crosscompiler on that machine, after logging in and starting up a bash shell:

[sprinkle@bruce ~]
$ cd /usr/local/escher/crosscompiler

[sprinkle@bruce /usr/local/escher/crosscompile]
$ source select_crosscompiler

See the crosscompiler page for more information on this tool.

Programs you need to download

• Makefile, Project and Workspace Creator (MPC) (from OCI)
  • Download this (I am using version 3.3.0) and install it somewhere in your Cygwin/*nix path
  • I chose /usr/local/MPC/MPC-3.3.0/ as the directory. We might later add this to the ESCHER code release.
• Buildroot (from busybox)
  • You don't need to download this tool if you use the checkout file available in the CVS module. As long as you have subversion on your machine, everything else should be taken care of.

Files and commands for cygwin/*nix development

• Syntax highlighting file for MPC files using vi (mpc.vim). Source this file from your .vimrc file. Note this file is a hack, and I welcome anyone who is willing to clean it up. If you end up creating a better one for vi, or one for emacs, please let me know and I will post it online.
• We are using MPC, which means you should have these declarations somewhere in your login scripts. I recommend .bash_login

  # please substitute the the appropriate directory
export MPC_HOME=/usr/local/MPC/MPC-3.3.0
alias mpc='perl $MPC_HOME/mpc.pl'
alias mwc='perl $MPC_HOME/mwc.pl'

Source Code Modules

As of 11/26, all source code is contained in the main escher module on source.eecs.berkeley.edu. What you find here are the directories inside there and explanations of what is contained therein.