PICO-i.MX6UL Development Platform for Brillo

Quick Start Guide

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Contents

1. Overview ................................................................................................................................................... 2

2. Hardware Requirement ............................................................................................................................ 2

3. Getting Familiar with the Development Platform .................................................................................... 2

4. Connect the board and host computer..................................................................................................... 4

5. Instructions to set up the serial console terminal .................................................................................... 5

6. Download Mode and Boot Mode ............................................................................................................. 6

7. Prepare Brillo Images ................................................................................................................................ 8

7.1 Brillo Image Introduction .................................................................................................................... 8

7.2 Prebuilt Brillo Images .......................................................................................................................... 9

7.3 Self-Built Brillo Images ........................................................................................................................ 9

7.3.1 Build Environment Setup ............................................................................................................. 9

7.3.2 Get Brillo Source Code ................................................................................................................. 9

7.3.3 Build Brillo Images ........................................................................................................................ 9

8. Testing and Debugging Tools .................................................................................................................. 10

9. Flash Brillo Images .................................................................................................................................. 10

9.1 Flash Brillo Images with MFG Tools .................................................................................................. 10

9.2 Provision images with FASTBOOT mode ........................................................................................... 12

10. Boot Brillo ............................................................................................................................................. 12

10.1 Change boot arguments.................................................................................................................. 12

11. Instructions to make board into FASTBOOT mode ............................................................................... 12

12. Useful Links ........................................................................................................................................... 13

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1. Overview

This tutorial helps new developers get started with NXP’s development platform for Brillo – PICO-

i.MX6UL board, and software support. Specifically, it walks through the hardware setup, Brillo image

build and board booting process.

All code development, build, and unit testing take place on the developer’s host computer. The

resulting image is flashed to the target hardware for further integration testing and debugging over

USB or Ethernet. Just as Brillo is Android-based, the software development leverages Android

development tools including ADB (Android Development Bridge) and FASTBOOT mode to interact

with the target.

This development platform together with the Board Support Package software aim to enable faster

development of IoT devices based on Brillo, and flexible hardware/software customization needed

for the particular device.

2. Hardware Requirement

The development kit contains:

PICO-i.MX6UL-eMMC System-On-Module (SOM)

• PICO-Hobbit I/O carrier board (pre-assembled with the SOM)

• DC power supply

The power adapter specification is rated as follows:

DC output voltage: 5V

DC output Current: 2A

DC plug dimensions (mm): 5.5 +/- 0.05 (OD) x 2.1 +/- 0.05 (ID) x 10 +/- 0.3 (L)

Other required materials include:

• Cables:

For ADB/FASTBOOT/MFGTool

o USB type-A to USB type-C cable

Serial console:

o FTDI branded USB to Serial cable such as the FTDI TTL-232R-3V3-WE

o WiFi antenna (IPEX interface)

3. Getting Familiar with the Development Platform

If you just got your board, please familiarize yourself with the key components of the System-on-Module

(PICO-i.MX6UL-eMMC System-On-Module)

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Figure 1. PICO-i.MX6UL-eMMC SOM Components

The key interfaces of the board are shown in Figure 2 and 3:

5V power input jack (number 6 in Figure 2).

Microphone + headphone jack (number 4 in Figure 2)

WiFi + Bluetooth antenna connector (number 5 in Figure 2)

6-pin header for UART console interface (number 2 in Figure 2). This interface is used for serial

console interface.

Figure 2. Top view of the PICO-i.MX6UL board

USB OTG type-C connector (number 11 in Figure 3). This connector is used for ADB and

FASTBOOT interface.

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Figure 3. Front view of the PICO-i.MX6UL board

Take a close look at the jumpers on the top view of the board. There are two different setup for

download mode and boot mode. Continue reading for further details.

4. Connect the board and host computer

1. The UART serial debug interface can be easily connected with an FTDI branded USB to Serial cable

such as the FTDI TTL-232R-3V3-WE. The cable can be found on

http://www.ftdichip.com/Products/Cables/USBTTLSerial.htm

2. Get a USB type A to USB type C cable. Plug the USB type C end into the USB OTG type C connector

(number 11 in Figure 3) for ADB and FASTBOOT interface. Plug the other end of the USB cable into

your computer.

Note: the connector is reversible but only one side is connected to the device. If you don’t have

ADB or FASTBOOT access, try plugging the USB cable with the other side up.

3. Connect the WiFi antenna to connector (number 5 in Figure 2)

4. Plug in the power supply. (The serial RS232 connector with UART pin out is not included in the kit.

Please use the FTDI branded USB to Serial cable)

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Figure 4. PICO-i.MX6UL board with serial console and Wi-Fi antenna connected

5. Instructions to set up the serial console terminal

1. Make sure you connect to the UART serial console as shown in step 3 in “Connect the board and

host computer” section

2. Start the serial communication software

3. Choose operating system of host computer– Window

a. Once the PC recognizes the virtual USB to UART device, it can be seen it in your PC Device

Manager list. You can determine the port number of the virtual COM port by looking under the

"Ports" group.

b. With the serial port driver installed, run your favorite terminal application to view the serial

output from i.MX6UL microprocessor's UART.

Recommended tools for serial communication terminal are: Putty and Minicom

Serial port configuration: 115200 baud, 8 data bits, 1 stop bit, no parity.

Note: The PC needs a driver to enable a virtual COM port through the PC USB port. Please

consult www.ftdichip.com/Documents/InstallGuides.htm to download the correct driver.

Set up serial communication terminal in Putty as below:

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Figure 5a. Screenshot of Putty

4. Choose operating system of host computer – Ubuntu

Install Minicom on host computer with below commands:

Set up serial communication terminal in Minicom as below:

Figure 5b. Screenshot of Minicom

6. Download Mode and Boot Mode

The board is designed as booting from the internal eMMC. There are two modes for the PICO-i.MX6UL

board. One is the download mode in which the board will receive the instructions from MFG Tools to

flash images to boot storage such as eMMC. The other one is boot mode in which the board will load the

image from the boot storage and boot from the image.

Only J1 and J4 need adjustments.

To make the board in download mode, please set the jumpers J1:12 and J4:23 as shown:

$ sudo apt-get install minicom

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Figure 6a. PICO-i.MX6UL Board Jumper Setup (Download Mode)

To make the board in boot mode, please set the jumpers J1:23 and J4:12 as shown:

Figure 6b. PICO-i.MX6UL Board Jumper Setup (Boot Mode)

The board comes with a working image burned in eMMC. To boot the board from that image, you can

boot the board directly with the power supply connected. Please make sure the board is in Boot Mode

with the jumper setting as above.

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7. Prepare Brillo Images

The next section shows how to use the NXP provided Brillo source code to build an operating system

image for Brillo, using uboot (universal bootloader) and how to use NXP provided MFGtool

(Manufacturing tool) to flash the board.

7.1 Brillo Image Introduction

The table describes Brillo images and the targeted eMMC partition where the Brillo images to be flashed

into:

Image Name Image Description Target Parition

u-boot.imx The u-boot bootloader image, which is

the first code run after the PICO-i.MX6UL

board hardware reset. It will load and

jump to the boot.img either from Slot a’s

boot partition or Slot b’s boot partition,

based on the meta data stored in misc

partition

The first 8MB section

boot.img The Brillo boot image which is composed

by linux kernel zImage, linux kernel

dtb(Device Tree Binary) file, Brillo

ramdisk image, and linux kernel boot

arguments. The code in boot.img will

mount the related system.img based on

the meta data stored in misc partition.

1st partition(Slot a’s boot partition) for

picoimx-emmc, named as boot_a

7st partition(Slot b’s boot partition) for

picoimx-emmc, named as boot_b

userdata.img The Brillo user data image which includes

Brillo and Weave test binary

4th partition for picoimx-emmc

system.img The Brillo system image which includes

all Brillo and Weave related binarys,

librarys, and system configuration files.

5th partition(Slot a’s system partition)

for picoimx-emmc, named as system_a

8th partition(Slot b’s system partition)

for picoimx-emmc, named as system_b

misc.img The Brillo misc image which is used to

store the Bootctrl meta data. The

Bootctrl is an implementation to switch

between the two Brillo images(Slot a, and

Slot b)

9th partition for picoimx-emmc

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7.2 Prebuilt Brillo Images

The prebuilt Brillo images can be downloaded at NXP Brillo landing page: www.nxp.com/IMXBRILLO.

7.3 Self-Built Brillo Images

7.3.1 Build Environment Setup Refer to the link https://source.android.com/source/initializing.html for establishing a Build

Environment.

7.3.2 Get Brillo Source Code To get the Brillo source, follow below steps:

$ cd ~

$ mkdir mybrillo

$ mkdir bin

$ cd mybrillo

$ curl http://commondatastorage.googleapis.com/git-repo-downloads/repo >

~/bin/repo

$ chmod a+x ~/bin/repo

$ ~/bin/repo init -u https://android.googlesource.com/brillo/manifest -b

master

$ repo sync

To get the uboot source code, follow below steps:

7.3.3 Build Brillo Images To build boot.img, userdata.img, system.img and misc.img, run as below:

Will generate images under ~/mybrillo/out/target/product/picoimx

To build u-boot.imx, run as below:

$ cd ~/mybrillo

$ mkdir –p bootable/bootloader

$ cd bootable/bootloader

$ git clone http://sw-stash.freescale.net/scm/imx/uboot-imx.git -b

imx_v2015.04_brillo

$ cd ~/mybrillo/

$ lunch picoimx-eng

$ make

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Will generate u-boot.imx under ~/mybrillo/bootable/bootloader/uboot-imx.

8. Testing and Debugging Tools

Unit tests run locally on the developer’s host computer and integration tests interact with the target

device via ADB. The PICO-i.MX6UL board is Brillo compatible and provides full support for ADB and

FASTBOOT over USB for debugging.

ADB and FASTBOOT are housed tools in the Android SDK. Please refer to the link

http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html#Other to download the latest version of Android SDK

9. Flash Brillo Images

9.1 Flash Brillo Images with MFG Tools

The generated images built in Section “Build Brillo Images” can be downloaded to the target board using

the MFGTool. The MFGTool is mfgtools.tar.gz.

Note: The MFGTool can work both in the Windows and Linux environment.

Perform the following steps to download the board images:

1. Unzip the mfgtools.tar.gz file to a selected location. The directory is named MFGTool-Dir in this

example.

2. Copy the following files from brillo_image_picoimx-emmc.tar.gz or to the directory: MFGTool-

Dir/Profiles/Linux/OS Firmware/files/brillo/pico

○ u-boot.imx

○ boot.img

○ system.img

○ userdata.img

○ misc.img

3. Make your board into download mode by setting the board’s jumper J1:12 and J4:23 (refer to

Figure 6a).

4. Program images in Windows OS:

a. Power on the board. Using USB cable on the OTG port, connect your Windows PC with PICO-

i.MX6UL board.

$ cd ~/ mybrillo/bootable/bootloader/uboot-imx

$ export ARCH=arm

$ export CROSS_COMPILE=~/mybrillo/prebuilts/gcc/linux-x86/arm/arm-linux-

androideabi-4.9/bin/arm-linux-androideabi-

$ make picosom-imx6ul_defconfig

$ make

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b. Double click the file mfgtool2-brillo-mx6ul-pico-emmc.vbs according to the target device as

shown in the below table.

c. Click Start to start image downloading.

Figure 7a. MFGTool screenshot for Start

d. The figure below shows the downloading in progress where the status bar shows the download

status. The download may take one to two minutes depending on the host machine.

Figure 7b. MFGTool screenshot In Process

e. The image below shows what the tool will become once the download is complete.

Figure 7c. MFGTool screenshot Complete

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f. Click “Stop” and disconnect the USB cable.

5. Program images in Linux OS:

a. In Linux, run below command:

b. Power on the board. Using USB cable on the OTG port, connect your Linux with PICO-i.MX6UL-

emmc board.

9.2 Provision images with FASTBOOT mode

All Brillo images except the uboot.imx can be flashed with provision-device script if the board already

been flashed with a valid Brillo. The process shows as below:

1. Refer “11. Instructions to make board into FASTBOOT mode” to make the board into FASTBOOT

mode.

2. Run below commands in Linux PC

$ cd ~/mybrillo/out/target/product/picoimx/

$ ./provision-device

$ fastboot reboot

10. Boot Brillo

After flashing the images, you can boot the board directly with the power supply connected. Please

make sure the board is in Boot Mode with the jumper setting as J1:23 and J4:12.

10.1 Change boot arguments

By default, the u-boot will take the boot arguments stored in Brillo’s boot.img. Below is an example in

case you need to change the default boot arguments used by u-boot.

11. Instructions to make board into FASTBOOT mode

FASTBOOT mode is a state in which the board will respond the commands from host PC FASTBOOT

commands to flash Brillo images or query board information. You can set the device into FASTBOOT

mode with either of the two ways below:

$ sudo ./linux-runvbs.sh mfgtool2-brillo-mx6ul-pico-emmc.vbs

U-Boot > setenv bootcmd boota mmc0

U-Boot > setenv bootargs console=ttymxc5,115200 init=/init

androidboot.console=ttymxc5 androidboot.hardware=freescale cma=96M

U-Boot > saveenv

U-Boot > boot

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1. Via ADB command line

o Once you confirm that you have access the device through ADB on your PC, run command

2. Via serial console

o Once the board completed booting-up, type the following commands in your serial console

window:

o Once the device is in FASTBOOT mode, your serial console will look similar to the screen shown

below:

Figure 8. Screenshot of serial console in FASTBOOT mode

o To get the device out of FASTBOOT mode, run command:

12. Useful Links

http://developer.android.com/tools/help/adb.html

https://www.kingoapp.com/help/fastboot-mode.htm

$ adb reboot bootloader

$ su

$ reboot bootloader

$ fast reboot

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