Aperture Robotics LLC.

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Published November 14, 2023 | Version 2023.08.2
Software Open

SkiffOS: Minimal Cross-compiled Linux for Embedded Containers

Creators

  • 1. Aperture Robotics, LLC.

Contributors

  • 1. Aperture Robotics, LLC.

Description

SkiffOS is a config package system for the Buildroot OS cross-compiler.

  • Run any distribution anywhere: decouples hardware support from user distro environments.
  • Reliable: minimal read-only host system for unbreakable boot-ups and over-the-air updates.
  • Reproducible: offline builds, pinned package versions, source-controlled custom configs.

Configuration packages are merged together to configure the system:

  • SKIFF_CONFIG=pi/4,core/debian - run Debian desktop on a Raspberry Pi 4.
  • SKIFF_CONFIG=odroid/xu4,core/fedora - run Fedora desktop on a Odroid XU4.
  • SKIFF_CONFIG=virt/qemu,custom/config - run a custom config in a Qemu VM.

There is a project template you can use for version-controlled customizations.

Linux devices have varying requirements for kernel, firmware, and other hardware support packages. SkiffOS decouples this support from the containerized environments. The containers are portable across devices with the same CPU architecture, while ordinary OS images (Board Support Packages) are not.

Supports any Linux-compatible computer, ranging from RPi, Odroid, NVIDIA Jetson, to Desktop PCs, Laptops (i.e. Apple MacBook), Phones, Cloud VMs, and even Web Browsers.

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This mainline release corresponds to Buildroot 2023.08.2.

Fixes and improvements:

  • starfive/visionfive: fix riscv isa definition (6a68b848)
  • buildroot: update to upstream (775a5783)
  • skiff-init: drop requirement on glibc (09388736)
  • configs-base: update kernel to 6.6.1 (f2e8d090)
  • buildroot: update to latest upstream (13d99a13)
  • licheerv_st7789v: add note about removing console (96359951)
  • licheerv_st7789v: update example image (0510ef2a)
  • allwinner/licheerv_st7789v: support for spi-based tft display (3d89ffe5)
  • pi/common: bump kernel to rpi-6.1.61 (59c4fab8)
  • buildroot: update go, containerd, rebase (6f1c0677)
  • allwinner/d1: reduce boot delay to 0 (0f1f92aa)
  • configs-base: update kernel to 6.5.10 (f5e815bb)
  • pi/common: bump kernel to rpi-6.1.58 (c62285c9)
  • buildroot: update docker-compose to v2.23.0 (83c216dd)
  • buildroot: update buildah (9e25b5b5)
  • buildroot: update to 2023.08.2 and update runc (f393e673)
  • configs-base: update kernel to 6.5.9 (5602a5c3)
  • configs-base: update kernel to 6.5.8 (4a0a008e)
  • pi/common: bump kernel to rpi-6.1.57 (d91fbe5e)
  • all: fix kernel headers selection (10023265)
  • core/gentoo: fix accept keywords (cc21399b)

Full Changelog: https://github.com/skiffos/SkiffOS/compare/2023.08.1...2023.08.2

Notes

If you use this software, please cite the arXiv paper.

Files

skiffos/SkiffOS-2023.08.2.zip

Files (2.2 MB)

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md5:3c1a05c3b08d3e2acd8f7a6fe73776c8
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Additional details

Related works

Is documented by
Report: arXiv:2104.00048 (arXiv)
Is supplement to
Software: https://github.com/skiffos/SkiffOS/tree/2023.08.2 (URL)
Report: https://zenodo.org/record/4628881 (URL)