Embedded Reference Linux Distribution rsyocto

For Intel® SoC FPGAs an optimized Embedded Linux Distribution was designed with the OpenEmbedded Yocto Project with a highly integrated build system to simplify the complex and time-consuming development effort required for modern SoC FPGA designs. This concept allows a high-level Application specific Optimization for embedded solutions in a simple fashion as it cannot achieve with any other approach. It enables, for instance, to build automatically a Linux Distribution accelerating FPGA Soft-IP components with specific Linux Kernel Mode Drivers. The build system fulfils the requirements of the Intel® Design flow and the OpenEmbedded Yocto Project.

The Board Support Package (BSP) meta layer, containing high-level Linux Drivers for the OpenEmbedded Yocto Project and Intel® SoC FPGAs are officially maintained by us.

To support the Linux Open-Source community and students the basic version of rsyocto was published as Open-Source on GitHub. This version could confirm the capabilities of this concept and is optimized for student rapid-prototyping projects. It supports the Intel Cyclone® V SoC FPGA and the Intel Arria® 10 SX SoC FPGA Family out of the box.

For modern commercial scientific and industrial use-cases an extended version is available, as well. It adds special reliability, security and customization functions to the feature set. The commercial version is not a fixed static product.

Instead of this, the rsyocto Embedded Linux Distribution with its build system can be seen as a reference point that allows us to Design a specific version for you as a service. The end product is a highly-optimized Embedded Linux Distribution, containing all needed applications and features, a special Design Bootloader system with its own fully automated build system for your proprietary Hardware.

The build system enables further FPGA and Application development that automates the initial board configuration during production with a single command. Intel® SoC FPGA Bootloader knowledge is not required.

For further questions and information please do not hesitate to contact us.

Features and Options

• Full utilization of the Arm®-based (Arm®v7-A and Arm®v8-A) Application Processors embedded inside Intel® SoC FPGAs with an adapted Linux Kernel
• Support for high-end SoC FPGAs, like the Intel Arria® 10 SX SoC FPGA, the Intel Intel Agilex® F-Series SoC FPGA and the Intel Cyclone® V SE/ST/SX SoC FPGA
• Optimized memory footprint for various boot sources and with RAM-Disk support
• High-End SoC FPGA Network-on-Chip Interconnect Firewall support
• Special Security and reliability support (e.g.: Secure boot, Arm® TrustZone®, Linux LTS, …)
• Anti-Tamper protection and piracy protection can be implemented
• Arm®v8-A virtualization with bare-metal hypervisor implementation with Arm® TrustZone® and SysMMU (I/O MMU) support is obtainable
• Linux Kernel Drivers for the entire Hard-IP interfaces (e.g.: CAN, SPI, Ethernet, …) are implemented
• Drivers for all Arm® AMBA® AXI Bridge interfaces between the FPGA- and Arm®-World (inc. DMA) are accessible
• Optional integration of an Intel® Nios® II Soft-Core Processor running a real-time OS (e.g. FreeRTOS) is available
• High-Speed shared DDR3/DDR4 memory interface between Linux and FPGA Soft-IP is optionally deliverable
• FPGA Configuration can be written and monitored during boot or by Linux
• Arm® (Arm® Development Studio (DS-5) and Streamline) and Intel® Software and Hardware tools (e.g.: Intel Quartus Prime® Standard and Pro) are out of the box supported
• Management Web or Desktop interfaces are optionally obtainable
• Software, Updates and Linux Packages, like Development Tools, can be added or removed according to customer requirements (e.g.: with the Linux opkg package manager)
• Linux Software and FPGA Soft-IP update manager can be implemented
• The integrated Embedded native remote development environment simplifies the Linux Software development in the team by enabling the use of powerful Development Tools such as Microsoft® Visual Studio™ Code

Final Product Components

→ Single bootable image file (.img)

• High-level optimized Embedded Linux Distribution
  1. Customized Linux Kernel
  2. Linux Device Tree to load proprietary Linux Kernel Drivers
  3. Pre-installed and pre-configured root file system with needed software components
• Tailored Intel Quartus Prime® Standard or Pro SoC FPGA Project Configuration for your proprietary Hardware
• Customized multi-stage Bootloader System to support your Hardware

→ Build automation system to allow to write all components to your Hardware with a single command