Contents of /tags/mkinitrd-6_5_1/busybox/INSTALL
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Fri Apr 24 18:33:46 2009 UTC (15 years, 5 months ago) by niro
Original Path: trunk/mkinitrd-magellan/busybox/INSTALL
File size: 5332 byte(s)
Fri Apr 24 18:33:46 2009 UTC (15 years, 5 months ago) by niro
Original Path: trunk/mkinitrd-magellan/busybox/INSTALL
File size: 5332 byte(s)
-updated to busybox-1.13.4
1 | Building: |
2 | ========= |
3 | |
4 | The BusyBox build process is similar to the Linux kernel build: |
5 | |
6 | make menuconfig # This creates a file called ".config" |
7 | make # This creates the "busybox" executable |
8 | make install # or make CONFIG_PREFIX=/path/from/root install |
9 | |
10 | The full list of configuration and install options is available by typing: |
11 | |
12 | make help |
13 | |
14 | Quick Start: |
15 | ============ |
16 | |
17 | The easy way to try out BusyBox for the first time, without having to install |
18 | it, is to enable all features and then use "standalone shell" mode with a |
19 | blank command $PATH. |
20 | |
21 | To enable all features, use "make defconfig", which produces the largest |
22 | general-purpose configuration. (It's allyesconfig minus debugging options, |
23 | optional packaging choices, and a few special-purpose features requiring |
24 | extra configuration to use.) |
25 | |
26 | make defconfig |
27 | make |
28 | PATH= ./busybox ash |
29 | |
30 | Standalone shell mode causes busybox's built-in command shell to run |
31 | any built-in busybox applets directly, without looking for external |
32 | programs by that name. Supplying an empty command path (as above) means |
33 | the only commands busybox can find are the built-in ones. |
34 | |
35 | Note that the standalone shell requires CONFIG_BUSYBOX_EXEC_PATH |
36 | to be set appropriately, depending on whether or not /proc/self/exe is |
37 | available or not. If you do not have /proc, then point that config option |
38 | to the location of your busybox binary, usually /bin/busybox. |
39 | |
40 | Configuring Busybox: |
41 | ==================== |
42 | |
43 | Busybox is optimized for size, but enabling the full set of functionality |
44 | still results in a fairly large executable -- more than 1 megabyte when |
45 | statically linked. To save space, busybox can be configured with only the |
46 | set of applets needed for each environment. The minimal configuration, with |
47 | all applets disabled, produces a 4k executable. (It's useless, but very small.) |
48 | |
49 | The manual configurator "make menuconfig" modifies the existing configuration. |
50 | (For systems without ncurses, try "make config" instead.) The two most |
51 | interesting starting configurations are "make allnoconfig" (to start with |
52 | everything disabled and add just what you need), and "make defconfig" (to |
53 | start with everything enabled and remove what you don't need). If menuconfig |
54 | is run without an existing configuration, make defconfig will run first to |
55 | create a known starting point. |
56 | |
57 | Other starting configurations (mostly used for testing purposes) include |
58 | "make allbareconfig" (enables all applets but disables all optional features), |
59 | "make allyesconfig" (enables absolutely everything including debug features), |
60 | and "make randconfig" (produce a random configuration). |
61 | |
62 | Configuring BusyBox produces a file ".config", which can be saved for future |
63 | use. Run "make oldconfig" to bring a .config file from an older version of |
64 | busybox up to date. |
65 | |
66 | Installing Busybox: |
67 | =================== |
68 | |
69 | Busybox is a single executable that can behave like many different commands, |
70 | and BusyBox uses the name it was invoked under to determine the desired |
71 | behavior. (Try "mv busybox ls" and then "./ls -l".) |
72 | |
73 | Installing busybox consists of creating symlinks (or hardlinks) to the busybox |
74 | binary for each applet enabled in busybox, and making sure these symlinks are |
75 | in the shell's command $PATH. Running "make install" creates these symlinks, |
76 | or "make install-hardlinks" creates hardlinks instead (useful on systems with |
77 | a limited number of inodes). This install process uses the file |
78 | "busybox.links" (created by make), which contains the list of enabled applets |
79 | and the path at which to install them. |
80 | |
81 | Installing links to busybox is not always necessary. The special applet name |
82 | "busybox" (or with any optional suffix, such as "busybox-static") uses the |
83 | first argument to determine which applet to behave as, for example |
84 | "./busybox cat LICENSE". (Running the busybox applet with no arguments gives |
85 | a list of all enabled applets.) The standalone shell can also call busybox |
86 | applets without links to busybox under other names in the filesystem. You can |
87 | also configure a standaone install capability into the busybox base applet, |
88 | and then install such links at runtime with one of "busybox --install" (for |
89 | hardlinks) or "busybox --install -s" (for symlinks). |
90 | |
91 | If you enabled the busybox shared library feature (libbusybox.so) and want |
92 | to run tests without installing, set your LD_LIBRARY_PATH accordingly when |
93 | running the executable: |
94 | |
95 | LD_LIBRARY_PATH=`pwd` ./busybox |
96 | |
97 | Building out-of-tree: |
98 | ===================== |
99 | |
100 | By default, the BusyBox build puts its temporary files in the source tree. |
101 | Building from a read-only source tree, or building multiple configurations from |
102 | the same source directory, requires the ability to put the temporary files |
103 | somewhere else. |
104 | |
105 | To build out of tree, cd to an empty directory and configure busybox from there: |
106 | |
107 | make -f /path/to/source/Makefile defconfig |
108 | make |
109 | make install |
110 | |
111 | Alternately, use the O=$BUILDPATH option (with an absolute path) during the |
112 | configuration step, as in: |
113 | |
114 | make O=/some/empty/directory allyesconfig |
115 | cd /some/empty/directory |
116 | make |
117 | make CONFIG_PREFIX=. install |
118 | |
119 | More Information: |
120 | ================= |
121 | |
122 | Se also the busybox FAQ, under the questions "How can I get started using |
123 | BusyBox" and "How do I build a BusyBox-based system?" The BusyBox FAQ is |
124 | available from http://www.busybox.net/FAQ.html or as the file |
125 | docs/busybox.net/FAQ.html in this tarball. |