Linux on the DE1-SoC

Linux on the DE1-SoC

by Andrej Gorjan -
Number of replies: 3

Hello.

For my project, I need to run Linux on the HLS processor on the board. I was following the steps in the SoC-FPGA Design guide on Moodle, but I encountered a problem.

At the start of section 13 there are instructions for generating the preloader, but what I see in the BSP editor is quite different

Instead of specifying a directory for the preloader settings, I have to provide the .sopc file and I cannot choose the hls processor in the dropdown menu, only the Nios 2. I think this is why the operating system selection does not have the bootloader option.

I suspect that the problem is a different version of Quartus. Instead of launching the editor with "bsp-editor", the only available command is "nios2-bsp-editor" and the option to generate a new HPS BSP is grayed out.

I was able to get Linux running by following the steps in section 5 of the DE1-SOC Getting Started Guide
http://www.ee.ic.ac.uk/pcheung/teaching/E2_experiment/DE1-SoC_Getting_Started_Guide.pdf
But I am not sure if this will work when we have to communicate with the FPGA (the FPGA interfaces and other peripherals were not configured).

Any help and advice on hot to proceed will be appreciated.

Best regards,
Andrej Gorjan

In reply to Andrej Gorjan

Re: Linux on the DE1-SoC

by Sahand Kashani -

Hi,

I'm not sure if the pre-built images from the Terasic DE1-SoC getting started guide have all FPGA communication-related interfaces enabled (HPS-FPGA bridges), so you may not know if it works until you try it out.

However, with respect to your question, I think you ran "bsp-editor" from a "Nios command shell" instead of from an "Embedded command shell". Both these shells have a binary called "bsp-editor", but the nios version only supports nios CPUs and you need to use the other one to get the BSP editor for the HPS (the Arm CPUs).

In reply to Sahand Kashani

Re: Linux on the DE1-SoC

by Andrej Gorjan -

Yes, I am almost certain that there will be some components missing from the pre built images. Fortunately, installing the Embedded command shell did solve my problem. Thank you.

In reply to Andrej Gorjan

Re: Linux on the DE1-SoC

by Clyde Laforge -

To other students that are wondering why the command bsp-editor is not found when not using the VM: it is not bundled with the quartus install. You may install it from here, along with quartus.