These instructions document how FreeBSD (head) can be built for, and installed on the Helios-4. This has been made possible by the initial port of FreeBSD to the SolidRun Clearfog that has been submitted June 2017 by Semihalf and Stormshield: [Read the announcement here](https://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-arm/2017-June/016314.html). ## Compiling FreeBSD There is a manual way to compile FreeBSD, and it is documented on the [SolidRun Wiki Clearfog page](https://wiki.solid-run.com/doku.php?id=products:a38x:software:os:freebsd). The process is almost identical for the Helios-4 in that a suitable DTB has to be copied to the boot partition. The following instructions use the [crochet](https://github.com/FreeBSD/crochet/) utility for automating the build and imaging process. ### Get the source We use a fork of crochet that has added the necessary bits for Helios-4. ```bash mkdir work; cd work git clone --checkout pr-clearfog https://github.com/Artox/crochet.git svn checkout https://svn.freebsd.org/base/head src ``` ### Configure the build crochet uses a configuration file to perform builds. config.sh.sample is an example, and can be adapted as needed. As a bare minimum, a line ```bash board_setup Clearfog ``` has to be at the top near the other commented board_setup_* lines. In addition enabling the growfs feature has proven useful for autoresizing the rootfs on first boot: simply uncomment the line ```bash option Growfs ``` There are plenty of other settings to change, but these suffice for creating a bootable image. ### Build Navigate to the crochet folder, and assuming you called your config file config.sh, run: ```bash sudo /bin/sh crochet.sh -c config.sh ``` On success an sdcard image will have been produced in the build directory, for example */opt/work/build/FreeBSD-armv7-12.0-GENERIC-333641-Clearfog.img*. This image is a complete FreeBSD installation, without U-Boot installed. ### Create SD-Card The previously created image can be written to an sdcard as is; assuming your SD-Card is available at /dev/sdX, write the image to it: ```bash pv FreeBSD-armv7-12.0-GENERIC-333641-Clearfog.img | sudo tee /dev/sdX >/dev/null ``` ## Boot It In an ideal world U-Boot would already be installed in SPI flash, including the necessary patch for FreeBSD. If you happen to have such an ideal system, you may skip the next section ### Install U-Boot Please refer to [U-boot](/helios4/uboot) for build instructions. The Boot-ROM expects to find U-Boot at 512 bytes into the sdcard. Assuming your SD-Card is available at /dev/sdX, write the u-boot binary to it using dd: ```bash sudo dd bs=512 seek=1 conv=fsync if=u-boot-a38x-5-15-mmc.bin of=/dev/sdX ``` ### Boot Insert the sd-card into your device, connect a serial console and turn it on. The U-Boot console will come up with a prompt: ```bash Hit any key to stop autoboot: 3 ``` Press a key to abort automatic boot, or wait till it fails to do a network boot. Once it has dropped to a terminal prompt, indicated by *Marvell>>* at the start of the line, configure U-Boot to load the FreeBSD loader by default: ```bash setenv fdt_addr_r 0x1000000 setenv loadaddr 0x2000000 setenv bootcmd 'fatload mmc 0:2 ${fdt_addr_r} armada-388-helios4.dtb; fatload mmc 0:2 ${loadaddr} ubldr.bin; go ${loadaddr}' setenv bootdelay 1 saveenv ``` Beware: You probably have to paste these lines individually, or U-Boot may mess it up. You can set bootdelay to 0 if you want, that way you will never again get to the u-boot console unless you delete the FreeBSD loader. Finally, type *boot*, or *reset*, or reset the board by pressing the button labeled U16 on the board. This time, just sit back and watch as FreeBSD comes up. ### Default User The FreeBSD image by crochet comes with an unlocked root account. This means you do not need to enter a password to log in as root. *Page contributed by [Artox](https://github.com/Artox)*