Dear Eric,

esa wrote:
> It's my first step to program a embedded system.

Fantastic! Welcome to the world of embedded Linux.

I have a customer who was in a situation almost identical to yours.

I would like to try to break down your questions a little, I think it
can help. Also I would like to say that if you do not have a strong
UNIX/Linux background you are facing a very large project.

You are basically going to start from scratch, learning hundreds if
not thousands of details about a new computer operating system, and
one or several new programming languages. Then you're going to
re-implement your application on top of all those new things.

It is relevant to know what your application does to make any
accurate estimates, but even without knowing any of that I can say
that you're in for a development and learning effort several years
long, and that the technical outcome in the end can be very much
state of the art.

The outcome can also be a problem filled pile of mistakes. In
particular, I feel strongly that trying to "cheat" the process of
learning a new system through the use of RAD (Rapid Application
Development) tools when producing software for an embedded system
creates more problems than it solves. It is even worse if said RAD
tools aren't open source. The problem is that there are so many
things you suddenly give up control of. Completely.

Because you look toward graphical interfaces I guess that you have a
GUI software in your system. My advice is to never use anything
"fatter" than GTK+ in the system. GTK+ can already be considered too
heavyweight but it does have decent performance. There are other GUI
toolkits (different widget AKA control libraries) which your app can
use, which are even lighter and faster.


> - Do I install the GNOME, X Windows or KDE for using CODE::block ?? 
> What is the best ? 

I have no idea what CODE::block is, and this mailing list is about
embedded gentoo so it is probably not the best place to find that
advice.

Per Google I found http://www.codeblocks.org/ which is Code::Blocks,
AKA CodeBlocks.


> - For my target, I use uclibc. Must I install code block under my
>   CHOST (where I install uclibc ). Or maybee it is not necessary. 

CodeBlocks is an IDE, a development environment. You do not need and
should never have the development environment on your target system.
GNOME or KDE on your development system does not matter. You can have
both. CodeBlocks uses wxWindows which is a widget abstraction
library, it doesn't have any widgets itself but can use GTK+.
You will need X, and should also understand it, on both development
and target system if you want to use any kind of GUI.


> - In this case, must I configure CODE::block to use uclibc ? 

uclibc is a C library implementation so it should really just be a
drop-in replacement for GNU libc, without need for any configuration.


> -Is it something important to configure in MAKE.CONF ? 

Impossible for us to answer. You have to learn about everything that
can be done in make.conf yourself, and find the correct settings
which matter in your system, and decide what their values should be -
or explain your system to someone else who is able to offer you
professional assistance.


> - my target is a Industrial PC with a GEODE processor. 

I am also involved in coreboot, a BIOS replacement which runs well on
many Geode boards, and can have Linux running in less than a second
after power on. I would suggest looking into the possibility of
leveraging coreboot on your target board to gain even more control of
your end product.


> Is it a document, where I can find what I can use and how to
> configure ?

I don't think so. Not that I know of at least. There is a lot of
great documentation for Gentoo which is recommended reading, but I
don't know of comprehensive documentation, much less a single
document, that covers all the areas that are relevant for your
project. If you ask me, you have to get or buy the experience.


> Thanks again for your help. 

You're welcome! Please don't feel discouraged, there are many places
(this mailing list, and others) where you are very welcome to ask for
help, but please also remember that it is always easiest to give good
answers to concrete questions.


Best regards

//Peter

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