The Yocto Project Release 1.3

The Yocto Project Release 1.3 has just been announced. This release codenamed “Danny” and based on Poky 8.0 is the fifth release of the project. The Yocto Project is a framework to assist developers in creating embedded Linux distributions.

New features and updates for the Yocto Project 1.3

Improved terminal UI, which makes it easy to see the tasks that are currently executing, and avoids burying any warnings that are printed.
Eliminated intermediate step when building cross compiler toolchain
Relocatable SDK
Large number of usability improvements in the Hob image building UI
Upgraded eglibc to version 2.16
Upgraded gcc to version 4.7
Upgraded Linux kernel version to 3.4.11
Added yocto-bsp script for automating the initial parts of creating a new BSP
Python functions now consistently use four spaces for indentation – no more having to try to match the mix of tabs and spaces in your recipes
Disabled sharing shared state between machines using different distros by default to avoid glibc version problems
qemu-native can now be built on host systems without X11 (i.e. for console use only)
Enabled python and perl scripting for perf as well as text-mode UI
Added ability to produce a companion SDK together with an image
Allow forced rebuilds of a recipe (new -C and improved -f options)
Enabled EFI in grub installer
Release of the J.A.R.V.I.S reference layer at http://git.yoctoproject.org/cgit/cgit.cgi/meta-jarvis/
Mesa can now provide GLES accelerated graphics without X11 (through EGL)
Added script for producing “bootcharts” from buildstats so you can see the timeline of the build
Checksums for local files referred to in SRC_URI are now included in task signatures so that changing their contents causes the relevant tasks to be re-executed
Extended bitbake-diffsigs to look up signature files from task and recipe name, and trace back recursively through dependent task changes
Moved from module-init-tools to kmod
Added create-recipe script to automate some of the parts of creating a brand new recipe
Buildhistory improvements: better performance, track postinst/postrm scripts
Added bin_package bbclass for recipes that package pre-built binaries
Added doc-pkgs IMAGE_FEATURES feature to install all documentation
Added class-* overrides – particularly useful for target/cross/crosssdk but works with all classes
Reference hardware BSPs are now separate from Poky reference distro configuration
nativesdk is now a prefix rather than a suffix, greatly simplifying packaging in nativesdk recipes
Detections and warnings when files in the sysroot are potentially written to by multiple recipes
Automatic launching of “screen” within terminal for devshell/patch resolution
task-* recipes renamed to packagegroup-* and tidied up significantly
Improved mirror handling – allow mirrors of mirrors; handle errors more gracefully
Reduced dependencies between debugging symbol packages
Significant cleanup of X server recipes
Added beginnings of a regression test suite for BitBake
Numerous improvements and fixes to documentation and others, upgrades to recipes and packages.
The first major release of the yocto-autobuilder source.
Eclipse plug-in upgraded to Juno and remote target operations support connections over both tcf and/or ssh.
Improved bitbake commander plugin.

You can download The Yocto Project 1.3 to give it a try. Alternatively, you can also retrieve the code via git:

git clone -b <code>danny </code>git://git.yoctoproject.org/poky.git

1	git clone -b <code>danny </code>git://git.yoctoproject.org/poky.git

For further details, you can visit Yocto Project 1.3 Features page.

The next version (The Yocto Project 1.4) is expected to be released in April 2014. Yocto Project 1.4 Features page has not been updated with the goals of the release yet, but a list of bugs and enhancements is already available.

Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft)

Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.