EBC Exercise 08 Installing Development Tools - Remote Development

Installing the cross development tools and the kernel on a laptop is nice, but sometimes the downloads are too long for such a portable device. I've had a bitbake run some 12 hours. Another option is to use a remote machine. In my case our CSSE department has created a virtual machine with Ubuntu 12.04 installed on it.

To install on a remote machine are the same as above; However here's a couple of tips to make it easier.

First, ssh to the remote machine. Assume the machine is called csse and your login name is beagle.

local$ ssh -XCc blowfish beagle@csse

You can leave the beagle@ off if you have the same login on both machine. The -C says to compress everything that's moved between the machines over the network. This is good for slow connections. The X says to pass the X11 display information to the remote machine. This way you can run graphical programs, such as gedit, on the remote machine and the graphics will display on your local machine (assuming you are running X11 on your local machine).

If you are sshing a lot check out the tip here about suspending ssh and the tip  here about authorizing ssh so you don't have to enter your password every time.

Once logged on to the removed machine run

remote$ sudo apt-get install byobu

This installs byobu which is a program that lets you connect to the same shell from multiple machines. Once installed run

remote$ byobu

You'll see something like:



So what? Run a couple of commands, like ls or who, then hit F6. This will suspend your session. Now run byobu again. You'll be back in the same session. The session keeps running, even when you aren't connected.

Do you see the use?
 * Fire up byobu
 * Start a long bitbake
 * Once you are sure it running OK, hit F6 and go home.
 * From home fire up byobu and you'll see your bitbake (probably still running).
 * You can F6 and check on it later.

Try opening another terminal and running byobu in both terminals. You'll see the same thing in both.

Run

host$ man byobu

to see what it can do. Here's a list of shortcuts:

F2 - Create a new window F3 - Move to previous window F4 - Move to next window F5 - Reload profile F6 - Detach from this session F7 - Enter copy/scrollback mode F8 - Re-title a window F9 - Configuration Menu F12 - Lock this terminal Ctrl-a $ - show detailed status Ctrl-a R - Reload profile Ctrl-a ! - Toggle key bindings on and off Ctrl-a k - Kill the current window

But there is much more. Go and explore.