Skip to content

build_system.md

Latest commit

 

History

History
79 lines (57 loc) · 2.61 KB

build_system.md

File metadata and controls

79 lines (57 loc) · 2.61 KB

Build system: CMake + Makefile

1. Purpose

The firmware is built by CMake (out-of-source, into build/). CMake is the real build system: it selects the board, target, toolchain and sources.

The root Makefile is only a thin convenience wrapper around CMake. It does not build anything by itself — it just turns long, error-prone CMake invocations into short targets that are easy to type and tab-complete in the shell. This is the same idea as PX4-Autopilot, where make px4_fmu-v5_default hides a full CMake configure+build.

So instead of:

cmake -S . -B build/.../obj -DNC_BOARD=rl/mini_v2 -DNC_TARGET=dronecan \
      -DNC_IMAGE_KIND=application -G "Unix Makefiles" && make -C build/.../obj

you type:

make rl_mini_v2_dronecan

2. Building

Each board/target combination has a ready-made target you can tab-complete:

make rl_mini_v2_dronecan       # bootloader-linked application image
make rl_mini_v3_cyphal         # cyphal app for Mini v3
make rl_sitl_dronecan          # host SITL build

Naming rule:

  • <vendor>_<board>_<target> builds the application image (IMAGE_KIND=application).
  • <vendor>_<board>_<target>_standalone builds a standalone image explicitly.

Under the hood each target runs scripts/build.sh, which (re)configures CMake only when an input changed and then compiles.

3. Options

Pass these as VAR=value before the target when you need them:

Variable Meaning
CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE Release (default) or Debug
NC_BUILD_DIR Build output root (default <node-core>/build)
EXTRA_CMAKE_ARGS Extra -D... flags forwarded to CMake

Example: CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug make rl_mini_v2_dronecan

4. Common commands

Command What it does
make Prints help (no default build target)
make all Builds the standard matrix of release targets
make rl_mini_v2_dronecan upload Flashes the most recently built release .bin
make rl_sitl_dronecan run Builds and runs the host SITL binary
make tests Runs unit tests
make code_style Runs the linters / style checks
make clean / make distclean Removes build objects / the whole build/ tree

5. Extending it

The Makefile ends with optional, git-ignorable hooks:

-include ${ROOT_DIR}/Makefile.vendor
-include ${ROOT_DIR}/Makefile.local

Use these to add your own targets without editing the core Makefile. When this repo is consumed as a framework, your application keeps its own top-level Makefile that forwards to node-core; see the README "Framework" workflow.