This is a last-ditch effort to figure out how we can continue to build our project on top of Armbian.
Goal
We are building an appliance on the RockPro64 board, with eMMC and an PCIe SSD attached, using a custom-built Armbian Ubuntu 18.04 image with extensive post-configuration (packages, appliacations, overlayroot...) within the boot process. The image is then processed by Mender to create a true dual-root filesystem over-the-air update system with fallback (we invested a lot of resources to extend Mender for Armbian and RockPro64). This build process works perfectly and is exactly what we need.
Issue
The reliability, however, is bad. In an older topic of mine, I documented our issues of regular device reboots due to kernel panics and infrequent freezes. We never really figured out what causes these crashes. It depends on the individual hardware, but on average reboots happen every few days, freezes that need a manuall power cycle every one or two weeks. This is also the case when using the official images.
Workaround
When using the exact same custom-built Armbian image, but replace the kernel with an Ayufan kernel, the images are stable. The devices run for weeks without reboots or freezes, independent on the individual hardware.
This is obviously a very hacky way of creating a Linux image. So we have two options:
(preferred) continue to use Armbian, but with a stable kernel
switch to Ayufan and eat all the costs: implement new build system, redesign post-configuration, extend Mender solution
The way forward
I am not a Linux kernel expert. I am also not sure how the two projects Armbian and Ayufan are related exactly, but it seems that Armbian uses some of Ayufans resources in the build process. For me the question then becomes where the differences originate.
Is this something that can be and people are willing to figure out?
How can I support that by running tests, providing logs or assist in other non source-code tasks?
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Question
Meier
This is a last-ditch effort to figure out how we can continue to build our project on top of Armbian.
Goal
We are building an appliance on the RockPro64 board, with eMMC and an PCIe SSD attached, using a custom-built Armbian Ubuntu 18.04 image with extensive post-configuration (packages, appliacations, overlayroot...) within the boot process. The image is then processed by Mender to create a true dual-root filesystem over-the-air update system with fallback (we invested a lot of resources to extend Mender for Armbian and RockPro64). This build process works perfectly and is exactly what we need.
Issue
The reliability, however, is bad. In an older topic of mine, I documented our issues of regular device reboots due to kernel panics and infrequent freezes. We never really figured out what causes these crashes. It depends on the individual hardware, but on average reboots happen every few days, freezes that need a manuall power cycle every one or two weeks. This is also the case when using the official images.
Workaround
When using the exact same custom-built Armbian image, but replace the kernel with an Ayufan kernel, the images are stable. The devices run for weeks without reboots or freezes, independent on the individual hardware.
Options
This is obviously a very hacky way of creating a Linux image. So we have two options:
The way forward
I am not a Linux kernel expert. I am also not sure how the two projects Armbian and Ayufan are related exactly, but it seems that Armbian uses some of Ayufans resources in the build process. For me the question then becomes where the differences originate.
Any help is appreciated.
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