CLI Development Environment Setup

Video Resources

• Linux CLI development environment setup guide

• Windows CLI development environment setup guide

Introduction

Ameba SDK supports two development environments: the CLI environment and the VS code extension environment. When developing through the VS code extension , the environment will be checked and automatically installed. For more information, please refer to VS Code User Guide .

This chapter introduces the composition of the development environment, and how to set up the CLI environment. Both Windows and Linux platforms will be coverd.

• For Windows: Windows 10 64-bit is used as a platform.

• For Linux server: Ubuntu 22.04 64-bit is used as a platform.

Preparing GCC Environment

The GCC environment includes the CMake compilation environment, Python environment, and other tool software, as shown in the table below。

Software	Version
cmake	3.20 or later
ninja	1.10.1 or later
make	3.82 or later
ccache	4.5.1 or later
python3	Recommended 3.10 or later
wget	Recommended latest
7zip	Recommended latest

Users can download the software package provided by Realtek and configure environment variables by scripts. This method will not affect the user’s original software environment and can avoid compatibility issues caused by software version differences.

LinuxWindows

1. Download the compressed package and extract it to the /opt/rtk-toolchain folder.

   mkdir /opt/rtk-toolchain
   cd /opt/rtk-toolchain
   wget https://github.com/Ameba-AIoT/ameba-toolchain/releases/download/prebuilts-v1.0.3/prebuilts-linux-1.0.3.tar.gz
   tar -xzf prebuilts-linux-1.0.3.tar.gz
   

   If you encounter network issues when downloading, try to use the aliyun url:

   wget https://rs-wn.oss-cn-shanghai.aliyuncs.com/prebuilts-linux-1.0.3.tar.gz
   

   Note

   The compressed package needs to be extracted to the default /opt/rtk-toolchain path. If need to change the path, refer to change toolchain path .

2. Install Python manually since a portable version of Python cannot be provided under Linux.

   sudo apt install python3 python3-pip python3-venv
   

   Note

   • Run python --version to check version of Python, recommended to use version greater than 3.10.

   • If pip version is outdated, it’s recommended to update using the command: pip install --upgrade pip.

   • If there are multiple versions of Python on the host, you can use the command update-alternatives --install /usr/bin/python python /usr/ bin/python3.x 1 to select a specific version of Python, where x in python3.x 1 represents the desired version number.

   • If you encounter the error command 'python' not found, try running the following command to solve the issue: ln -s /usr/bin/python3 /usr/bin/python

3. Install dependencies

   sudo apt install libssl-dev libncurses-dev
   

4. Enter into the root directory of SDK and run source ameba.sh, which will automatically configure the environment variables.

   source ameba.sh
   
   PIP CHECK... All packages are installed correctly!
   ========================================================
   |  First choose IC platform: cd [IC]_gcc_project
   |  Configure command: menuconfig.py
   |  Build command: build.py
   ========================================================
   (.venv)
   

Note

The environment variables will be reset after terminal closed. Therefore, the scripts need to be run again when you open a new terminal.

Installing Toolchain

By default, the toolchain will be automatically installed in default path when building the project at the first time:

• Linux：/opt/rtk-toolchain

• Windows：C:\rtk-toolchain

1. Before the compilation, the build scripts will check if the toolchain exists and if the version of the toolchain match the lastest version. Once error occurs, you should fix the error according to the prompts on the screen and try building again.

2. The toolchain compressed package is available on GitHub, and the system will attempt to download the toolchain from GitHub by default before the first build. If you encounter any issues with the download, please verify that your host machine can correctly access GitHub. If you cannot access GitHub, use the following commands to switch the download source:

   build.py -D USE_ALIYUN_URL=True
   

3. If you need to modify the toolchain installation path, create an environment variable RTK_TOOLCHAIN_DIR in your system and assign it the modified installation path.

   LinuxWindows

   1. Open the ~/.bashrc file and add the following line at the end:

      export RTK_TOOLCHAIN_DIR="/path/to/your/toolchain/dir"
      

   2. To make the environment variable take effect immediately, please run:

      source ~/.bashrc
      

Note

• If you already have a downloaded toolchain archive, move the archive to the installation path and run build.py again.

• If you encounter the error Download Failed, check your network connection. If the issue persists, refer to Step 2.

• If you encounter the error Create Toolchain Dir Failed. May Not Have Permission, try creating the folder manually. If the issue persists, refer to Step 3 to change the default installation path.

After completing the above steps, the following files will be present under the rtk-toolchain path:

|--- prebuilts-[win/linux]-1.x.x
|
|--- asdk-10.3.1-xxxx
|
|--- vsdk-10.3.1-xxxx