Platform Porting

Port OpenBMC to your custom hardware platform.

What You’ll Learn

Create a machine-specific layer
Configure device tree for your BMC SoC
Set up U-Boot for your platform
Enable and configure OpenBMC services
Verify and validate your port
Port to ARM-based server platforms (NVIDIA, Ampere)

Porting Overview

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                    Your Machine Layer                       │
│                   meta-<your-company>                       │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│  ┌─────────────────┐  ┌─────────────────┐  ┌─────────────┐  │
│  │ Machine Config  │  │  Device Tree    │  │   Recipes   │  │
│  │   <machine>.conf│  │   <soc>.dts     │  │   *.bb      │  │
│  └─────────────────┘  └─────────────────┘  └─────────────┘  │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│                    Phosphor Layer                           │
│                     meta-phosphor                           │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│                    OpenBMC Distro                           │
│                     meta-openbmc                            │
├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤
│                    Yocto/Poky                               │
│           meta-poky, meta-oe, meta-networking               │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Porting Workflow

Plan - Identify hardware, map features to OpenBMC services
Create Layer - Set up meta- structure
Device Tree - Configure BMC SoC peripherals
U-Boot - Configure bootloader
Enable Services - Configure OpenBMC features
Test - Verify each feature works
Iterate - Fix issues, add features

Guides in This Section

Guide	Description	Phase
Porting Reference	Complete checklist	Planning
Machine Layer	Create your layer	Setup
Device Tree	BMC SoC configuration	Configuration
U-Boot	Bootloader setup	Configuration
Verification	Testing procedures	Validation
ARM Platform Guide	ARM server platforms	Advanced
Entity Manager Advanced	Dynamic hardware config	Advanced
Flash Layout Optimization	SPI flash partitioning, image size reduction	Advanced
AST2700 Enablement	ASPEED AST2700 next-gen SoC porting	Advanced

Supported BMC SoCs

OpenBMC supports several BMC system-on-chip platforms:

SoC	Vendor	Common Platforms
AST2400	ASPEED	Legacy systems
AST2500	ASPEED	Current mainstream
AST2600	ASPEED	Latest generation
NPCM7xx	Nuvoton	Alternative platforms

For ARM-based server platforms (NVIDIA Grace, Ampere, etc.), see the ARM Platform Guide.

Prerequisites

Complete all previous sections
Strong Linux kernel knowledge
Device tree experience
Yocto/BitBake proficiency
Access to your target hardware

Porting requires hardware access. While some testing can be done in QEMU, final validation needs real hardware.

Getting Help

OpenBMC Mailing List
OpenBMC Discord
Review existing machine layers in the OpenBMC repository