Stag is a framework designed to use the Debian GNU/Linux package management system for embedded development. This is the latest development of Emdebian.
By -for now hopefully- providing a wealth of full cross-compilable source packages and tested binary packages, it should speed up embedded development. This is being achieved by using a slightly modified version of dpkg-cross and the debhelper tools. The settings like cross-compiler, library and interactive configuration (if applicable) can be controlled with a single file. By using the existing tools, building from source can be performed in an uniform way without having to look at program-specific installation routines. Dependencies are checked by the means of binary packages (and pre-dependencies in source packages) like in a normal Debian installation. When selecting all the needed binary packages at once you should get a good idea of eventual dependencies and an idea of the final root file systems size. Also these binary packages can be used to do a quick test of the embedded system. When installing these packages on your development host all binaries will be installed in a seperate directory from which you can then build an image. When building from source packages the Debian package management system automatically builds a binary package, which makes software management easy. As an extra benefit you end up with a set of binary packages tailored to your specific application making reinstalls and archiving easier.
Warning : Most of these ideas have moved on to Emdebian where we all hope that some day we will find the time to fit them into something useful.
Last update: 02/01/2006