Building QNX OS Images

Using the IDE's QNX System Builder feature, you can generate OS images, which are bootable images that contain startup code, the OS, your executables, and any data files that might be related to your programs. The IDE supports image building by enabling you to transfer an image to a target board.

Here are the main tasks for using the IDE to set up an OS image on a target board:
  1. Create a QNX System Builder project to generate a system image for your target. This process is simple if a Board Support Package (BSP) exists for the board. If an exact match isn't available, you may be able to modify an existing BSP to meet your needs.
  2. Modify your project as needed using the buildfile editor. You may skip this step during the first iteration just to build a basic image based on a BSP.
  3. Build your project to generate the image files.
  4. Transfer the image to your target board using a serial link, TFTP server, or another method.

After you've booted the image and verified that the OS runs successfully on your target hardware, you might go through more iterations of this process as you optimize your system. For example, you could modify the project again to add components. You would then need to repeat the last three steps to run the new system image.

The IDE also lets you import BSP archives as projects and build them into system images. BSP archives contain the hardware-specific components needed to support the QNX Neutrino RTOS on a particular board. The Building Embedded Systems guide provides an overview on BSPs. After you successfully build a BSP project, the output image files contain everything needed to boot the system and run the OS and any included applications.