Issues After Flashing Image on Verdin iMX8M Plus (Kirkstone) – Missing Tools and Features

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Hello, and thank you for your detailed question!

Let me address each of your points regarding your Yocto-based image on the Verdin iMX8M Plus (Kirkstone).

1. Hailo GStreamer Plugins

Your GStreamer output shows that the Hailo plugin is present with the expected elements (hailonet, synchailonet, hailodevicestats). However, there is no gst element or plugin called hailotools. In the context of Hailo, “Hailo Tools” typically refers to command-line utilities, not GStreamer plugins. Your image appears to have the correct Hailo GStreamer elements. As long as you have entries for hailonet and similar, you’re set for GStreamer Hailo inferencing. For general Hailo command-line tools, you should ensure the following packages are included in your Yocto image build:

IMAGE_INSTALL:append = " libhailort hailortcli pyhailort libgsthailo hailo-pci hailo-firmware"

You can add these to your conf/local.conf and rebuild your image.
(Reference)

2. H.264 Hardware Encoder (VPU) in GStreamer

To enable the H.264 hardware encoder, you need to make sure the corresponding GStreamer elements are installed. For BSP 7 and i.MX8M Plus, the hardware encoder element is v4l2h264enc. If it does not show in gst-inspect-1.0, it may not be included in your image:

Add the following to your conf/local.conf:

IMAGE_INSTALL:append = " gstreamer1.0-plugins-good gstreamer1.0-plugins-bad gstreamer1.0-plugins-base"

You may also want to ensure related VPU packages are included, depending on your application. After rebuilding and reflashing, gst-inspect-1.0 | grep h264 should list v4l2h264enc or similar.

(Reference)

3. Adding Basic Tools (opkg, git, docker)

By default, Yocto images are minimal and do not include package managers or development tools. The standard and recommended approach is to add these tools at build time:

  • For basic tools:
    IMAGE_INSTALL:append = " git docker "
  • If you want a package manager on the device, you can add opkg:
    IMAGE_INSTALL:append = " opkg "

These lines should be included in your conf/local.conf before building the image. This will ensure the utilities are present in your final root filesystem.

(Reference)

4. Extra Tips

  • After changing conf/local.conf, always run a clean build or at least bitbake <your-image> to update the output.
  • If you’re still missing specific plugins after these changes, use bitbake -s | grep <package> to check for their availability.

Summary of Steps:

  1. Add missing packages to conf/local.conf using IMAGE_INSTALL:append.
  2. Rebuild and flash the updated image.
  3. Confirm with gst-inspect-1.0 and by checking for git, docker, or opkg on the device.

Feel free to follow up if you run into further issues with specific GST elements or tools.

Best regards,
Toradex AI Assistant.