RDK-V Emulator Users Guide

Copyright 2022 RDK Management, LLC. All rights reserved.

The contents of this document are RDK Management, LLC Proprietary and Confidential and may not be distributed or otherwise disclosed without prior written permission of RDK Management, LLC.

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This document is provided under the terms and conditions of the RDK License Agreement, License Agreement for Software Integration Kit, License Agreement for Set-top Box Software Integration Kit.

RDK Management LLC is not responsible for any liability of any nature whatsoever resulting from or arising out of any use or reliance upon this specification. This document is furnished on an "AS IS" basis, and RDK Management, LLC does not provide any representation or warranty, express or implied, regarding its accuracy, completeness, or fitness for a particular purpose."

Table of Contents

Introduction

RDK (Reference Design Kit) is an integrated set of software components, tools and documentation that help in the development of the software stack for set-top box based on the standard Linux operating system which is designed to meet the requirements of the latest generation media servers and clients.

The RDK emulator is an x86 based implementation of the RDK software stack. It is primarily targeted towards the RDK development community (integrators, component developers and application developers) that attempts to simplify the process of working with the RDK software stack without the need for a reference hardware platform.  The key applications in the RDK Emulator are the rmfApp, Media streamer and the RDK-Browser. As RDK emulator runs on desktop computers, applications can be tested and debugged before trying to deploy them to real devices.

Purpose of this Document

The purpose of this document is to enable RDK users and developers to be able to bring up the RDK stack and emulator on the PC platform. The document also includes step-by-step procedures to setup & build RDK Emulator

Audience

The intended audience includes the MSO teams, developers and external vendors responsible for the development of firmware and applications for RDK-based Set Top Boxes 

Scope

Scope of this document includes understanding RDK Emulator and  functionalities, supported build types and to run and test in Virtual Box environment.

Limitations

RDK Emulator does not support all components of RDK 2.0 stack .Currently RDK Emulator supports mediaframework, media-streamer,RDK-Browser and RDK-Logger, XRE components.

Known Issues

• During video playback, performance issues are there due to video scaling.
• Also In rmfApp , while playing video through hnsource or qamsource , application may crash once EOS is reached.
• It has been seen that open source package mirror repos may go down temporarily or may be blocked by local corporate firewalls. Please try the build again at a later time or after resolving local firewall issues. One test would be to access the failing url on the web browser and see if the site is up. This can help isolate local issues.

Abbreviations and Acronyms

The following table describes the acronyms and abbreviations used in this document

Overview of RDK Emulator

• Executes on x86-based platforms including virtualization environments such as Virtual Box and QEMU.
• Multiple build types - media client
• Up to date with the RDK generic trunk and any x86-specific platform code.
• Built using Yocto and RDK build frameworks

Key Features

• RMF Support
• Video/Audio playback using westerossink and autoaudiosink gstreamer elements.

Supported Build Types

Build Setup Instructions

Setting up the Host Environment

How to Build#SettinguptheHostEnvironment

Downloading Source Code & Building

RDK-V Emulator Build Guide

Bringing up the Emulator on Virtual Box

Host Requirements

Install Virtual Box and follow the following steps to bring up RDK Emulator on Virtual Box:

In the following steps, it is recommended to review the description and screenshot completely before proceeding with steps.

STEP 1: Create your new VM Instance:

• Open Virtualbox

• Select New [A popup will come up]

• Select Type as ‘Linux’

• Select Version as ‘Other Linux (32 Bit)’

• Click on “Next”

• Choose a Memory Size of 512 MB

• Use an existing virtual hard drive file which would be your newly built image in *.vmdk format and create your VM:

STEP 2: Configure your new VM Instance:

• Click on “Settings” tab to configure your new VM instance

• Configure your VMs network settings
• Choose “Bridged Adapter” mode as shown in the screenshot below

STEP 3: Create an external hard drive:

Your VM has been built with very limited hard drive space. In order to run emulator and play video files, you need to copy your video files into the file system for playback. For this, you will need to setup a virtual external hard drive.

• Select the vm instance on the main menu of Virtual Box
• Click Settings -> Storage -> Add Hard disk [icon]
• Click ‘Create new disk’ (Note: In the screenshot below, "Choose existing disk" may seem highlighted. Please select "Create new disk")

• Select VDI (VirtualBox Disk Image) as your Hard Drive file type:

• Select "Dynamically allocated" storage: 

STEP 4: Formatting and partitioning your new external hard drive:

• Boot up the image and login as root with no password and use ifconfig to get IP address
• Once you have the IP address you may SSH into your VM from your linux shell console. Use root as the ssh user.

• Use the “mount” command to see the current status of connected hard disks

• Use fdisk command to list out connected hard drives. You may note that in the screenshot below, there are two hard drives listed. hda and hdb. hdb is the external hard drive that we have created in the previous step.

• Use fdisk to create your new hard disk partition

Review the description of the steps during fdisk operation below and the following screenshot for reference before proceeding.

• Use fdisk to create your new hard disk partition
  • Use the command "n" to add a new partition
    

• • Select partition type as the suggested default "p" for primary partition

• • Set your partition number as the suggested default. In the example case: 1

• • Press "Enter" key for First sector & Last sector prompts
  • Select the command "p" to print the partition table on screen for review

• • Select the command "w" to write the partition table to disk and exit fdisk

$ mkdir -p /run/user/0
$ export XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=/run/user/0/
$ westeros --renderer <renderer module> --display <socket-name> &
$ westeros --renderer /usr/lib/libwesteros_render_gl.so.0.0.0 --display WPE &
$ gdisplay start
$ export WAYLAND_DISPLAY=WPE

for Dunfell Emulator
---------------------
$ mkdir -p /run/user/0
$ export XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=/run/user/0/
Add the below line in westeros-init.sh
export LD_PRELOAD=/usr/lib/libwesteros_gl.so.0.0.0
$ westeros --renderer /usr/lib/libwesteros_render_gl.so.0.0.0 --display WPE &

Run the commands
westeros-init.sh
westeors_test

# After Launching westeros compositor in emulator
$ export XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=/run/user/0/
$ export WAYLAND_DISPLAY=WPE
$ westeros_test
(or)
$ westeros_test --display WPE

$ export XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=/run/user/0/
$ export WAYLAND_DISPLAY=WPE

#Check the plugin in image
$ gst-inspect-1.0 westerossink

# To play the video and render on westeros compositor
$ gst-launch-1.0 playbin uri=http://localhost:50050/received_spts1.ts videosink=westerossink