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Eric Andersen766c0122000-06-21 22:43:07 +00008<body text="#000000" alink="#660000" link="#660000" bgcolor="#dee2de" vlink="#660000">
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +00009
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Matt Kraai9ba0daf2001-01-31 01:59:46 +000023 <a href="/"><IMG SRC="images/busybox2.jpg" alt="BusyBox" border="0" width="360" height="230"></a><BR>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +000024
25
26<!-- Begin Introduction section -->
27
28
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +000029<TABLE WIDTH="95%" CELLSPACING=1 CELLPADDING=4 BORDER=1>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +000030<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#ccccc0" ALIGN=center>
31 <A NAME="intro"> <BIG><B>
32 The Swiss Army Knife of Embedded Linux
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +000033 </B></BIG></A>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +000034</TD></TR>
35<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#eeeee0">
36
37BusyBox combines tiny versions of many common UNIX utilities into a single
38small executable. It provides minimalist replacements for most of the utilities
39you usually find in fileutils, shellutils, findutils, textutils, grep, gzip,
Eric Andersen8ec10a92001-01-27 09:33:39 +000040tar, etc. BusyBox provides a fairly complete POSIX environment for any small or
41embedded system. The utilities in BusyBox generally have fewer options than
42their full featured GNU cousins; however, the options that are included provide
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +000043the expected functionality and behave very much like their GNU counterparts.
44<p>
45BusyBox has been written with size-optimization and limited resources in mind.
46It is also extremely modular so you can easily include or exclude commands (or
Eric Andersen8ec10a92001-01-27 09:33:39 +000047features) at compile time. This makes it easy to customize your embedded
Eric Andersen09580932001-04-10 20:10:55 +000048systems. To create a working system, just add /dev, a kernel, and a shell.
49For a really minimal system, you can even use the busybox shell (not Bourne compatible, but very small and quite usable), and the busybox vi editor.
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +000050<p>
51
52BusyBox is now maintained by
Eric Andersen537d1652001-01-25 22:00:37 +000053<a href="http://codepoet.org/andersen/erik/erik.html">
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +000054Erik Andersen</a>, and its ongoing development is being sponsored by
55<a href="http://www.lineo.com/">Lineo</a>.
56<p>
57BusyBox is licensed under the
58<a href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html">GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE</a>
Eric Andersen766c0122000-06-21 22:43:07 +000059<p>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +000060
Mark Whitley74476422001-03-20 19:57:30 +000061
Mark Whitleyac21e932001-01-30 23:37:15 +000062<h3> Screenshot </h3>
63
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +000064<p> Because everybody loves screenshots, a screenshot of BusyBox
65is now available <a href="screenshot.html"> right here</a>
Mark Whitleyac21e932001-01-30 23:37:15 +000066
Mark Whitley74476422001-03-20 19:57:30 +000067
Eric Andersen8ec10a92001-01-27 09:33:39 +000068<H3>Mailing List Information</h3>
Matt Kraai8677d7b2000-12-15 15:41:03 +000069BusyBox now has a <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/lists/busybox/">mailing list</a>!
Eric Andersen766c0122000-06-21 22:43:07 +000070To subscribe, go and visit <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/mailman/listinfo/busybox">this page</a>.
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +000071
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +000072<!-- Begin Latest News section -->
73
74<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#ccccc0" ALIGN=center>
75 <A NAME="news">
76 <BIG><B>
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +000077 Latest News
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +000078 </B></BIG>
79 </A>
80</TD></TR>
81<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#eeeee0">
82
83<ul>
84
Eric Andersen09580932001-04-10 20:10:55 +000085 <li> <b>10 April 2001 -- BusyBox 0.51 released</b>
86 <br>
87
88 BusyBox 0.51 (the "rock-solid release") is now out there. This
89 release adds only 2 new applets: env and vi. The vi applet,
90 contributed by Sterling Huxley, is very functional, and is only
91 22k. This release fixes 3 critical bugs in the 0.50 release.
92 There were 2 potential segfaults in lash (the busybox shell) in
93 the 0.50 release which are now fixed. Another critical bug in
94 0.50 which is now fixed: syslogd from 0.50 could potentially
95 deadlock the init process and thereby break your entire system.
96 <p>
97
98 There are a number of improvements in this release as well. For
99 one thing, the wget applet is greatly improved. Dmitry Zakharov
100 added FTP support, and Laurence Anderson make wget fully RFC
101 compliant for HTTP 1.1. The mechanism for including utility
102 functions in previous releases was clumsy and error prone. Now
103 all utility functions are part of a new libbb library, which makes
104 maintaining utility functions much simpler. And BusyBox now
105 compiles on itanium systems (thanks to the Debian itanium porters
106 for letting me use their system!).
107 <p>
108 You can read the
109 <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox/Changelog">changelog</a> for
110 complete details. BusyBox 0.51 can be downloaded from
111 <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox">ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox</a>.
112 <p>Have Fun!
113 <p>
114
Eric Andersenf77d8862001-04-01 04:49:41 +0000115 <li> <b>Busybox Boot-Floppy Image</b>
116
117 <p>Because you asked for it, we have made available a <a href=
118 "ftp://opensource.lineo.com/busybox/busybox.floppy.img"> Busybox boot floppy
119 image</a>. Here's how you use it:
120
121 <ol>
122
123 <li> <a href= "ftp://opensource.lineo.com/busybox/busybox.floppy.img">
124 Download the image</a>
125
126 <li> dd it onto a floppy like so: <tt> dd if=busybox.floppy.img
127 of=/dev/fd0 ; sync </tt>
128
129 <li> Pop it in a machine and boot up.
130
131 </ol>
132
133 <p> If you want to look at the contents of the initrd image, do this:
134
135 <pre>
136 mount ./busybox.floppy.img /mnt -o loop -t msdos
137 cp /mnt/initrd.gz /tmp
138 umount /mnt
139 gunzip /tmp/initrd.gz
140 mount /tmp/initrd /mnt -o loop -t minix
141 </pre>
142
143
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000144 <li> <b>15 March 2001 -- BusyBox 0.50 released</b>
145 <br>
146
147 This release adds several new applets including ifconfig, route, pivot_root, stty,
148 and tftp, and also fixes tons of bugs. Tab completion in the
149 shell is now working very well, and the shell's environment variable
150 expansion was fixed. Tons of other things were fixed or made
151 smaller. For a fairly complete overview, see the
152 <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox/Changelog">changelog</a>.
153 <p>
154 lash (the busybox shell) is still with us, fixed up a bit so it
155 now behaves itself quite nicely. It really is quite usable as
156 long as you don't expect it to provide Bourne shell grammer.
157 Standard things like pipes, redirects, command line editing, and
158 environment variable expansion work great. But we have found that
159 this shell, while very usable, does not provide an extensible
160 framework for adding in full Bourne shell behavior. So the first order of
161 business as we begin working on the next BusyBox release will be to merge in the new shell
162 currently in progress at
163 <a href="http://doolittle.faludi.com/~larry/parser.html">Larry Doolittle's website</a>.
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000164 <p>
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000165
166
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000167 <li> <b>27 January 2001 -- BusyBox 0.49 released</b>
Eric Andersen8ec10a92001-01-27 09:33:39 +0000168 <br>
169
170 Several new applets, lots of bug fixes, cleanups, and many smaller
171 things made nicer. Several cleanups and improvements to the shell.
172 For a list of the most interesting changes
173 you might want to look at the <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox/Changelog">changelog</a>.
174 <p>
175 Special thanks go out to Matt Kraai and Larry Doolittle for all their
176 work on this release, and for keeping on top of things while I've been
177 out of town.
178 <p>
179 <em>Special Note</em><br>
180
181 BusyBox 0.49 was supposed to have replaced lash, the BusyBox
182 shell, with a new shell that understands full Bourne shell/Posix shell grammer.
183 Well, that simply didn't happen in time for this release. A new
184 shell that will eventually replace lash is already under
185 construction. This new shell is being developed by Larry
186 Doolittle, and could use all of our help. Please see the work in
187 progress on <a href="http://doolittle.faludi.com/~larry/parser.html">Larry's website</a>
188 and help out if you can. This shell will be included in the next
189 release of BusyBox.
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000190 <p>
Eric Andersen8ec10a92001-01-27 09:33:39 +0000191
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000192 <li> <b>13 December 2000 -- BusyBox 0.48 released</b>
Eric Andersen43622002000-12-13 18:30:13 +0000193 <br>
194
195 This release fixes lots and lots of bugs. This has had some very
196 rigorous testing, and looks very, very clean. The usual tar
197 update of course: tar no longer breaks hardlinks, tar -xzf is
198 optionally supported, and the LRP folks will be pleased to know
199 that 'tar -X' and 'tar --exclude' are both now in. Applets are
Matt Kraaie3a94f72000-12-13 19:50:48 +0000200 now looked up using a binary search making lash (the busybox
Eric Andersen43622002000-12-13 18:30:13 +0000201 shell) much faster. For the new debian-installer (for Debian
202 woody) a .udeb can now be generated.
203 <p>
Matt Kraaie3a94f72000-12-13 19:50:48 +0000204 The curious can get a list of some of the more interesting changes by reading
Eric Andersen43622002000-12-13 18:30:13 +0000205 the <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox/Changelog">changelog</a>.
206 <p>
207 Many thanks go out to the many many people that have contributed to
208 this release, especially Matt Kraai, Larry Doolittle, and Kent Robotti.
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000209 <p>
Eric Andersen43622002000-12-13 18:30:13 +0000210
211
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000212 <li> <b>Old News</b>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000213 <br>
Eric Andersen766c0122000-06-21 22:43:07 +0000214 For the old news, visit <a href="http://busybox.lineo.com/oldnews.html">the old news page</a>.
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000215</ul>
216
217
Eric Andersen4a971ae2000-06-22 01:27:11 +0000218<!-- Begin Download section -->
219
220<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#ccccc0" ALIGN=center>
221 <A NAME="download"><BIG><B>
222 Download
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000223 </B></BIG></A>
Eric Andersen4a971ae2000-06-22 01:27:11 +0000224</TD></TR>
225<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#eeeee0">
226<ul>
Mark Whitley8ba1b112001-01-25 23:29:58 +0000227
228 <li> Source for the latest release can always be downloaded from
Eric Andersenbdcc6fb2000-09-26 06:15:12 +0000229 <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox">ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox</a>.
Mark Whitley8ba1b112001-01-25 23:29:58 +0000230
231 <li> A new snapshot of the source is made daily and is available as a GNU
232 gzipped tarball <a href="busybox.tar.gz"> right here</a>.
233
234 <li> BusyBox now has its own publically browsable
Eric Andersen4a971ae2000-06-22 01:27:11 +0000235 <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/cgi-bin/cvsweb/busybox/">CVS tree</a>,
236 anonymous
237 <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/cvs_anon.html">CVS access</a>, and
238 for those that are actively contributing there is even
239 <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/cvs_write.html">CVS write access</a>.
Mark Whitley8ba1b112001-01-25 23:29:58 +0000240
Eric Andersen4a971ae2000-06-22 01:27:11 +0000241</ul>
242
243
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000244<!-- Begin Docs section -->
245
246<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#ccccc0" ALIGN=center>
247 <A NAME="docs"><BIG><B>
248 Documentation
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000249 </B></BIG></A>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000250</TD></TR>
251<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#eeeee0">
252Current documentation for BusyBox includes:
253<ul>
Eric Andersenbdcc6fb2000-09-26 06:15:12 +0000254 <li> <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox/BusyBox.html">BusyBox.html</a>.
255 This is a list of the all the available commands in BusyBox with
256 complete usage information and examples of how to use each app. I
257 have spent a <em>lot</em> of time updating these docs and trying to
258 make them fairly comprehensive. If you find any errors (factual,
259 grammatical, whatever) please let me know.
Eric Andersen43622002000-12-13 18:30:13 +0000260 <li> <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox/README">README</a>.
261 This is the README file included in the busybox source release.
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000262 <li> <a href="http://bugs.lineo.com/db/pa/lbusybox.html">BusyBox Bugs</a>.
Eric Andersenbdcc6fb2000-09-26 06:15:12 +0000263 Need to report a bug? Need to check if a bug has been filed?
Eric Andersenaec27bc2000-07-11 18:18:40 +0000264 <li> If you need more help, the BusyBox
265 <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/lists/busybox/">mailing list</a> is
266 a good place to start.
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000267</ul>
268
269
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000270<!-- Begin Links section -->
271
272<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#ccccc0" ALIGN=center>
273 <A NAME="links">
274 <BIG><B>
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000275 Important Links
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000276 </B></BIG>
277 </A>
278</TD></TR>
279<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#eeeee0">
280
281<ul>
282
283 <li> <A HREF="http://perens.com/FreeSoftware/">
284 Free Software from Bruce Perens</A><br>
285 The original idea for BusyBox, and all versions up to 0.26 were written
286 by <A HREF="mailto:bruce@perens.com">Bruce Perens</a>. This is his BusyBox website.
287 <p>
288
Eric Andersen5efa2292001-03-05 18:26:50 +0000289 <li> <A HREF="http://freshmeat.net/projects/busybox/">
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000290 Freshmeat AppIndex record for BusyBox</A>
291 <p>
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000292 <li><a href="http://tinylogin.lineo.com/">TinyLogin</a>
293 is a nice embedded tool for handling authentication, changing passwords,
294 and similar tasks which nicely complements BusyBox.
295 <p>
296
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000297 <li><a href="http://cvs.uclinux.org/uClibc.html">uClibc</a>
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000298 is a C library for embedded systems. You can actually statically link
299 a "Hello World" application under x86 that only takes 4k (as opposed to
300 200k under GNU libc). It can do dynamic linking too and works nicely with
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000301 BusyBox to create very small embedded systems.
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000302 <p>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000303
Eric Andersen766c0122000-06-21 22:43:07 +0000304 <li> <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/software.html">Other cool embedded software</a>.
305 <p>
306
307 <li> <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/">opensource.lineo.com</a>.
308 <p>
309
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000310 <li> <A HREF="http://www.lineo.com/">Lineo</A> is sponsoring BusyBox development.
311 <p>
312
313</ul>
314
315
Eric Andersen1b622ff2000-12-14 15:43:57 +0000316<!-- Begin Projects section -->
317
318<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#ccccc0" ALIGN=center>
319 <A NAME="projects"><BIG><B>
320 Products/Projects Using BusyBox
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000321 </B></BIG></A>
Eric Andersen1b622ff2000-12-14 15:43:57 +0000322</TD></TR>
323<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#eeeee0">
324
325<p> I know of the following products and/or projects that use BusyBox --
326listed in the order I happen to add them to the web page:
327
328<ul>
329 <li> <a href="http://www.lineo.com/products/embedix_linux/">Lineo Embedix Linux</a>
330 <li> <a href="http://cvs.debian.org/boot-floppies/">Debian installer (boot floppies) project</a>
331 <li> <a href="http://www.linuxrouter.org/">Linux Router Project </a>
332 <li> <a href="http://linux-embedded.org/">LEM</a>
333 <li> <a href="http://www.toms.net/rb/">tomsrtbt</a>
334 <li> <a href="http://www.stormix.com/">Stormix Installer</a>
335 <li> <a href="http://www.emacinc.com/linux2_sbc.htm">EMAC Linux 2.0 SBC</a>
336 <li> <a href="http://www.trinux.org/">Trinux</a>
337 <li> <a href="http://oddas.sourceforge.net/">ODDAS project</a>
338 <li> <a href="http://www.kerbango.com/">The Kerbango Internet Radio</a>
339 <li> <a href="http://www.linuxmagic.com/vpn/">LinuxMagic VPN Firewall</a>
340 <li> <a href="http://byld.sourceforge.net/">Build Your Linux Disk</a>
341 <li> <a href="http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~ichi/baslinux.html">BasicLinux</a>
342 <li> <a href="http://ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/system/recovery">Zdisk</a>
343 <li> <a href="http://www.adtran.com">AdTran - VPN/firewall VPN Linux Distribution</a>
Eric Andersen1b622ff2000-12-14 15:43:57 +0000344 <li> <a href="http://mkcdrec.ota.be/">mkCDrec - make CD-ROM recovery</a>
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000345 <li> <a href="http://recycle.lbl.gov/~ldoolitt/bse/">Linux on nanoEngine</a>
346 <li> <a href="http://www.zelow.no/floppyfw/"> Floppyfw</a>
Mark Whitley74476422001-03-20 19:57:30 +0000347
348 <li> <a href="http://midori.transmeta.com/"> Midori Linux</a> - <a href=
349 "http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,42399,00.html"> Article on
350 Midori Linux</a> on <a href= "http://www.wired.com"> Wired</a>. Quote from
351 Erik at the top of <a href=
352 "http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,42399-2,00.html"> this
353 page</a>
Mark Whitley798ab302001-03-13 17:08:54 +0000354
Eric Andersen1b622ff2000-12-14 15:43:57 +0000355</ul>
356
357<p> Do you use BusyBox? I'd love to know about it and I'd be happy to link to
358you.
359
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000360
361
362<!-- End of Table -->
363
364</TD></TR>
365</TABLE>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000366
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375 Mail all comments, insults, suggestions and bribes to
376 <a href="mailto:andersen@lineo.com">Erik Andersen</a><BR>
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000377 The Busybox logo is copyright 1999,2000,2001, Erik Andersen.
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000378 </font>
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