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Eric Andersen766c0122000-06-21 22:43:07 +0000[diff] [blame]8<body text="#000000" alink="#660000" link="#660000" bgcolor="#dee2de" vlink="#660000">
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18 <B>B&nbsp;u&nbsp;s&nbsp;y&nbsp;B&nbsp;o&nbsp;x</B>
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22 </TABLE>
Matt Kraai9ba0daf2001-01-31 01:59:46 +0000[diff] [blame]23 <a href="/"><IMG SRC="images/busybox2.jpg" alt="BusyBox" border="0" width="360" height="230"></a><BR>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]24
25
26<!-- Begin Introduction section -->
27
28
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000[diff] [blame]29<TABLE WIDTH="95%" CELLSPACING=1 CELLPADDING=4 BORDER=1>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]30<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 +0000[diff] [blame]33 </B></BIG></A>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]34</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 +0000[diff] [blame]40tar, 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 +0000[diff] [blame]43the 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 +0000[diff] [blame]47features) at compile time. This makes it easy to customize your embedded
48systems. To create a working system, just add /dev, a kernel, and an editor,
49such as nano, e3, or elvis-tiny. For a really minimal system, you can even use
50the busybox shell (not Bourne compatible, but very small and quite usable).
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]51<p>
52
53BusyBox is now maintained by
Eric Andersen537d1652001-01-25 22:00:37 +0000[diff] [blame]54<a href="http://codepoet.org/andersen/erik/erik.html">
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]55Erik Andersen</a>, and its ongoing development is being sponsored by
56<a href="http://www.lineo.com/">Lineo</a>.
57<p>
58BusyBox is licensed under the
59<a href="http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html">GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE</a>
Eric Andersen766c0122000-06-21 22:43:07 +0000[diff] [blame]60<p>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]61
Mark Whitleyac21e932001-01-30 23:37:15 +0000[diff] [blame]62<h3> Screenshot </h3>
63
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000[diff] [blame]64<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 +0000[diff] [blame]66
Eric Andersen8ec10a92001-01-27 09:33:39 +0000[diff] [blame]67<H3>Mailing List Information</h3>
Matt Kraai8677d7b2000-12-15 15:41:03 +0000[diff] [blame]68BusyBox now has a <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/lists/busybox/">mailing list</a>!
Eric Andersen766c0122000-06-21 22:43:07 +0000[diff] [blame]69To subscribe, go and visit <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/mailman/listinfo/busybox">this page</a>.
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]70
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]71<!-- Begin Latest News section -->
72
73<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#ccccc0" ALIGN=center>
74 <A NAME="news">
75 <BIG><B>
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000[diff] [blame]76 Latest News
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]77 </B></BIG>
78 </A>
79</TD></TR>
80<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#eeeee0">
81
82<ul>
83
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000[diff] [blame]84 <li> <b>15 March 2001 -- BusyBox 0.50 released</b>
85 <br>
86
87 This release adds several new applets including ifconfig, route, pivot_root, stty,
88 and tftp, and also fixes tons of bugs. Tab completion in the
89 shell is now working very well, and the shell's environment variable
90 expansion was fixed. Tons of other things were fixed or made
91 smaller. For a fairly complete overview, see the
92 <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox/Changelog">changelog</a>.
93 <p>
94 lash (the busybox shell) is still with us, fixed up a bit so it
95 now behaves itself quite nicely. It really is quite usable as
96 long as you don't expect it to provide Bourne shell grammer.
97 Standard things like pipes, redirects, command line editing, and
98 environment variable expansion work great. But we have found that
99 this shell, while very usable, does not provide an extensible
100 framework for adding in full Bourne shell behavior. So the first order of
101 business as we begin working on the next BusyBox release will be to merge in the new shell
102 currently in progress at
103 <a href="http://doolittle.faludi.com/~larry/parser.html">Larry Doolittle's website</a>.
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000[diff] [blame]104 <p>
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000[diff] [blame]105
106
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000[diff] [blame]107 <li> <b>27 January 2001 -- BusyBox 0.49 released</b>
Eric Andersen8ec10a92001-01-27 09:33:39 +0000[diff] [blame]108 <br>
109
110 Several new applets, lots of bug fixes, cleanups, and many smaller
111 things made nicer. Several cleanups and improvements to the shell.
112 For a list of the most interesting changes
113 you might want to look at the <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox/Changelog">changelog</a>.
114 <p>
115 Special thanks go out to Matt Kraai and Larry Doolittle for all their
116 work on this release, and for keeping on top of things while I've been
117 out of town.
118 <p>
119 <em>Special Note</em><br>
120
121 BusyBox 0.49 was supposed to have replaced lash, the BusyBox
122 shell, with a new shell that understands full Bourne shell/Posix shell grammer.
123 Well, that simply didn't happen in time for this release. A new
124 shell that will eventually replace lash is already under
125 construction. This new shell is being developed by Larry
126 Doolittle, and could use all of our help. Please see the work in
127 progress on <a href="http://doolittle.faludi.com/~larry/parser.html">Larry's website</a>
128 and help out if you can. This shell will be included in the next
129 release of BusyBox.
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000[diff] [blame]130 <p>
Eric Andersen8ec10a92001-01-27 09:33:39 +0000[diff] [blame]131
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000[diff] [blame]132 <li> <b>13 December 2000 -- BusyBox 0.48 released</b>
Eric Andersen43622002000-12-13 18:30:13 +0000[diff] [blame]133 <br>
134
135 This release fixes lots and lots of bugs. This has had some very
136 rigorous testing, and looks very, very clean. The usual tar
137 update of course: tar no longer breaks hardlinks, tar -xzf is
138 optionally supported, and the LRP folks will be pleased to know
139 that 'tar -X' and 'tar --exclude' are both now in. Applets are
Matt Kraaie3a94f72000-12-13 19:50:48 +0000[diff] [blame]140 now looked up using a binary search making lash (the busybox
Eric Andersen43622002000-12-13 18:30:13 +0000[diff] [blame]141 shell) much faster. For the new debian-installer (for Debian
142 woody) a .udeb can now be generated.
143 <p>
Matt Kraaie3a94f72000-12-13 19:50:48 +0000[diff] [blame]144 The curious can get a list of some of the more interesting changes by reading
Eric Andersen43622002000-12-13 18:30:13 +0000[diff] [blame]145 the <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox/Changelog">changelog</a>.
146 <p>
147 Many thanks go out to the many many people that have contributed to
148 this release, especially Matt Kraai, Larry Doolittle, and Kent Robotti.
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000[diff] [blame]149 <p>
Eric Andersen43622002000-12-13 18:30:13 +0000[diff] [blame]150
151
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000[diff] [blame]152 <li> <b>Old News</b>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]153 <br>
Eric Andersen766c0122000-06-21 22:43:07 +0000[diff] [blame]154 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 +0000[diff] [blame]155</ul>
156
157
Eric Andersen4a971ae2000-06-22 01:27:11 +0000[diff] [blame]158<!-- Begin Download section -->
159
160<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#ccccc0" ALIGN=center>
161 <A NAME="download"><BIG><B>
162 Download
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000[diff] [blame]163 </B></BIG></A>
Eric Andersen4a971ae2000-06-22 01:27:11 +0000[diff] [blame]164</TD></TR>
165<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#eeeee0">
166<ul>
Mark Whitley8ba1b112001-01-25 23:29:58 +0000[diff] [blame]167
168 <li> Source for the latest release can always be downloaded from
Eric Andersenbdcc6fb2000-09-26 06:15:12 +0000[diff] [blame]169 <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox">ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox</a>.
Mark Whitley8ba1b112001-01-25 23:29:58 +0000[diff] [blame]170
171 <li> A new snapshot of the source is made daily and is available as a GNU
172 gzipped tarball <a href="busybox.tar.gz"> right here</a>.
173
174 <li> BusyBox now has its own publically browsable
Eric Andersen4a971ae2000-06-22 01:27:11 +0000[diff] [blame]175 <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/cgi-bin/cvsweb/busybox/">CVS tree</a>,
176 anonymous
177 <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/cvs_anon.html">CVS access</a>, and
178 for those that are actively contributing there is even
179 <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/cvs_write.html">CVS write access</a>.
Mark Whitley8ba1b112001-01-25 23:29:58 +0000[diff] [blame]180
Eric Andersen4a971ae2000-06-22 01:27:11 +0000[diff] [blame]181</ul>
182
183
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]184<!-- Begin Docs section -->
185
186<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#ccccc0" ALIGN=center>
187 <A NAME="docs"><BIG><B>
188 Documentation
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000[diff] [blame]189 </B></BIG></A>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]190</TD></TR>
191<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#eeeee0">
192Current documentation for BusyBox includes:
193<ul>
Eric Andersenbdcc6fb2000-09-26 06:15:12 +0000[diff] [blame]194 <li> <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox/BusyBox.html">BusyBox.html</a>.
195 This is a list of the all the available commands in BusyBox with
196 complete usage information and examples of how to use each app. I
197 have spent a <em>lot</em> of time updating these docs and trying to
198 make them fairly comprehensive. If you find any errors (factual,
199 grammatical, whatever) please let me know.
Eric Andersen43622002000-12-13 18:30:13 +0000[diff] [blame]200 <li> <a href="ftp://oss.lineo.com/busybox/README">README</a>.
201 This is the README file included in the busybox source release.
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000[diff] [blame]202 <li> <a href="http://bugs.lineo.com/db/pa/lbusybox.html">BusyBox Bugs</a>.
Eric Andersenbdcc6fb2000-09-26 06:15:12 +0000[diff] [blame]203 Need to report a bug? Need to check if a bug has been filed?
Eric Andersenaec27bc2000-07-11 18:18:40 +0000[diff] [blame]204 <li> If you need more help, the BusyBox
205 <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/lists/busybox/">mailing list</a> is
206 a good place to start.
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]207</ul>
208
209
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]210<!-- Begin Links section -->
211
212<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#ccccc0" ALIGN=center>
213 <A NAME="links">
214 <BIG><B>
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000[diff] [blame]215 Important Links
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]216 </B></BIG>
217 </A>
218</TD></TR>
219<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#eeeee0">
220
221<ul>
222
223 <li> <A HREF="http://perens.com/FreeSoftware/">
224 Free Software from Bruce Perens</A><br>
225 The original idea for BusyBox, and all versions up to 0.26 were written
226 by <A HREF="mailto:bruce@perens.com">Bruce Perens</a>. This is his BusyBox website.
227 <p>
228
Eric Andersen5efa2292001-03-05 18:26:50 +0000[diff] [blame]229 <li> <A HREF="http://freshmeat.net/projects/busybox/">
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]230 Freshmeat AppIndex record for BusyBox</A>
231 <p>
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000[diff] [blame]232 <li><a href="http://tinylogin.lineo.com/">TinyLogin</a>
233 is a nice embedded tool for handling authentication, changing passwords,
234 and similar tasks which nicely complements BusyBox.
235 <p>
236
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000[diff] [blame]237 <li><a href="http://cvs.uclinux.org/uClibc.html">uClibc</a>
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000[diff] [blame]238 is a C library for embedded systems. You can actually statically link
239 a "Hello World" application under x86 that only takes 4k (as opposed to
240 200k under GNU libc). It can do dynamic linking too and works nicely with
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000[diff] [blame]241 BusyBox to create very small embedded systems.
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000[diff] [blame]242 <p>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]243
Eric Andersen766c0122000-06-21 22:43:07 +0000[diff] [blame]244 <li> <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/software.html">Other cool embedded software</a>.
245 <p>
246
247 <li> <a href="http://opensource.lineo.com/">opensource.lineo.com</a>.
248 <p>
249
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]250 <li> <A HREF="http://www.lineo.com/">Lineo</A> is sponsoring BusyBox development.
251 <p>
252
253</ul>
254
255
Eric Andersen1b622ff2000-12-14 15:43:57 +0000[diff] [blame]256<!-- Begin Projects section -->
257
258<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#ccccc0" ALIGN=center>
259 <A NAME="projects"><BIG><B>
260 Products/Projects Using BusyBox
Matt Kraai18d50642001-01-31 02:13:05 +0000[diff] [blame]261 </B></BIG></A>
Eric Andersen1b622ff2000-12-14 15:43:57 +0000[diff] [blame]262</TD></TR>
263<TR><TD BGCOLOR="#eeeee0">
264
265<p> I know of the following products and/or projects that use BusyBox --
266listed in the order I happen to add them to the web page:
267
268<ul>
269 <li> <a href="http://www.lineo.com/products/embedix_linux/">Lineo Embedix Linux</a>
270 <li> <a href="http://cvs.debian.org/boot-floppies/">Debian installer (boot floppies) project</a>
271 <li> <a href="http://www.linuxrouter.org/">Linux Router Project </a>
272 <li> <a href="http://linux-embedded.org/">LEM</a>
273 <li> <a href="http://www.toms.net/rb/">tomsrtbt</a>
274 <li> <a href="http://www.stormix.com/">Stormix Installer</a>
275 <li> <a href="http://www.emacinc.com/linux2_sbc.htm">EMAC Linux 2.0 SBC</a>
276 <li> <a href="http://www.trinux.org/">Trinux</a>
277 <li> <a href="http://oddas.sourceforge.net/">ODDAS project</a>
278 <li> <a href="http://www.kerbango.com/">The Kerbango Internet Radio</a>
279 <li> <a href="http://www.linuxmagic.com/vpn/">LinuxMagic VPN Firewall</a>
280 <li> <a href="http://byld.sourceforge.net/">Build Your Linux Disk</a>
281 <li> <a href="http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~ichi/baslinux.html">BasicLinux</a>
282 <li> <a href="http://ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/system/recovery">Zdisk</a>
283 <li> <a href="http://www.adtran.com">AdTran - VPN/firewall VPN Linux Distribution</a>
Eric Andersen1b622ff2000-12-14 15:43:57 +0000[diff] [blame]284 <li> <a href="http://mkcdrec.ota.be/">mkCDrec - make CD-ROM recovery</a>
Eric Andersenc36c2ba2001-03-16 07:16:12 +0000[diff] [blame]285 <li> <a href="http://recycle.lbl.gov/~ldoolitt/bse/">Linux on nanoEngine</a>
286 <li> <a href="http://www.zelow.no/floppyfw/"> Floppyfw</a>
287 <li> <a href="http://midori.transmeta.com/"> Midori Linux</a>
Mark Whitley798ab302001-03-13 17:08:54 +0000[diff] [blame]288
Eric Andersen1b622ff2000-12-14 15:43:57 +0000[diff] [blame]289</ul>
290
291<p> Do you use BusyBox? I'd love to know about it and I'd be happy to link to
292you.
293
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]294
295
296<!-- End of Table -->
297
298</TD></TR>
299</TABLE>
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]300
301
302
303<!-- Footer -->
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308 <font size="-1" face="arial, helvetica, sans-serif">
309 Mail all comments, insults, suggestions and bribes to
310 <a href="mailto:andersen@lineo.com">Erik Andersen</a><BR>
Eric Andersendfba13d2001-03-16 08:30:00 +0000[diff] [blame]311 The Busybox logo is copyright 1999,2000,2001, Erik Andersen.
Erik Andersen330fd2b2000-05-19 05:35:19 +0000[diff] [blame]312 </font>
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