[OE-core] how much can bitbake tell me about my upcoming build?

[Robert P. J. Day]

  so, let's say i've decided to use oe-core to build a qemux86 image:

$ . oe-core/oe-init-build-env builds/qemux86

before i go *any* further (before i even decide which image i'm going
to bake), how much can bitbake tell me about this configuration?

  i know

$ bitbake -e

can tell me my current environment, that's certainly useful.

  i can also use

$ bitbake -s

to show me the current and preferred versions of all packages (related
strictly to the current MACHINE setting in local.conf, correct?)

  what other info can i get out of bitbake?  what about image-specific
info?  is there a way to list the packages required for a given image?
some equivalent of

$ bitbake -s core-image-sato

  what about a command that lists the available images without having
to peruse the oe-core "images" directories?  and what about any of the
other bitbake-related utilities?  i can see "bitbake-layers" being
pretty useful.

  in short, without starting an actual build, how much information can
i extract using bitbake and bitbake-related utilities?

rday

p.s.  one thing i'd like is to be able to ask how much source i would
need to download for a given build before i start.  is there any way
to do that?

-- 

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Robert P. J. Day                                 Ottawa, Ontario, CANADA
                        http://crashcourse.ca

Twitter:                                       http://twitter.com/rpjday
LinkedIn:                               http://ca.linkedin.com/in/rpjday
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