SWUpdate is a Linux Update agent with the goal to provide an efficient and safe way to update an embedded Linux system in field. SWUpdate supports local and OTA updates, multiple update strategies and it is designed with security in mind.

To start with SWUpdate, it is suggested you look at the documentation and build for one evaluation board (or you run SWUpdate on your host for a first overview).

SWUpdate is a framework with a lot of configurable options:

• Update of all components of device (rootfs, kernel, bootloader, microcontroller FW)
• Install on embedded media (eMMC, SD, Raw NAND, UBIFS, NOR and SPI-NOR flashes)
• Partitioner for GPT and MBR partition table
• Allow single image delivery on multiple devices
• Streaming mode without temporary copies of artifacts
• Multiple interfaces (local and OTA) for getting software
  • local storage (USB, etc.)
  • integrated web server
  • integrated REST client connector to hawkBit for fleet updates.
  • remote server download
• Software delivered as images, gzipped tarball, etc.
• Allow custom handlers for installing FPGA firmware, microcontroller firmware via custom protocols.
• Delta updates based on librsync.
• Fail safe and atomic update
• Lua interpreter to extend the update rules on your needs
• Hardware / Software compatibility.
• Small footprint to generate a rescue system to restore the device.
• Cryptographic sign and verification of updates
  • support for OpenSSL
  • support for mbedTLS
  • support for WolfSSL
• Encryption of artifacts via symmetric AES key.
• pre and post update scripts
• small resources required.
• controllable via library
• progress interface to report update status to an application / HMI.
• ...and many others.

Take a look at features.

Documentation is part of the project and can be generated, or you access to the Online Documentation.

SWUpdate is well integrated in the Yocto build system by adding the meta-swupdate layer. It is also integrated in Buildroot. Debian (and Debian-like distributions) has merged a package.

Examples using meta-swupdate with evaluation boards (Beaglebone, RPI3) are provided in meta-swupdate-boards layer.

SWUpdate is released under GPLv2. A library to control SWUpdate is part of the project and it is released under LGPLv2.1. License information for any file is either explicitly stated or defaults to GPL version 2.0. Extension written in Lua are subjected to Lua license (MIT).

A community support takes place on the SWUpdate's Mailing List:

swupdate@googlegroups.com

The Mailing List is open without need to be registered.

A web-interface is available here.

SWUpdate was analyzed to be Open Source compliant. See Open Source Compliance for details.

Contributions are welcome ! You can submit your patches (or post questions regarding the project) to the Mailing List.

Please read the contributing chapter in the documentation how to contribute to the project.

Patches are collected by Patchwork