Raspberry pi based terminal - quick boot with GUI application - general idea and how-to

Question

So theese are my first steps into arm-based computers. I'm planning (only theoretically) to build a device using rPi / bbone etc. It would have some sensors connected and display some data on small lcd screen.

I'm really not into graphical interfaces, but quite familiar with linux, c++.

I want to make this device boot quickly and display full-screen program. I've read some articles about embedded linux and how to make it lightweight and fast but I'm not able (probably using bad keywords) to find how to make it boot directly to graphical app.

I don't want to use kde, gnome, windowmaker etc (maybe I must?). I want my board to have single program that would be started on boot and nothing else.

And one more thing. I find debian really annoying. Of course I know that every linux is able to be installed on rPi but is for example gentoo supporting rPi as well as debian? Or maybe there is dedicated lightweight distribution of it for arm?

Answer 1

First take a look at Buildroot. It is embedded Linux distro, that builds root file system from scratch. So you have full control over your target OS.

As for GUI, I'd suggest to use Qt Embedded. It requires only a framebuffer device.

As for autostart, just create s script under /etc/init.d/ and let it start your application.