Barebox is an open source

Open source

The term open source describes practices in production and development that promote access to the end product's source materials. Some consider open source a philosophy, others consider it a pragmatic methodology...

, primary boot loader used in embedded devices

Embedded system

An embedded system is a computer system designed for specific control functions within a larger system. often with real-time computing constraints. It is embedded as part of a complete device often including hardware and mechanical parts. By contrast, a general-purpose computer, such as a personal...

. It is available for a number of different computer architecture

Computer architecture

In computer science and engineering, computer architecture is the practical art of selecting and interconnecting hardware components to create computers that meet functional, performance and cost goals and the formal modelling of those systems....

s, including ARM

ARM architecture

ARM is a 32-bit reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by ARM Holdings. It was named the Advanced RISC Machine, and before that, the Acorn RISC Machine. The ARM architecture is the most widely used 32-bit ISA in numbers produced...

, Blackfin

Blackfin

The Blackfin is a family of 16- or 32-bit microprocessors developed, manufactured and marketed by Analog Devices. The family is characterized by their built-in, fixed-point digital signal processor functionality supplied by 16-bit Multiply–accumulates , accompanied on-chip by a small and...

, MIPS

MIPS architecture

MIPS is a reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by MIPS Technologies . The early MIPS architectures were 32-bit, and later versions were 64-bit...

, Nios

Nios embedded processor

Nios was Altera's first configurable 16-bit embedded processor for its FPGA product-line. For new designs, Altera recommends the 32-bit Nios II. It is now considered obsolete.- See also :* LatticeMico8* LatticeMico32* MicroBlaze* PicoBlaze* Micon P200...

 and x86.

History

The barebox project began in July 2007. It was initially derived from Das U-Boot

Das U-Boot

Das U-Boot is an open source, primary boot loader used in embedded devices. It is available for a number of different computer architectures, including PPC, ARM, MIPS, AVR32, x86, 68k, Nios, and MicroBlaze.- Supported File Systems :...

 and adheres to several of its ideas, so users familiar with U-Boot are meant to come into production quickly with barebox. As the barebox developers are dedicated to the Linux kernel

Linux kernel

The Linux kernel is an operating system kernel used by the Linux family of Unix-like operating systems. It is one of the most prominent examples of free and open source software....

's coding style and code quality, barebox tries to stick as closely as possible to the methodologies and techniques developed in Linux.