[Armbian newsletter] - Github Highlights

This week's work centers on Rockchip platform maturation, kernel and toolchain modernization, and board-level enablement across vendors.

Rockchip received the largest share of attention, with RK3528 gaining a thermal driver, cooling-map refinements, and cleanup of legacy PCIe and pmdomain workarounds. The Radxa E24C now stores its U-Boot environment in SPI flash and reads switch port MAC addresses from EEPROM, while device trees for the Mixtile Blade 3, Core3588E, and Edge 2 were corrected. New board support was added for the Boardcon SBC3568, and the Rock 5T now ships an edge kernel. On the configuration side, hyphenated LINUXFAMILY handling was fixed in both the kernel selector and firmware remap logic for the rk35xx family.

Kernel and build infrastructure saw significant modernization. Mainline advanced to 7.3-rc5, several C23 build errors were resolved for D1 ATF, OpenSBI, and libbpf, and the default FRAME_WARN was restored on 64-bit configs. Deprecated patch directories for imx6 and the RK BSP 5.10 legacy kernel were retired, parallel patch queueing was optimized, and kernel-debs postinst ordering was hardened for DKMS safety. CI switched to remote ccache only, and ATF builds now honor USE_CCACHE correctly.

Board-level enablement spanned multiple vendors. ODROID-HC4 gained PCIe suspend, Wake-on-LAN, and RTC alarm support, along with a usable SPI NOR and SD card power-down. ODROID-XU4 was bumped from 6.15 to 7.2 on edge, the Amlogic C400 Plus received SD-boot and Wi-Fi profile fixes, and the Raspberry Pi 4B added support for Waveshare and Raspberry touchscreen v2 panels. The MorseMicro DKMS project also matured substantially with split MM6108/MM8108 packages, Linux 7.1 API compatibility, and initial NetworkManager udev integration.

#Armbian #EmbeddedLinux #Rockchip #Kernel #SBC

Changes

• Actions: Test DKMS module against many kernels. by @vidplace7 in armbian/MorseMicro-DKMS#16
• Actions: Update to Ubuntu 26.04. by @vidplace7 in armbian/MorseMicro-DKMS#10
• arm64: dts: rockchip: add Boardcon SBC3568 support. by @boardcon-arm in armbian/linux-rockchip#562
• arm64: dts: rockchip: fix the Mixtile Blade 3, Core3588E and Edge 2 device trees. by @evtest-hash in armbian/linux-rockchip#556
• arm64: dts: rockchip: rk3528: drop pcie2x1 skip-reset-in-config. by @rpardini in armbian/linux-rockchip#552
• armbian_firmware: apply RK3588 family remap for BOARDFAMILY=rk35xx too. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/configng#1030
• armbian_firmware: fix kernel selector truncating hyphenated LINUXFAMILY. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/configng#1028
• artifacts: hash compile_crust into the u-boot artifact version. by @iav in armbian/build#10829
• atf: fix C23 build errors for D1 (OpenSBI). by @khaliforce in armbian/build#10772
• bcm2711: don't wipe the firmware kernel when removing one of several kernels. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#10783
• board-tests: sections + right-hand TOC, no collapsed cards. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/documentation#1343
• board: ztl-a568: enable OTG connector VBUS switch. by @yanhy2000 in armbian/build#10823
• boards: aml-c400-plus: fix SD card booting capability, QCA9377 profiles and blacklist simpledrm. by @jomadeto in armbian/build#10793
• bootscripts: rk35xx: fall back to PARTUUID instead of hardcoded rootdev. by @akshar27 in armbian/build#10622
• ci: use remote ccache only, drop the duplicate local cache. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/ci#77
• cleanup deprecated kernel patch directories. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#10810
• cli: obtain host release and arch for config-only artifact dumps. by @iav in armbian/build#10485
• compilation: add compile-wrapper and ATF/Crust make hooks. by @iav in armbian/build#10828
• deprecate rk bsp 5.10 "legacy" kernel. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#10811
• docs: widen the content column 25%, site-wide. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/documentation#1342
• drm: rockchip: dw_hdmi_qp: support inverted HDMI HPD. by @evtest-hash in armbian/linux-rockchip#559
• env_init: fix KERNELPKG_LINUXFAMILY truncating hyphenated family. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/configng#1029
• extensions: arm64-compat-vdso: do nothing on non-arm64 targets. by @iav in armbian/build#10809
• extensions: gxlimg: cleanups, better logging, debugging. by @rpardini in armbian/build#10769
• external: add ZFS for resolute from arter97 PPA. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/os#490
• external: pull the Raspberry Pi archive suite that matches the release. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/os#491
• Fix build against Linux 7.0 by updating kernel API usage to match 7.1. by @vidplace7 in armbian/MorseMicro-DKMS#17
• Fix Documentation references in systemd unit files for hostapd and wpa_supplicant. by @vidplace7 in armbian/MorseMicro-DKMS#14
• fix(atf): honour USE_CCACHE; no leading space when CCACHE is empty. by @iav in armbian/build#10820
• imx6: drop abandoned patch dirs for 6.1, 6.6 and 6.10. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#10795
• Initial usage docs + udev rules for NM. by @vidplace7 in armbian/MorseMicro-DKMS#15
• inovato-quadra: force an explicit HDMI mode for the switch-fed port. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#10800
• kernel-debs: copy the kernel into FAT32 /boot, and give FAT32 /boot room for it. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#10801
• kernel-debs: run header_postinst.d from linux-headers postinst (DKMS order-safety). by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#10775
• kernel: 7.3: fix false test_fortify failures with colored diagnostics. by @iav in armbian/build#10805
• kernel: drop NETFILTER_NETLINK from the forced module list. by @iav in armbian/build#10808
• kernel: fix C23 build errors for libbpf in D1. by @khaliforce in armbian/build#10773
• kernel: use the default FRAME_WARN (2048) on 64-bit configs. by @iav in armbian/build#10821
• mainline: bump to 7.3-rc4. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#10785
• mainline: bump to v7.3-rc5. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#10841
• meson64-6.18: fix broken patch with upstream changes, general patch maintenance. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#10786
• meson64: 7.2, 7.3: HEVC decoder patch: fallthrough keyword, source. by @iav in armbian/build#10807
• meson64: new tm16xx driver; aml-t95z-plus: bump & fixes. by @rpardini in armbian/build#10814
• meson64: odroid c4/hc4: let the SD card be powered down. by @iav in armbian/build#10781
• meson64: odroidhc4: make the SPI NOR usable — mux HOLD#/WP#, clock it at 40 MHz. by @iav in armbian/build#10779
• meson64: sleep and wake on ODROID-HC4 - PCIe, Wake-on-Lan and the RTC alarm. by @iav in armbian/build#10740
• milkv-duos: make the MAC addresses truly stable. by @lukaszsobala in armbian/build#10778
• MorseMicro 2.1.0. by @vidplace7 in armbian/MorseMicro-DKMS#11
• mvebu: CPU bugfixes. by @neheb in armbian/build#10789
• net: stmmac: don't claim IFF_UNICAST_FLT without address registers. by @rpardini in armbian/linux-rockchip#551
• odroidxu4: bump edge kernel 6.15 → 7.2 (validated on HC1). by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#10796
• odroidxu4: name on-board ethernet end0 via device tree. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#10831
• parallel-patches: optimize chain queue to start from largest set. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#10818
• patching: keep the b4 footer after the diff out of the diff. by @iav in armbian/build#10806
• radxa-e24c: u-boot: environment in SPI Flash. by @rpardini in armbian/build#10836
• Remove D-Bus integration from wpa-supplicant-s1g and update service configs. by @vidplace7 in armbian/MorseMicro-DKMS#13
• rewrite various patches. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#10830
• rock-5t: build and publish an edge kernel. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#10824
• rockchip64-7.2: radxa-e24c: read ethernet switch ports MAC from EEPROM. by @rpardini in armbian/build#10817
• rockchip64-7.2: rk3528: add thermal driver. by @rpardini in armbian/build#10816
• rockchip64-7.2: rk3528: drop "pmdomain/rockchip: skip domains returning -EPROBE_DEFER". by @rpardini in armbian/build#10815
• rockchip64-7.2: rk3528: thermal: cooling-map on the first passive trip. by @rpardini in armbian/build#10837
• rockchip64-7.3: fix warnings from overlay-configfs, rk3328-dmc and hdmi-clock patches. by @iav in armbian/build#10822
• rockchip64: fix u-boot builds for 9tripod-x3568-v4 and graperain-g3568-v2. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#10825
• rpi4b: add support for waveshare and Raspberry touchscreen v2. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#10784
• runner-cleanup: don't wipe _diag under a busy runner. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/configng#1035
• seeed-extension: don't fetch external repo during config-dump-json (fixes matrix race). by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#10763
• Split MM6108 / MM8108 packages. by @vidplace7 in armbian/MorseMicro-DKMS#9
• star64: change KERNEL_TARGET to the last available "vendor". by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#10794
• sun55i-a523 fix/restore delays on the network adapters. by @juanesf in armbian/build#10804
• sunxi-6.18: current: fix stk3310 patches causing breakage. by @EvilOlaf in armbian/build#10787
• Sync from mainline for 9tripod-x3568-v4 and graperin-g3568-v2. by @rbqvq in armbian/build#10819
• system: add tuning profiles for the machine's actual role. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/configng#1033
• uefi-x86: refresh applesmc drvdata patch for the workqueue-leak fix. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/build#10791
• Update hostap_s1g and mm6108/mm8108 driver DKMS configurations. by @vidplace7 in armbian/MorseMicro-DKMS#12
• Automatic refresh repository README. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/documentation#1196
• Automatic refresh repository README. by @igorpecovnik in armbian/shallow#12

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