Run a Computer Vision Model on a Himax Microcontroller
Introduction
Overview
Set up the environment
Build the firmware
Flash firmware onto the microcontroller
Run additional models in the web toolkit
Review
Next Steps

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This Learning Path has been validated on Ubuntu 22.04 LTS and macOS.

Tip

If you are running Windows, you can use Ubuntu through Windows subsystem for Linux 2 (WSL2). Check out Get started with Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) on Arm to learn more.

Install software tools

Follow the instructions below to install the required development tools.

Install Python and Pip

You will use Python to build the firmware image and pip to install additional dependencies.

Verify Python is installed by running:

    

        
        
            python3 --version

You should see an output like the following:

    

        
        Python 3.12.7

On Ubuntu, you may need to install pip and venv with the following commands:

    

        
        
            sudo apt update
sudo apt install python3-pip python3-venv -y

Verify Pip is installed correctly:

    

        
        
            pip3 --version

The output is similar to:

    

        
        pip 24.0 from /usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/pip (python 3.12)

It is good practice to manage Python packages through a virtual environment.

Create one with the steps below.

    

        
        
            python3 -m venv $HOME/yolo-venv
source $HOME/yolo-venv/bin/activate

Your terminal displays (yolo-venv) in the prompt indicating the virtual environment is active.

You also need the Git distributed version control system installed.

Run the command below to verify that Git is installed on your system:

    

        
        
            git --version

If it is installed, you will see output similar to:

    

        
        git version 2.39.3

Install Make

Install the Make build tool, which is used to build the firmware in the next section.

    

        
        
            
sudo apt update
sudo apt install make -y
  
        
    

    

        
        
            
brew install make

After Make is installed, run it to print the version.

    

        
        
            make --version

The output is similar to:

    

        
        GNU Make 4.3
Built for x86_64-pc-linux-gnu
Copyright (C) 1988-2020 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
Note

If you are using macOS, you need to verify that your installation is for GNU Make - not the BSD version. You should see GNU in the version output.

Install the Arm GNU toolchain

The toolchain is used to compile code on the host for the embedded device architecture.

    

        
        
            
cd $HOME
wget https://developer.arm.com/-/media/Files/downloads/gnu/13.2.rel1/binrel/arm-gnu-toolchain-13.2.rel1-x86_64-arm-none-eabi.tar.xz
tar -xvf arm-gnu-toolchain-13.2.rel1-x86_64-arm-none-eabi.tar.xz
export PATH="$HOME/arm-gnu-toolchain-13.2.Rel1-x86_64-arm-none-eabi/bin/:$PATH"
  
        
    

    

        
        
            
cd $HOME
wget https://developer.arm.com/-/media/Files/downloads/gnu/13.3.rel1/binrel/arm-gnu-toolchain-13.3.rel1-darwin-arm64-arm-none-eabi.tar.xz
tar -xvf arm-gnu-toolchain-13.3.rel1-darwin-arm64-arm-none-eabi.tar.xz
export PATH="$HOME/arm-gnu-toolchain-13.3.rel1-darwin-arm64-arm-none-eabi/bin/:$PATH"
Tip

You can add the export command to your .bashrc or .zshrc file to set the search path for each new shell.

Now that your development environment is ready, move to the next section where you will generate the firmware image.

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