The ColdFire, MPC8610 and MPC5121E projects programs are open now. You can reach each Submission page from the Projects button at the top of the site, then find the Program you want.

In the interest of getting some high quality project proposals, this article hopes to outline the guidelines with regards to writing project proposals for the best chance of being accepted into the program.

Since initially the number of accepted projects will be low, it is important to submit project ideas which adequately explain the goals, tools and resources required, and the methods expected to complete the project.

So, here are the hints;

• Be verbose! A 2-line project proposal will not be accepted. Detail your project, why the chosen processor will be suitable, which ports and peripherals you will need to be exposed to complete the project.
• Be serious! Projects will not be accepted to "run Linux on the Efika" or "evaluate systems" without exposition. A special dispensation will be given to developers who have proven such work on other Programs - for example, employees of Red Hat, Novell, Canonical, who wish to bring up comprehensive distribution support for the platforms, or individual developers who have relevant experience (Linux driver authors, kernel maintainers, but please detail which drivers/modules you will work on)
• Be sure! If your project has a deadline for start of semester for a thesis or requiring grant application from a University or funding internally in a company, Genesi will do it's best to accomodate you, but please do not bet your education on a board being provided. Genesi makes no guarantees on approving projects, and once approved, no guarantees will be given on shipping dates for boards.
• Make sure you have the resources you need. Genesi cannot provide thousands of dollars of support hardware for every project developer. If you require 8 disks in RAID6 configuration to test a NAS, be prepared to buy them yourself. If you require 64 units for a cluster, be prepared to get one or two for free.. and pay for the rest yourself. Genesi will donate resources and hardware where we deem appropriate - this may be on certain milestones of your project, or Freescale or other partners taking an interest and further sponsoring the development within or without the Program.
• Check the documentation of the chip the Program focuses on to make sure you CAN actually acheive the results you are looking for. For instance requiring 64 GPIO pins on the MPC5200B would not work as there are not that many GPIO pins on the chip, and many of them are multiplexed with other peripherals.
• Submission of the same Project to multiple programs is allowed but discouraged, unless the project has a distinct advantage in running on all of the processors. Where Programs differ, enough explanation in each project is required - for example, to show why you need a MPC5121E board to develop a project which will run on the MPC8610 as well, or why you need an MPC8610 board to develop a project which will run adequately on an MPC5121E
• Genesi and Freescale will be responsible for the Linux BSP and providing MorphOS (if it is a valid target platform). Please do not submit Projects which rely on the release of MorphOS or any other operating system being ported before you can start. Special dispensation will be given to known talented MorphOS developers who already own Pegasos or Efika hardware - for instance, MPC5121E projects for those who own and have access to MPC5200B and MorphOS, and MPC8610 projects for those who own and have access to a Pegasos and MorphOS.
• Operating System ports such as FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, eCos will be considered on the basis of previous work. Projects should detail the work required to bring the port up on the platform. The port should have a purpose - for instance, FreeNAS relies on FreeBSD and making a NAS development system out of the MPC5121E would require the FreeBSD port. Porting FreeBSD just to run it is cool, but pointless :)
• Please make sure you select the correct project category. We have greatly expanded them :)
• Use images, links and the BBCode tags to make your project description prettier and more descriptive. Show links to previous work related to the project.
• Preview your project proposal before you submit. You have to do this at least once, but please make sure you are happy with the formatting, and content of your proposal. You will not be able to edit it later (especially once approved).

Have fun!

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Matt Sealey

Looks like average user can't take any of these cards, even for reasonable price. Too sad :(

In any case I hope that these systems will be available for more wider audience than for hardcore developers in the nearest future :)

You just need to come up with a great idea.

What we are talking about here is boards given away for free to aid projects which add significant value to the platforms - or as the basis of new products around the board or chips they're based on.

What we don't want to do is run a free for all so anyone who can type a 40-word summary can save $799 on a complete system. We had much the same requirements for the ODW Program at SNDF Frankfurt in 2004 - everyone had to fill out a paper form justifying their project to get the free ODW (after the free tutorial/seminar on AltiVec and Linux and the benefits of the PowerPC architecture, and the free meal, and the free booze :)

The requirements are strict because, for the very first approvals, they won't be getting Efika, they will be getting Freescale development boards with our firmware, which will be configured close to the final product as possible. These are EXPENSIVE, and potentially hard to work with! They can be used to get head starts on OS ports (BSD and the like) or start work on drivers.

When real hardware arrives we can do another round of approvals (and do swaps on the development boards) and take the requirements a little lower - if an OS port is done, you can engineer a project around it. This gives more options for project developers and more scope for ideas.
Yes, they will be on the store for everyone to buy, whether you have a good idea or not.

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Matt Sealey

Hi Neko,

I have just added a project description.

Do you think its clear and comprehensive enough to understand?

Cheers
Gunnar

Yes, that's pretty much what we are looking for. You've explained your goals, expected methods and the end result.. perfect.

I did clean up your formatting a bit :)

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Matt Sealey

Hi !

I would be interested to upgrade the Efika book with those new Efika chips (Efika 8610 and Efika 5121E).
(Same upgraded ebook, or new ebooks).

Are you interested by that kind of project, and do I have to add a proposal for the different chips ?

Are you also interested in such documentation projects for the Coldfire ?

Sure, why not..

Please be descriptive about what you would be writing about though. Remember the Projects system is meant to be a stepping stone not only for Genesi, but also for Freescale and other Partners which may be looking for suitable talent for commercial projects, products and demonstrations.

If they don't know what the "Efika Book" was and there is not too much of an explanation, they will probably pass the project by. The better the projects are described and planned out, the more chance you have of being further sponsored or seeing your work at a trade show or in meetings with Freescale for the next set of designs.. :)

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Matt Sealey

Hi Matt,

I've added the projects we talked about (separately so that progress monitoring should be easier per project). All are for 8610, here are the links:

libfreevec expansion
Mesa 3D
DirectFB driver for the 8610 LCD controller
qt4/eigen & SIMDx86
qt4/qimageblitz

I'm also thinking on an einit project, but I don't need a 8610 for that (actually I don't need a 8610 for any of these projects save the DirectFB driver), my pegasos II will work nicely for the rest.

I also applied now, even while I know my project is rather something
for the final Efika done by bplan and not the Hellrosa dev board. The
Efika2 is the key for my picture frame project.

I'd be glad to extend the project later on with an 8610 board with a
bigger screen (HDTV anyone?), but for now I focus on the e300 thing.
I hope the 8610 program will keep open for a while...

Hi !

I've posted two new Efika book projects proposals :
- Efika 8610 book
- Efika 5121e book

Note: I've put the 2nd project in "Industrial" by mistake (it should be "Other" I guess).
I would also like to change one or two things in project description.
So how can I edit the project pages ?

too bad for me (but that's not that bad ;-) )

For now, you talk to me about it. I disabled the edit code for internal reasons.

If you previewed the project proposal and checked it like you should, then you shouldn't need to edit it. These boards are not going to be shipped for a couple of weeks yet - you have lots of time to write up a good proposal and then submit it to the program. There is no need to rush.

Let's consider the lack of an edit button an opportunity to make sure you have everything specified and verified, rather than rush for a free board. I don't expect to get it right the first time, but at least.. you can proof read your own writing in the preview (it's laid out exactly as it is on the main site) and you can preview it as many times as you care to.

In any case; once you have a proposal submitted, you can add blogs. If any aspect of the project changes between now and later, you can simply report the change in a blog entry. Please do not use it to fix a spelling mistake, though.

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Matt Sealey

Hello everyone,

In addition to this being my first post, I have submitted my proposal for a new Freevo based media center running on the Efika 8610.

Thanks!
-Rob

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Rob Shortt
Independent developer
http://tvcentric.com
http://freevo.org

Hello,

I have also added my first project: Hard Real Time with the MPC5121E.
Is it ok or do you need more information ?

Thank you in advance.