Using Bootgen Interfaces

The Create Boot Image wizard in the Vitis™ GUI offers a limited number of Bootgen options to generate a boot image.

To create a boot image using the GUI, do the following:

1. Select the application project in the Project Navigator or C/C++ Projects view and right-click Create Boot Image. Alternatively, click Xilinx > Create Boot Image.

   The Create Boot Image dialog box opens, with default values pre-selected from the context of the selected C project.

   Note the following:

   • When you run Create Boot Image the first time for an application, the dialog box is pre-populated with paths to the FSBL ELF file, and the bitstream for the selected hardware (if it exists in hardware project), and then the selected application ELF file.
   • If a boot image was run previously for the application, and a BIF file exists, the page is pre-populated with the values from the /bif folder.
2. Populate the Create Boot Image dialog box with the following information:
   Note: The Vitis GUI wizard is not yet available for Versal devices.
   1. From the Architecture drop-down, select the required architecture.
   2. Select either Create a BIF file or Import an existing BIF file.
   3. From the Basic tab, specify the Output BIF file path.
   4. If applicable, specify the UDF data: See udf_data for more information about this option.
   5. Specify the Output path:
3. In the Boot image partitions, click the Add button to add additional partition images.
4. Create offset, alignment, and allocation values for partitions in the boot image, if applicable.

   The output file path is set to the /bif folder under the selected application project by default.

5. From the Security tab, you can specify the attributes to create a secure image. This security can be applied to individual partitions as required.
   1. To enable authentication for a partition, check the Use Authentication option, then specify the PPK, SPK, PSK, and SSK values. See the Using Authentication topic for more information.
   2. To enable encryption for a partition, select the Encryption view, and check the Use Encryption option. See Using Encryption for more information.
6. Create or import a BIF file boot image one partition at a time, starting from the bootloader. The partitions list displays the summary of the partitions in the BIF file. It shows the file path, encryption settings, and authentication settings. Use this area to add, delete, modify, and reorder the partitions. You can also set values for enabling encryption, authentication, and checksum, and specifying some other partition related values like Load, Alignment, and Offset.

When you specify Bootgen options on the command line you have many more options than those provided in the GUI. In the standard install of the Vitis software platform, the XSCT (Xilinx Software Command-Line Tool) is available for use as an interactive command line environment, or to use for creating scripting. In the XSCT, you can run Bootgen commands. XSCT accesses the Bootgen executable, which is a separate tool. This Bootgen executable can be installed standalone as described in Installing Bootgen. This is the same tool as is called from the XSCT, so any scripts developed here or in the XSCT will work in the other tool.

The Xilinx Software Command-Line Tool (XSCT) Reference Guide in the Embedded Software Development flow describes the tool. See the "XSCT Use Cases" chapter for an example of using Bootgen commands in XSCT.

The following table lists the Bootgen command options. Each option is linked to a longer description in the left column with a short description in the right column. The architecture name indicates what Xilinx® device uses that command:

• zynq: Zynq®-7000 SoC device
• zynqmp: Zynq® UltraScale+™ MPSoC device
• fpga: Any 7 series and above devices
• versal: Versal™ ACAP

For more information, see Command Reference.