BitForge

A single-binary Yocto / BitBake workspace manager with declarative layers, a lockfile and a live build web UI.

Purpose

BitForge makes Yocto builds reproducible and easy to manage from one static binary — no Python virtualenv or global installs required. It:

• Scaffolds a Yocto workspace and clones poky / OpenEmbedded-core plus BitBake with a single BitForge --init.
• Manages upstream layers declaratively in BitForge.toml, keeping the manifest and bblayers.conf in sync automatically.
• Pins every layer to an exact commit in BitForge.lock, so a fresh checkout rebuilds the same tree.
• Generates your BitBake configuration and serves a built-in web UI that streams BitBake output live — start and watch builds from the CLI or the browser.
• Updates itself in place with BitForge --update (with a --beta channel for early builds).

Installation

Download and install the latest stable binary with the install script:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/DraviaVemal/BitForge/release/install.sh | sh

This installs the BitForge binary to ~/.local/bin. Options:

# Install the latest pre-release (beta) build
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/DraviaVemal/BitForge/release/install.sh | sh -s -- --beta

# Install to a custom directory
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/DraviaVemal/BitForge/release/install.sh | sh -s -- --dir=/usr/local/bin

Make sure the install directory is on your PATH, then run BitForge --init to bootstrap your first workspace.

Documentation

Full documentation — getting started, layer and workspace guides, the build web UI, the complete BitForge.toml schema and the CLI reference — lives at:

https://docs.draviavemal.com/bitforge

License

BitForge is dual-licensed — use it under whichever fits your case:

1. GNU GPL-3.0 (open source) — the full text is in the LICENSE file. You may use, study, modify and distribute the software, including for commercial purposes, provided distributed derivative works remain open under GPL-3.0.
2. Commercial license — for closed-source / proprietary use without the GPL-3.0 copyleft obligations, offered through GitHub Sponsors. It adds commercial-friendly (MIT-style) terms, access to a private packaged-release repository and priority support.

See the licensing overview for details, and Versioning & Licensing for how terms can differ between versions. For custom arrangements, contact contact@draviavemal.com.

Contributing

Contributions target the single release branch:

1. Fork the repository and create a feature branch from release.
2. Make your change in clear, focused commits using Conventional Commits (e.g. feat: add layer prune command, fix: handle missing lockfile).
3. Add or update tests and docs where relevant.
4. Open a pull request against release describing the change and its motivation. Merging publishes a new alpha automatically; stable releases are cut later by a maintainer pushing a vX.Y.Z tag.

A good bug report includes the version (stable or alpha), a minimal reproducible example, expected vs. actual behaviour, and your OS and toolchain versions. Please keep interactions respectful and constructive. See the shared community & contributing guide for more.