Automatic Partitioning Technique for Flash Memory on Linux-Based Embedded Systems

Abstract

This paper proposes an automatic partitioning technique for flash memory in Linux-based mobile embedded systems. The proposed technique creates a set of flash memory partitions whose sizes are exactly the same as the software modules stored in the flash memory, resultantly maximizing the space for user applications. When updating software modules, the proposed scheme automatically reconfigures the partitions by moving the unchanged software modules and replacing the updated modules with the old ones. Moreover, it can facilitate software updates in flash memory by removing the need for human intervention. Our performance evaluations reveal that the proposed technique not only guarantees about 10% more space for the user area in the flash memory, but also increases the speed of the software module updates by eight times, as compared with a manual update.