Bitbake: "Nothing PROVIDES" error

Question

I'm new to Yocto and Bitbake. I'm running my yocto machine through a qemu emulator on Ubuntu and attempting to use the meta-selftest layer to get a sense of how to install new layers. I have downloaded the meta-selftest files into the directory where the rest of the meta- directories are, and added the path to the meta-selftest directory to the bblayers.conf file. Running bitbake-layers show-layers command gives the output

layer                 path                                      priority
==========================================================================
meta                  /home/[my name]/Documents/poky/meta         5
meta-poky             /home/[my name]/Documents/poky/meta-poky    5
meta-yocto-bsp        /home/[my name]/Documents/poky/meta-yocto-bsp  5
meta-selftest         /home/[my name]/Documents/poky/meta-selftest  5

however, when I try to run bitbake meta-selftest I get the error:

Loading cache: 100% 
Loaded 1294 entries from dependency cache.
ERROR: Nothing PROVIDES 'meta-selftest'

Summary: There was 1 ERROR message shown, returning a non-zero exit code.

What does this error mean? I checked meta-selftest's dependencies, and it doesn't have any, so I get the sense this error isn't saying there is a dependency issue, but I can't find any clear documentation on what this error is telling me. I get the vague sense it means that bitbake can't find meta-selftest, but show-layers contradicts that by listing it with the correct path.

Any help would be deeply appreciated.

-Patches

Answer 1

You don't bitbake a layer, you bitbake a recipe from that layer. Try a bitbake test-empty-image for example. That is an image recipe provided by that layer.

Explore the meta-selftest directory and look for .bb files, the recipes. Those can be build using bitbake.

I recommend having a look at the quick start guide: http://www.yoctoproject.org/docs/current/yocto-project-qs/yocto-project-qs.html