home-automation ESP32-P4 failed

Error message

home-automation ESP32-P4 failed: ${e.cmd} exited with ${e.returncode}

What it means

In build_p4, if any idf.py invocation (build or flashing-stage command like @flash_args) exits non-zero, the script warns 'home-automation ESP32-P4 failed: <cmd> exited with <returncode>' and returns the esp32-p4-function-ev-board feature in its failed list. Like build_mcu, the failure is recorded rather than raised, so other images still build and demos.json generation can proceed.

Solutions

Inspect the idf.py output above the warning for the root cause and fix the project/environment
Ensure ESP-IDF >= 6.0 is active (idf.py --version) with the esp32p4 target installed
Re-run idf.py fullclean in demos/home-automation/esp-idf then rebuild
Continue without the P4 image if not needed — the failure only omits it from demos.json

Defensive patterns

Strategy: try-catch

Validate before calling

. ~/esp/esp-idf/export.sh && idf.py --version && idf.py set-target esp32p4  # pre-validate before the scripted build

Try / catch

try:
    subprocess.run(cmd, cwd=directory, env=env, check=True)
except subprocess.CalledProcessError as e:
    warn(f"home-automation ESP32-P4 failed: {' '.join(e.cmd)} exited with {e.returncode}")
    return [], ["esp32-p4-function-ev-board"]

Prevention

Use ESP-IDF >= 6.0 with esp32p4 target support installed
Run idf.py fullclean after switching ESP-IDF versions
Validate the home-automation ESP-IDF project compiles in its own CI job
Keep the ESP-IDF python venv dependencies up to date

When it happens

Trigger: idf.py build (or the subsequent flash-args command run in demos/home-automation/esp-idf/build) returns a non-zero exit code — compile error in the ESP-IDF project, wrong ESP-IDF version (< 6.0), missing chip support target, or failing CMake configuration.

Common situations: ESP-IDF version too old for ESP32-P4 support; uncommitted/broken home-automation demo code; missing ESP-IDF python dependencies in the activated env; out-of-disk during the P4 build.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of slint-ui/slint@bb937076de (2026-09-16). Data as JSON: /api/errors/ff5db2d4d7ea8b9b. Report an issue: GitHub.

Appendix: source

Thrown at scripts/build-demo-images.py:329

        run(
            [
                "python",
                "-m",
                "esptool",
                "--chip",
                "esp32p4",
                "merge_bin",
                "-o",
                str(out / image),
                "-f",
                "raw",
                "@flash_args",
            ],
            cwd=directory / "build",
            env=env,
        )
    except subprocess.CalledProcessError as e:
        warn(
            f"home-automation ESP32-P4 failed: {' '.join(e.cmd)} exited with {e.returncode}"
        )
        return [], ["esp32-p4-function-ev-board"]
    return [
        {
            "feature": "esp32-p4-function-ev-board",
            "name": "ESP32-P4 Function EV",
            "method": "esp",
            "file": image,
            "chip": "esp32p4",
            "offset": "0x0",
            "demo": "home-automation",
        }
    ], []


def emit_demos_json(out: Path, base: str, records: list[dict]) -> None:
    log(f"writing {out / 'demos.json'}")

View on GitHub (pinned to bb937076de)