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+barebox remote control
+======================
+
+barebox remote control is for controlling barebox from a remote host via
+scripts. The barebox console is designed for human interaction,
+controlling it from a script is very error prone since UARTs do not
+offer reliable communication. Usually a tool like 'expect' is used for
+this purpose which uses its own language to communicate with the remote
+partner. The barebox remote control offers an alternative. barebox
+commands can be integrated into regular shell scripts running on the
+host:
+
+.. code-block:: sh
+
+  bbremote --port /dev/ttyUSB0 run "ls"
+
+Additionally files can be transferred from/to barebox and a regular
+console offers interactive access to barebox on flawy serial
+connections.
+
+Enabling remote control support
+-------------------------------
+
+To get remote control support barebox has to be compiled with
+CONFIG_RATP and CONFIG_CONSOLE_RATP enabled. Optionally CONFIG_FS_RATP
+can also be enabled.
+
+Running the bbremote tool
+-------------------------
+
+The bbremote host tool is written in python. To run it python2 has to be
+installed with the following additional packages:
+
++----------------+---------------------+
+| python package | Debian package name |
++================+=====================+
+| crcmod         | python-crcmod       |
++----------------+---------------------+
+| enum           | python-enum         |
++----------------+---------------------+
+| enum34         | python-enum34       |
++----------------+---------------------+
+
+If your distribution does not provide aforementioned packages, you can
+use 'pip' in order to install the dependencies localy to your user
+account via:
+
+.. code-block:: sh
+
+  pip install --user crcmod enum enum34
+
+configuring bbremote
+^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
+
+bbremote needs the port and possibly the baudrate to access the remote
+barebox. The port can be configured with the ``--baudrate`` option or
+with the ``BBREMOTE_PORT`` environment variable. The port can either be
+the device special file if it's a local port or if it's a remote port a
+string of the form: ``rfc2217://host:port``. The baudrate can be given
+with the ``--baudrate`` option or the ``BBREMOTE_BAUDRATE`` environment
+variable. For the rest of this document it is assumed that ``bbremote``
+has been configured using environment variables.
+
+running commands on the target
+------------------------------
+
+``bbremote`` can be used to run arbitrary commands on the remote
+barebox:
+
+.. code-block:: sh
+
+  bbremote run "echo huhu"
+  huhu
+
+The bbremote exit status will be 0 if the remote command exited
+successfully, 1 if the remote command failed and 127 if there was a
+communication error.
+
+**NOTE** It is possible to put the output into a shell variable for
+further processing, like ``RESULT=$(bbremote run "echo huhu")``.
+However, this string may contain unexpected messages from drivers and
+the like because currently we cannot filter out driver messages and
+messages to stderr.
+
+ping
+----
+
+This is a simple ping test.
+
+.. code-block:: sh
+
+  bbremote ping
+  pong
+
+getenv
+------
+
+.. code-block:: sh
+
+  bbremote getenv global.version
+  2015.12.0-00150-g81cd49f
+
+interactive console
+-------------------
+
+The bbremote tool also offers a regular interactive console to barebox.
+This is especially useful for flawy serial connections.
+
+.. code-block:: sh
+
+  bbremote console
+  barebox@Phytec phyFLEX-i.MX6 Quad Carrier-Board:/ ls
+  .      ..     dev    env    mnt
+
+*NOTE** To terminate resulting Barebox console session press 'Ctrl-T'
+
+**NOTE** You can also send 'ping' request to the target without
+ closing console session by pressint 'Ctrl-P'
+
+transferring files
+------------------
+
+With the bbremote tool it's possible to transfer files both from the
+host to barebox and from barebox to the host. Using the ``--export``
+option to bbremote a directory can be specified to export to barebox.
+This can be mounted on barebox using the regular mount command using
+``-t ratpfs`` as filesystem type.
+
+.. code-block:: sh
+
+  bbremote --export=somedir console
+  mkdir -p /ratpfs; mount -t ratpfs none /ratpfs
+  ls /ratpfs
+