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EBBR Notes 2018.07.12

Grant Likely edited this page Aug 9, 2018 · 1 revision

12 July 2018

Attendees

  • Ilias Apalodimas (Linaro)
  • Rob Herring (Linaro)
  • Udit Kumar (NXP)
  • Grant Likely (Arm)
  • Peter Robinson (Red Hat)
  • Daniel Thompson (Linaro)
  • Dong Wei (Arm)

Agenda

  1. Issue review
  2. Set/GetVariable() behaviour when non-volatile doesn't work at runtime
  3. v0.6 release
  4. Review distribution list
  5. Any other business

Notes

Issue review

  • Remove v0.6 tag from AArch32… it cannot be achieved for this cycle

v0.6 release

  • No blocker concerns from reviews this week except for Set/GetVariable()
  • Agreed to release v0.6 with no disagreement (nor abstention)

Set/GetVariable() behaviour when non-volatile doesn't work at runtime

  • Currently we use SBBR language (which requires Get/SetVariable to work at runtime… no get out for shared storage eMMC)
  • RFC
    • EBBR platforms allow SetVariable() to return an error
    • Mark all variables as not non-volatile (a.k.a. volatile)
  • Why not just allow SetVariable() to return an error (no messing with non-volatile)?
    • Grant: Looking at UEFI spec this feels too non-conforming
    • Udit: Marking as volatile violates the table that summarizes variable properties
    • Daniel: Why are we so nervous here? Baytrail and Cherrytrail UEFI implementation is notorious for problems with Boot… variables (likely because fixed disk is eMMC). Installing the workaround for this is important enough to earn menu space for an automagic fix in the Debian rescue tooling.

Two questions to answer:

  1. (Primarily to Dong) What solution is most faithful to the UEFI spec?
  2. (Primarily to Distro reps) What solution works for you?
    1. Daniel (not a distro rep): Debian installer uses a rescue based workaround (attempting to rescue a failed install allows you to install bootloader like removable media)
    2. Alex has previously described current SuSE behaviour: GetVariable() fails and we install like removable media

We cannot currently answer these questions. For v0.6 Grant will write a TODO-like section describing the problem, leaving it unsolved and soliciting feedback.

Review distribution list

  • Q: Who should we share this document with?
  • Linaro membership (Daniel, engineering update?)
  • 96Boards membership (a.k.a. steering committee) (Grant)
  • ARM SiPs
  • U-Boot list (Tom)
  • TF-A List (Grant)
  • Risc-V community (just send message to ebbr list)
  • Arm-linux-kernel (Grant)
  • FreeBSD folks (Grant)
  • Microsoft (Dong)

Any other business

Crickets...

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