[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Eric W. Biederman) writes:
> Ronald G Minnich <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
> > do you think we can integrate this into the linuxbios source tree? doable?
> > if so, what do we have to change?
>
> Yes, but I think I need a day or two before I get to that point.
>
> To actually have integration it looks like we are going to have
> to introduce some kind of arch directory. There are just
> so many header files that change when you switch to a 64 bit
> architecture.
>
> For alpha the linux kernel is so close I'm going to push a pure
> linuxBIOS. In particular I'm not going to initialize anything in
> the linuxBIOS except the serial port & the flash so I can print
> debugging messages and read from the flash. Then all linuxBIOS
> becomes is linuxbiosmain.c and it's supporting functions. I have
> to admit on intel I would still memory initialization to do, but
> for alpha I can skip that step because the SROM does that for me.
Grr. I oversimplified that. I still need cpu initialization (mostly
SROM for me.) and northbridge initialization/reading. In addition to RAM
initialization. But that is simply the required initialization to
do anything worth while.
I keep trying to develop this very limited focus for the ``linuxbios''
code. My current definition boils down to:
Initialize CPU.
Initialize NorthBridge.
Turn on RAM.
Turn on serial port/(whatever backs printk)
Find kernel in flash, load it in memory and jump to it.
Does this list need anymore?
>
> A second point. Currently we hardcode the location of the kernel
> image and where it should be uncompressed in memory into linuxbios.
> What I would like to do unless someone has an objection is:
> (a) Implement my kexec interface for starting a kernel from linuxBIOS.
> (b) move the responsibility of decompression into the kernel image
> itself. This can still be used by the BSD's if they choose to.
> (c) Implement a search algorithm in the rom where we look for a
> ELF header to find the kernel. Instead of hardcoding its
> location into ROM.
>
> With these changes using an initial ram disk with linuxBIOS should
> become easier. As well as having more than one kernel image.
> And our dependency on a particular version of linux should decrease.
>
> Eric
