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Subject: Re: [PATCH] arm64: defconfig: enable EFI_ARMSTUB_DTB_LOADER
To:     Ard Biesheuvel <ard.biesheuvel@linaro.org>,
        Olof Johansson <olof@lixom.net>
Cc:     Catalin Marinas <catalin.marinas@arm.com>,
        Will Deacon <will.deacon@arm.com>,
        Arnd Bergmann <arnd@arndb.de>,
        BCM Kernel Feedback <bcm-kernel-feedback-list@broadcom.com>,
        Linux ARM Mailing List <linux-arm-kernel@lists.infradead.org>,
        Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>
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From:   Scott Branden <scott.branden@broadcom.com>
Message-ID: <fa0a06bc-2a4d-000e-66ec-852e6ff3012e@broadcom.com>
Date:   Fri, 31 Aug 2018 14:28:21 -0700
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Hi Olof/Ard,


On 18-08-30 09:23 AM, Ard Biesheuvel wrote:
> On 30 August 2018 at 17:06, Olof Johansson <olof@lixom.net> wrote:
>> On Wed, Aug 29, 2018 at 10:54 PM, Ard Biesheuvel
>> <ard.biesheuvel@linaro.org> wrote:
>>> On 29 August 2018 at 20:59, Scott Branden <scott.branden@broadcom.com> wrote:
>>>> Hi Olof,
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On 18-08-29 11:44 AM, Olof Johansson wrote:
>>>>> Hi,
>>>>>
>>>>> On Wed, Aug 29, 2018 at 10:21 AM, Scott Branden
>>>>> <scott.branden@broadcom.com> wrote:
>>>>>> Enable EFI_ARMSTUB_DTB_LOADER to add support for the dtb= command line
>>>>>> parameter to function with efi loader.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Required to boot on existing bootloaders that do not support devicetree
>>>>>> provided by the platform or by the bootloader.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Fixes: 3d7ee348aa41 ("efi/libstub/arm: Add opt-in Kconfig option for the
>>>>>> DTB loader")
>>>>>> Signed-off-by: Scott Branden <scott.branden@broadcom.com>
>>>>> Why did Ard create an option for this if it's just going be turned on
>>>>> in default configs? Doesn't make sense to me.
>>>>>
>>>>> It would help to know what firmware still is crippled and how common
>>>>> it is, since it's been a few years that this has been a requirement by
>>>>> now.
>>>> Broadcom NS2 and Stingray in current development and production need this
>>>> option in the kernel enabled in order to boot.
>>> And these production systems run mainline kernels in a defconfig configuration?
>>>
>>> The simply reality is that the DTB loader has been deprecated for a
>>> good reason: it was only ever intended as a development hack anyway,
>>> and if we need to treat the EFI stub provided DTB as a first class
>>> citizen, there are things we need to fix to make things works as
>>> expected. For instance, GRUB will put a property in the /chosen node
>>> for the initramfs which will get dropped if you boot with dtb=.
>>>
>>> Don't be surprised if some future enhancements of the EFI stub code
>>> depend on !EFI_ARMSTUB_DTB_LOADER. On UEFI systems, DTBs [or ACPI
>>> tables] are used by the firmware to describe itself and the underlying
>>> platform to the OS, and the practice of booting with DTB file images
>>> (taken from the kernel build as well) conflicts with that view. Note
>>> that GRUB still permits you to load DTBs from files (and supports more
>>> sources than just the file system the kernel Image was loaded from).
>> Ard,
>>
>> Maybe a WARN() splat would be more useful as a phasing-out method than
>> removing functionality for them that needs to be reinstated through
>> changing the config?
>>
> We don't have any of that in the stub, and inventing new ways to pass
> such information between the stub and the kernel proper seems like a
> cart-before-horse kind of thing to me. The EFI stub diagnostic
> messages you get on the serial console are not recorded in the kernel
> log buffer, so they only appear if you actually look at the serial
> output.
>
>> Once the stub and the boot method is there, it's hard to undo as we
>> can see here. Being loud and warn might be more useful, and set a
>> timeline for hard removal (12 months?).
>>
> The dtb= handling is still there, it is just not enabled by default.
> We can keep it around if people are still using it. But as I pointed
> out, we may decide to make new functionality available only if it is
> disabled, and at that point, we'll have to choose between one or the
> other in defconfig, which is annoying.
dtb= handling does need to be enabled in the only defconfig
upstreamed though.  ARM64 maintainers have mandated a single
defconfig upstreamed up this point.  If another incompatible
efistub is needed in the future then 2 kernel images would need
to be built to support booting on all platforms.
>
>> Scott; an alternative for you is to do a boot wrapper that bundles a
>> DT and kernel, and boot that instead of the kernel image (outside of
>> the kernel tree). Some 32-bit platforms from Marvell use that. That
>> way the kernel will just see it as a normally passed in DT.
The EFI stub is the boot wrapper?  Everything works perfectly today
with the upstream kernel (with the defconfig fix of the efistub regression).
We support a single kernel image booting with multiple DTs
(selected in UEFI and passed in via dtb= on command line).
>>
> Or use GRUB. It comes wired up in all the distros, and let's you load
> a DT binary from anywhere you can imagine, as opposed to the EFI stub
> which can only load it if it happens to reside in the same file system
> (or even directory - I can't remember) as the kernel image. Note that
> the same reservations apply to doing that - the firmware is no longer
> able to describe itself to the OS via the DT, which is really the only
> conduit it has available on an arm64 system..
Ard, GRUB is not a requirement to boot the kernel.  But, it sounds like
using GRUB may be a solution to your problem?  You could use GRUB
and leave the efistub alone then (or at least leave dtb= in the upstream
defconfg).

Regards,
  Scott