Re: [PATCH v2 0/7] Enable Cubieboard A10 boot SPL from SD card

["Philippe Mathieu-Daudé" <philmd@linaro.org>]

On 18/12/22 23:57, Strahinja Jankovic wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I just looked around a bit more. Would OpenWrt image be acceptable?

Sure.

> It looks like there are releases for cubieboard that are kept for a
> longer time, and I just checked that they work properly, so I could
> add them to the acceptance test.
> 
> Best regards,
> Strahinja
> 
> On Sun, Dec 18, 2022 at 11:34 PM Strahinja Jankovic
> <strahinjapjankovic@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Hi,
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Dec 18, 2022 at 11:17 PM Philippe Mathieu-Daudé
>> <philmd@linaro.org> wrote:
>>>
>>> On 18/12/22 22:19, Strahinja Jankovic wrote:
>>>> This patch series adds missing Allwinner A10 modules needed for
>>>> successful SPL boot:
>>>> - Clock controller module
>>>> - DRAM controller
>>>> - I2C0 controller (added also for Allwinner H3 since it is the same)
>>>> - AXP-209 connected to I2C0 bus
>>>>
>>>> It also updates Allwinner A10 emulation so SPL is copied from attached
>>>> SD card if `-kernel` parameter is not passed when starting QEMU
>>>> (approach adapted from Allwinner H3 implementation).
>>>>
>>>> Boot from SD card has been tested with Cubieboard Armbian SD card image and custom
>>>> Yocto image built for Cubieboard.
>>>> Example usage for Armbian image:
>>>> qemu-system-arm -M cubieboard -nographic -sd ~/Armbian_22.11.0-trunk_Cubieboard_kinetic_edge_6.0.7.img
>>>
>>> As a follow-up, could you add a test similar to
>>> test_arm_orangepi_bionic_20_08() in tests/avocado/boot_linux_console.py?
>>>
>>> This test could be refactored as do_test_arm_allwinner_armbian(), called
>>> for orangepi and cubieboard with the corresponding url / hash.
>>
>> I was planning to do it (I already have a patch for cubieboard), but
>> there is a problem with finding a stable-enough image for cubieboard
>> for automated testing.
>> Unfortunately, Cubieboard does not have supported Armbian images as
>> OrangePi-PC has (it only has weekly builds).

Developers shouldn't worry about that but focus on the testing. The
QEMU project doesn't have dedicated sysadmin / storage, but if it had
it should be their problem, not yours. Meanwhile such a test is still
useful. Artifacts come with their hash, so can be uploaded elsewhere
later.

>> From the images that can
>> be found on archive.armbian.com, there is only one bionic image
>> (21.02) and it won't boot because it hangs due to the musb issue (I
>> tried both with my patches and without, by extracting
>> kernel/dtb/initrd).

Similar approach:
https://lore.kernel.org/qemu-devel/20201018205551.1537927-4-f4bug@amsat.org/

>> Other images are focal, but for some reason, in
>> those images it is impossible to interrupt U-Boot (tested with 21.08),
>> so I could not append to bootcmd to make boot process more verbose and
>> easier to monitor for automated testing.
>>
>> That is why, for now, I would suggest not updating the SPL/SD boot
>> test for Cubieboard.

Niek can tell how many times his tests catched regressions for his
OrangePi machine; I remember at least 3 occasions :)

Regards,

Phil.