Re: [Qemu-devel] [qemu RFC] qapi: add "firmware.json"

["Daniel P. Berrangé" <berrange@redhat.com>]

On Mon, Apr 09, 2018 at 06:34:41PM +0200, Laszlo Ersek wrote:
> On 04/09/18 09:26, Thomas Huth wrote:
> >  Hi Laszlo,
> > 
> > On 07.04.2018 02:01, Laszlo Ersek wrote:
> >> Add a schema that describes the properties of virtual machine firmware.
> >>
> >> Each firmware executable installed on a host system should come with a
> >> JSON file that conforms to this schema, and informs the management
> >> applications about the firmware's properties.
> >>
> >> In addition, a configuration directory with symlinks to the JSON files
> >> should exist, with the symlinks carefully named to reflect a priority
> >> order. Management applications can then search this directory in priority
> >> order for the first firmware executable that satisfies their search
> >> criteria. The found JSON file provides the management layer with domain
> >> configuration bits that are required to run the firmware binary.
> > [...]
> >> +##
> >> +# @FirmwareDevice:
> >> +#
> >> +# Defines the device types that a firmware file can be mapped into.
> >> +#
> >> +# @memory: The firmware file is to be mapped into memory.
> >> +#
> >> +# @kernel: The firmware file is to be loaded like a Linux kernel. This is
> >> +#          similar to @memory but may imply additional processing that is
> >> +#          specific to the target architecture.
> >> +#
> >> +# @flash: The firmware file is to be mapped into a pflash chip.
> >> +#
> >> +# Since: 2.13
> >> +##
> >> +{ 'enum' : 'FirmwareDevice',
> >> +  'data' : [ 'memory', 'kernel', 'flash' ] }
> > 
> > This is not fully clear to me... what is this exactly good for? Is this
> > a way to say how the firmware should be loaded, i.e. via "-bios",
> > "-kernel" or "-pflash" parameter? If so, the term "memory" is quite
> > misleading since files that are loaded via -bios can also end up in an
> > emulated ROM chip.
> 
> I threw in "-kernel" because, although it also (usually?) means
> "memory", I expected people would want it separate.

What platform / scenario actually uses -kernel to load firmware. If you
have loaded firmware using -kernel, how do you then load the actual
kernel ?


Regards,
Daniel
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