Re: [Qemu-devel] [PATCH 01/18] smbios: Add a function to directly add an entry

[Anthony Liguori <anthony@codemonkey.ws>]

Corey Minyard <tcminyard@gmail.com> writes:

> On 08/01/2012 09:40 PM, Anthony Liguori wrote:
>> Corey Minyard <cminyard@mvista.com> writes:
>>
>>> On 08/01/2012 08:15 PM, Kevin O'Connor wrote:
>>> Well, I should also probably add the ACPI name space definition for this
>>> information, too, and the SMBIOS information is not capable of passing
>>> all the information required for this (though the above structure can).
>>>
>>> I've been studying this, but I don't see an obvious way to dynamically
>>> add something to the ACPI name space.  At least an easy way.
>> Okay, I was actually going to ask if there was an ACPI table for this.
>>
>> Maybe this argues in favor of doing a fw_cfg interface?
>>
>> Another question--is it really necessary for all of this to be user
>> specified?  Can't we just use a static SMBIOS/ACPI entry?  Then SeaBIOS
>> only needs to be concerned with whether or not an IPMI device exists.
>
> That's a good question At least the interrupt is important for the user 
> to be able to specify.  The specific interface type may also be 
> important if the user is trying to accomplish some specific emulation.  

Why is it important to specify the interrupt?  Is this important for a
typical user, or important for the IPMI maintainer who needs to test a
bunch of different scenarios? :-)

If it's the later, we can probably express the interrupt number as a
#define in SeaBIOS, but still make it configurable in QEMU.  Then you
could build multiple copies of SeaBIOS and then just point QEMU at the
right version.

> Two other standard emulations exist, too, one in memory and one over 
> I2C.  I'd eventually like to add those, if for nothing else my ability 
> to test the interfaces.

Right, see above.  It may be easier to just build multiple copies of the
BIOS then to try and make this all dynamic.

Regards,

Anthony Liguori

>
> If the user is trying to emulate some specific machine, setting the 
> address is also important, and I need to add the ability to specify 
> register spacing and the address space.  This will become more important 
> for non-x86 machines.
>
> -corey
>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Anthony Liguori
>>
>>> -corey