From mboxrd@z Thu Jan  1 00:00:00 1970
From: Chin Liang See <clsee@altera.com>
Date: Wed, 13 Nov 2013 11:57:39 -0600
Subject: [U-Boot] [PATCH] Separate EBV Socrates board from Altera
 Cyclone 5 board
In-Reply-To: <5283A107.6040704@monstr.eu>
References: <20131111192602.GA22118@amd.pavel.ucw.cz>
	<20131111203332.GG420@bill-the-cat> <5281E55E.8090701@monstr.eu>
	<m2r4amq6ya.fsf@lamuella.denx.de> <52820044.6020700@monstr.eu>
	<1384267607.5528.6.camel@clsee-VirtualBox.altera.com>
	<52824677.1010806@monstr.eu>
	<1384353544.6030.10.camel@clsee-VirtualBox.altera.com>
	<5283A107.6040704@monstr.eu>
Message-ID: <1384365459.6899.13.camel@clsee-VirtualBox.altera.com>
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To: u-boot@lists.denx.de

Hi,

> >>>>
> >>>
> >>> Currently, the SOCFPGA SPL is customized through a set of handoff files
> >>> which located at board folders. These handoff files are generated by
> >>> tools based on board and user design in FPGA. With that, not much
> >>> decision being made during run time based on the board. With this
> >>> handoff and tools approach, it will shield off the complexity of
> >>> hardware configuration and errors (if user change it manually without
> >>> tools help). Thanks
> >>
> >> Which nice copy of our approach. :-)
> > 
> > Hmmm... is it true? This approach being used since few years back at
> > NIOS soft processor. Besides that, we are utilizing the SPL framework
> > for our second stage boot loader. I believe you guys are not using SPL
> > right? It seems you guys would need tools to generate and even build you
> > guys own version of boot loader. It creates high dependency for user to
> > your tools. 
> 
> Interesting discussion. :-)
> I believe we will use SPL at some point in future for Microblaze
> just because of easier maintenance . But will see.

Yup, utilizing SPL will gain you the power of open source :)

> 
> I don't understand your point regarding to tool dependency. For DTSes
> I believe you are also generating this structure from design tools
> or you can write it by hand.
> We are also generating U-boot configuration but if someone wants to write
> it by hand they can.

I believe we have misalignment on the term used. For us, second stage
bootloader is referring to the bootloader loaded by BootROM. I believe
you guys are referring that as FSBL. 

> > For our solution, customer can just grab the code from git and build it
> > using the normal U-Boot way (if they don't want to use the tools). With
> > the SPL also, we are taking advantage of open source community power to
> > make our second stage boot loader more powerful and user friendly to
> > user. Our user can grab any drivers or leverage the supports from the
> > open community too. I believe that is the power of open source :) 
> 
> We have the same for Microblaze and Zynq.

Same as above, I believe both of us are using U-Boot. But for bootloader
before U-Boot, we are using SPL while you guys using FSBL which is not
SPL framework, right? With that, I believe you guys would need a
proprietary tools to compile and build the FSBL. We would not have this
dependency when building the SPL code.

Thanks
Chin Liang

> 
> Cheers,
> Michal
>