one more note.
It's looking, increasingly, like future CPUs will require initlalization very early in startup. Some will require it right after initram; some during initram; and some BEFORE initram.
But they will all require it in what we call stage 1 -- before the device tree exists.
The implication is that the device tree may not be that useful in future for "CPUs as devices". I think we should plan around this. CPUs were always kind of a stretch to make a device anyway. Just FYI.
ron