On Thu, Feb 19, 2015 at 12:35:11PM +0100, Patrick Georgi via coreboot wrote:
2015-02-19 0:14 GMT+01:00 Carl-Daniel Hailfinger c-d.hailfinger.devel.2006@gmx.net:
I am currently planning to set up a test system with 5 (later up to 10) machines boot testing each new coreboot commit. This test system will be serviced (i.e. recovery from bricking) Mo-Fr during CET/CEST office hours.
Current goals for every commit:
- Check if coreboot + SeaBIOS are able to boot Linux to a point where
network is up and running
Current goals for every work day:
- Check if screen, keyboard and touchpad/mouse work
- Check if USB works and has the expected transfer speed (i.e. if USB
High and Super Speed both work)
http://blogs.coreboot.org/blog/author/ayushsagar/ documents last year's GSoC project to implement some of those - incl. a screen test using the display present signals.
Through external flashing, there's also no need to handle unbricking manually.
This is a bit off topic, but I've been thinking that a neat project would be to package up an automated test and recovery system using the Beagle Bone Black board.
The Beagle Bone Black isn't too expensive ($55), it is widely available, it has an SPI interface (for emergency flashing), has GPIOs (which, with a level shifter, could be used to turn on/off the board and report LED status), and can emulate a USB client. The emulated USB client could (in theory) be used to emulate a USB boot drive, a USB networking adapter, a USB keyboard, a USB serial port, and/or a USB debug device. In theory, one could wrap many of the target board's standard interfaces so that automated testing and remote development could be done.
It would be a bit of work to get the software working and packaged nicely - but if it was, I think it could enable many more users to participate in automated tests and remote development.
-Kevin