[coreboot] CoreBIOS: a viable option for me?

Brendan Trotter btrotter at gmail.com
Sat Jan 26 09:20:06 CET 2008


Hi,

I want to use something like LinuxBIOS/Coreboot to allow my software
to be installed as "boot from ROM" by end-users.

Previously (many months ago) I assessed LinuxBIOS and found that it
wasn't a viable option, as my payload would need to be constantly
updated to reflect changes in LinuxBIOS, and I couldn't have a single
payload that worked regardless of which (past, present and future)
version of LinuxBIOS/Coreboot the end-user installs.

As LinuxBIOS/Coreboot is *almost* exactly what I'm looking for, I'm
wondering if this situation has changed or if it's likely to change in
future; or if LinuxBIOS/Coreboot will never be a viable option.

Specifically, I need something that puts the computer into a well
defined state and passes information to the payload in a well defined
manner. This implies that any future changes to the firmware are
either transparent to the payload, or that future changes preserve
backward compatibility for the payload.

Note: This doesn't mean that Coreboot couldn't be extended, only that
the payload would need to detect (via. a well defined method) which
version of Coreboot is present before using features/information added
in later versions.

Basically, I want to implement code that complies with some sort of
"Coreboot Specification" and know that my code will work for all
(past, present and future) versions of Coreboot, and that end-users
will be able to independently update the version of Coreboot they're
using or the version of my software they're using without
compatibility problems between different versions of both projects.


Cheers,

Brendan




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