[coreboot] initrd in 4.4 versus head

[Stefan Reinauer]

* Trammell Hudson <hudson at trmm.net> [160727 13:58]:
> I see a difference in the way 4.4 handles initrd images for linux
> payloads versus the way it is done in head.  With 4.4 my Linux
> kernel can not find the external initrd, so it is necessary to
> build it as part of the kernel.  With head it works fine.
> 
> It looks like 4.4 is adding the initrd as a separate section
> named "(empty)" with type "null" and the kernel can't find it:

(empty) is indeed what it claims to be, empty space in the image.
There is no initrd in there.

> performing operation on 'COREBOOT' region...
> Name                           Offset     Type         Size
> cbfs master header             0x0        cbfs header  32
> cpu_microcode_blob.bin         0x80       microcode    22528
> cmos.default                   0x5900     cmos_default 256
> cmos_layout.bin                0x5a40     cmos_layout  1948
> fallback/dsdt.aml              0x6240     raw          13847
> (empty)                        0x98c0     null         26264
> fallback/romstage              0xff80     stage        74020
> (empty)                        0x22140    null         56664
> mrc.cache                      0x2fec0    mrc_cache    65536
> fallback/ramstage              0x3ff00    stage        84790
> fallback/payload               0x54a80    payload      1618769
> (empty)                        0x1dfe40   null         2226328
> bootblock                      0x3ff700   bootblock    1952
> 
> While in head it is bundling them together into the payload
> region (3.9 MB == bzImage + initrd.img) -- the kernel can
> find the image and use it:
> 
> Performing operation on 'COREBOOT' region...
> Name                           Offset     Type         Size
> cbfs master header             0x0        cbfs header  32
> fallback/romstage              0x80       stage        14620
> cpu_microcode_blob.bin         0x3a00     microcode    22528
> fallback/ramstage              0x9280     stage        43781
> cmos_layout.bin                0x13dc0    cmos_layout  1948
> fallback/dsdt.aml              0x145c0    raw          4021
> fallback/payload               0x155c0    payload      3906169
> (empty)                        0x3cf080   null         199256
> bootblock                      0x3ffb00   bootblock    960
> 
> I don't see any changes in the util/cbfstool/cbfs-payload-linux.c
> file between these two versions.  Is there something else
> that changed?

It seems these two images are significantly different from each other,
apart from the payload. Almost all the stages are about twice as big in
the first image.

Did you compare the .config files for both images? Did you use the same
compiler to produce them? Are these for the same mainboard? Which one?

Stefan