From owner-freebsd-arch@FreeBSD.ORG Fri Sep 9 12:22:40 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id B2F7D106566C; Fri, 9 Sep 2011 12:22:40 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from jhb@freebsd.org) Received: from cyrus.watson.org (cyrus.watson.org [65.122.17.42]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 89CF38FC16; Fri, 9 Sep 2011 12:22:40 +0000 (UTC) Received: from bigwig.baldwin.cx (66.111.2.69.static.nyinternet.net [66.111.2.69]) by cyrus.watson.org (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 3F96C46B0C; Fri, 9 Sep 2011 08:22:40 -0400 (EDT) Received: from jhbbsd.localnet (unknown [209.249.190.124]) by bigwig.baldwin.cx (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id CFE628A02E; Fri, 9 Sep 2011 08:22:39 -0400 (EDT) From: John Baldwin To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Date: Fri, 9 Sep 2011 08:20:21 -0400 User-Agent: KMail/1.13.5 (FreeBSD/8.2-CBSD-20110617; KDE/4.5.5; amd64; ; ) References: <4E6940D3.4070801@freebsd.org> In-Reply-To: <4E6940D3.4070801@freebsd.org> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: Text/Plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Message-Id: <201109090820.21116.jhb@freebsd.org> X-Greylist: Sender succeeded SMTP AUTH, not delayed by milter-greylist-4.2.6 (bigwig.baldwin.cx); Fri, 09 Sep 2011 08:22:39 -0400 (EDT) Cc: Andrew Duane , Peter Grehan , "freebsd-arch@freebsd.org" Subject: Re: Soliciting opinions on an extension of the bootinfo structure X-BeenThere: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Discussion related to FreeBSD architecture List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 09 Sep 2011 12:22:40 -0000 On Thursday, September 08, 2011 6:25:23 pm Peter Grehan wrote: > > I'm proposing an extension framework for the bootinfo structure used > > to pass information from the bootstrap/loader to the kernel. Although > > I'm only proposing this for the MIPS bootinfo, it's completely > > applicable to any of them. > > > > What I propose is adding an optional platform extension structure: > > bootinfo_pext, surrounded by #ifdef BOOTINFO_PEXT > > Any reason not to put the vendor bits into another piece of loader > metadata ? That seems the extensible way to add additional info from the > loader, rather than extending bootinfo (as was the case pre-loader days). I agree. The metadata appended to the end of the kernel is a better way to manage this. -- John Baldwin