On Mon, Nov 3, 2014 at 1:27 PM, Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > On Mon, Nov 03, 2014 at 11:33:23AM -0800, Andy Lutomirski wrote: >> On 11/02/2014 07:07 PM, Kweh Hock Leong wrote: >> > From: "Kweh, Hock Leong" <hock.leong.kweh-ral2JQCrhuEAvxtiuMwx3w@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> >> > >> > Hi Guys, >> > >> > This patchset is created on top of "efi: Capsule update support" patch: >> > http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.linux.kernel.efi/4837 >> > >> > It leverages the request_firmware_nowait() to expose the user helper interface for user to upload the capsule binary and calling the >> > efi_capsule_update() API to pass the binary to EFI firmware. >> >> I don't get it. Why is the firmware interface at all reasonable for >> uploading capsules? > > Tradition dictates that BIOS updates go through the firmware interface, > that way you don't have to write a new userspace tool, which is a good > thing. > >> The firmware interface makes sense for nonvolatile firmware where >> hotplugging something or otherwise loading a driver needs a blob. > > Or BIOS data. We've been doing it this way for a long time now. On what system? Dell? IMO this sucks from a UI point of view. When I install wifi firmware, I expect to stick it somewhere and have the driver find it, because the driver knows exactly when it needs the firmware. When I update my BIOS, I want to click a button or type a command and update my bios. > >> But uploading an EFI capsule is an *action*, not something that should >> happen transparently. If there's an EFI firmware update available and >> the user wants to install it, then the userspace tool should install it, >> and it shouldn't hang around in /lib/firmware. In fact, you shouldn't >> even need /lib to be on writable media to use this. > > What does /lib have to do with this? Where else does the file come from, given that udev no longer supports userspace firmware loading? Is there really some pre-existing tool that pokes it into the sysfs firmware class thing? Since EFI capsules are apparently on their way to becoming a ubiquitous mechanism, I think it might be time to rethink request_firmware for this. --Andy -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-efi" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
