Re: [coreboot] [Qemu-devel] Release plan for 0.12.0

[Natalia Portillo]

I don't think that's the case.

EFI actually DOES HAVE ground.

Itanium machines are still worldwide used, manufactured and sold.
Intel-based Macintoshes used them and ALL of their facilities.

The disadvantages can be a lot.
The advantages that I see, are the following (implemented by Apple's  
EFI):
Hardware drivers, so the OS loader can use ANY hardware present.
Hardware testing easily programable, as you can use the EFI to call  
the hardware (unlike PC diagnostics that makes direct and real mode  
calls to the hardware, making them imposible to test different  
hardware without implementing all variations -SCSI cards, wifi cards,  
so on-)
Filesystem independent bootloader (it just expects the EFI to have the  
filesystem and disk driver, then searches the disk for the OS loader)
Upgradable drivers without firmware patching (so if I add a wifi card,  
I can put a driver for netbooting it)
Extensive input devices support (USB keyb and mice, bluetooth keyb and  
mice and infrared remote)

I think that this is impossible (if not nearly to) make using BIOS.
I think it is only possible with OpenFirmware or EFI.

And I prefer EFI for the matters of being programable in C (personal  
distaste for Forth) and the EFI System Partition usability.

A bootloader can fuckinly easy put a good splash without limiting to  
12 colors or making calls to the VGA system (for example). What will  
happen with the GRUB if tomorrow VGA disappears? What a mess...

And I don't work for Intel, IBM, HP, Apple, etc.

In QEMU' side I see that maybe not for 0.12.0 but anyway, EFI is a  
MUST have if we want to emulate, support, test, patch, anything that  
uses it, starting with Itanium, continuing with Intel Macintosh, and  
finishing with all the thousands of PCs (not only from Intel, as I've  
seen a bunch from Asus and Asrock) that instead of using a BIOS are  
using a hidden EFI with a boot-by-default CSM.

I'm sure, EFI will prevail over BIOS and sooner or later, also over  
OpenFirmware.
And we need to move with the world, not against it.

Regards,
Natalia Portillo

El 03/10/2009, a las 23:19, Patrick Georgi escribió:

> Am Samstag, den 03.10.2009, 15:13 -0700 schrieb Jordan Justen:
> > I'll admit that this is a fairly dumb argument to make while we are
> > talking about a QEMU release only a few months from now.  But, as  
> > UEFI
> > seems to be gaining ground in the industry, I think the sooner QEMU
> > can get this support, the better.
> This smells like self-fulfulling prophecy: Let QEmu support EFI in the
> hope that EFI actually gains ground (for example by better testability
> due to available emulation environments)
>
> So you want QEmu as a marketing device - nothing wrong with saying  
> that,
> right?
>
>
> Regards,
> Patrick