[SeaBIOS] (no subject)

[Fred .]

On Mon, Dec 12, 2011 at 11:53 PM, David Hendricks <dhendrix at google.com> wrote:
> On Sun, Dec 11, 2011 at 8:47 AM, Fred . <eldmannen at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> > The ability for SeaBIOS to launch a "setup program" is already present
>> > - it just requires the creation of this setup program.  Several
>> > coreboot payloads already have some menu drawing code, so this
>> > shouldn't be too difficult.  Frankly though, there isn't much to
>> > configure (and that is a good thing).
>> >
>> >> * Competition have password protection. SeaBIOS does not.
>> >
>> > Again - this is part of the "setup program" - there is nothing in
>> > SeaBIOS to protect.
>> The BIOS of the competition have two types of passwords.
>> One to boot the system and one to access the setup screen.
>> Password for bootup has nothing todo with the "setup program".
>> Since there is currently no such setup program, the initial
>> implementation for a bootup password could use a password configured
>> at compile-time.
>
>
> I think it's useful to step back and look at it in a different light. The
> "competition" follows a very different usage model than coreboot and
> SeaBIOS; Many commercial BIOS products are essentially OSes in themselves,
> which has historically been considered a bad thing in the coreboot community
> and by extension the SeaBIOS community.
Much of the competition and also SeaBIOS is modular.
So you can enable/disable features and modules to make it
heavier/lighter depending on needs through configuration at
compile-time.


> From that perspective, it doesn't make much sense for SeaBIOS to have a boot
> password when every modern OS has a robust authentication mechanism already.
>
> (you have some good ideas, but keep in mind many people simply want SeaBIOS
> to do its job and get out of the way)
A BIOS password would add an additional line of defense and protect
against booting from a removable device such as CD or USB. An OS
password would not protect against booting from removable media.
Adding password support would probably be pretty trivial.


>
>> >
>> >> * SeaBIOS supports 32-bit PCI. It should support 64-bit PCI.
>> >
>> > I'm not sure what you mean here.
>> I've read that SeaBIOS supports 32-bit PCI.
>> http://www.seabios.org/Releases#SeaBIOS_0.5.1
>> PCI also have 64-bit.
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conventional_PCI#64-bit_PCI
>
>
> 64-bit PCI is actually obsolete. It was used for a period in server
> platforms, but has been supplanted by PCI Express.
>
> David Hendricks (dhendrix)
> Systems Software Engineer, Google Inc.
Indeed.
But 32-bit PCI is also obsolete, yet it is implemented in SeaBIOS.
So 64-bit PCI should be added to a not-yet-implemented list or a
low-priority list and then if anyone wants to work on it, they may do
so.
Since we already have support for 32-bit PCI, then it would be great
if 64-bit PCI support could be added if it perhaps only require a
slight modification to the existing code.