[SeaBIOS] Some questions

[Kevin O'Connor]

Hi Stefan,

I'm CC'ing the mailing list.

On Wed, Nov 24, 2010 at 11:45:17AM -0500, Stefan Berger wrote:
> Hi Kevin,
> 
>   while I am porting the BIOS code for TCG support to SeaBIOS, I am
> wondering about the following:
> 
> 'When' is it recommendable to switch from 16 bit to 32bit.

To be honest, this has never really been done before in SeaBIOS, so I
think we'll have to figure this out as we go.  Since you need to
access full memory, it looks like it will be required to jump into
32bit mode.

>I am
> asking because the interface I am implementing allows callers to
> pass input and output data structures using es:di and ds:si, with es
> and ds allowed to be loaded with anything possible. So my strategy
> in the Bochs BIOS was to switch to 32 bit even before calling the
> interrupt handler, there doing the case statement for branching into
> the actual functions (switch (regs->al)) and passing 32 bit pointers
> converted from es:di and ds:si to the functions doing the work and
> reading from those memory locations.

This sounds okay to me - it should be possible to implement
handle_1abb(regs) which does a call32(tcg32_1abb, regs).  It's
possible to do all the pointer conversion while in 32bit mode.

>The 'thing' is also that
> several ones of the functions that can be called through the
> interrupt interface are also called from the implemented functions.
> Example:
> 
> Functions A,B,C can be called via the interrupt handler.
> 
> Function B also calls A.
> Function C also calls B.

This shouldn't really be an issue.  The build should take care of
this.

> 
> This is due to the hierarchical nature of the functions. Also, while
> for example B calls A, B fills a data structure (on the stack) that
> it passes to A. A of course can get the same data structure from the
> user calling the interrupt interface. So, by switching to 32 bit
> mode and converting to 32 bit pointers early I could previously
> avoid a lot of headaches with the segment registers in 16 bit mode
> and reading the data from wherever they may be. Would you have any
> concerns about switching to 32 bit mode early, so that the interrupt
> handler and anything subsequent runs in 32 bit mode?

I can't say for sure what will make sense without seeing the code
first, but it sounds okay to me.

-Kevin

> 
>    Regards,
>      Stefan
> 
> 
>