[U-Boot-Users] [PATCH] ATSTK1002: Remove default ethernet addresses

[Haavard Skinnemoen]

[re-adding mailing lists to Cc]

On Mon, 29 Oct 2007 11:21:25 +0100
"Ulf Samuelsson" <ulf at atmel.com> wrote:

> Haavard,
> For production use, you want to be able to set up a default address.

I don't think this is necessary in our production setup at least.

> All production PCs would have a dedicated Ethernet board, with a 
> predetemined IP address.
> Nothing but the production PC and the board under production is connected to 
> this Ethernet.
> Thus there is not a problem to have a fixed ethernet address on the AVR32 
> board.

If you want this, feel free to patch it back into your production
images. But as soon as someone erases the pre-programmed environment on
two or more boards, you'll have chaos on the network they're connected
to.

Btw, why don't you just pre-program a default environment sector right
after you program the u-boot image? That way, you can have all the
custom settings you want.

> This way you can define a bootcmd which downloads an Autoscript
> which in its turn programs the linux kernel and the address.
> When everything is finished, then the etherent address should
> be programmed with its real value.

So you need to define other environment variables anyway? Why can't you
patch in a default ethernet address at the same time?

> To avoid problems, the linux kernel should not be bootable
> if the kernel address is this "special" address.

No way. I'm not adding bogus special-casing in the Linux kernel to cope
with a problem I'm not even sure exists. Besides, you don't have to
boot the kernel to experience problems; running "dhcp" from u-boot is
enough to wreak havoc on the network.

We've tried using a default ethernet address on both STK1000 and NGW100
for a while now, and it causes a lot more problems than it solves. I'm
turning it off unless someone can point to a specific, valid use-case
that breaks.

Håvard