[U-Boot] [U-boot] Uboot's plan for ARMv8

[Wolfgang Denk]

Dear Abraham,

In message <CANiE1qoyXV10iDghK=qK9=Wjb2yueWC7U2MTRt-sSUyY5QiSJQ at mail.gmail.com> you wrote:
> 
> u-boot is an open source bootloader. It isn't run by a single
> organization (though it IS headed by denx). Architecturally the
> software can be divided into multiple processor and development
> boards.
> 
> Now, if organization A is developing a new processor (along with
> development board) and they want to use u-boot as the bootloader, they
> would need to write the necessary /cpu sections by themselves and post
> it as a patch to the u-boot mailing list. Assuming it meets the coding

This is not strictly correct.  Anybody interested in support for some
piece of hardware can implement it and submit the patches - this is
not necessarily the vendor of the chip or the board.  So if Tiger Liu
is interested in support for some specific ARMv8 hardware, he could
implement it himself, or hire some external experts to implement it
for him - or wait until some other member of the community submits
patches.

> Looking it at from another perspective, it is rather arrogant (and
> rude) of organization-A to build a brand new processor, come in here
> and expect u-boot to magically support it. Most people don't work for
> free. And even if they wanted to, since the rest of the mailing list
> does not have physical access to the new processor/board, how much
> help can you _reasonably_ expect?

Correct.  Some hardware vendors actively support the community, for
example by providing free eval boards to active community members, and
especially by providing full documentation for their hardware.  Others
don't.  You can see this pretty easily by the level of support for
such hardware in mainline U-Boot.  For example, look around how much
support for Qualcomm chips we have in mainline, just to name one.


In general the old rule applies: Scratch where it itches.  If I don't
have free access to such hardware, and if no (paying( customer asks me
to do it, I see little reason to spend time and efforts for some
specific new piece of hardware - there are so many of them...

Best regards,

Wolfgang Denk

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