Aw: Re: Re: Re: distro_boot vs. env-based bootmenu

[Frank Wunderlich]

Hi Jonas

thx again for your valuable answer

> Gesendet: Samstag, 01. Juli 2023 um 10:12 Uhr
> Von: "Jonas Karlman" <jonas at kwiboo.se>
> An: "Frank Wunderlich" <frank-w at public-files.de>
> Cc: "Simon Glass" <sjg at chromium.org>, "U-Boot Mailing List" <u-boot at lists.denx.de>, "Heinrich Schuchardt" <heinrich.schuchardt at canonical.com>, "Ilias Apalodimas" <ilias.apalodimas at linaro.org>
> Betreff: Re: Aw: Re: Re: distro_boot vs. env-based bootmenu
>
> Hi Frank,
> On 2023-06-30 19:51, Frank Wunderlich wrote:
> > Hi Jonas
> > 
> > sorry for the delay. i came back to this and tried your way. Thx for your information...there is no real example in the docs (or i didn't found it) for manual trigger the extlinux-boot, so your information helps a lot.
> > 
> >> Gesendet: Sonntag, 30. April 2023 um 19:40 Uhr
> >> Von: "Jonas Karlman" <jonas at kwiboo.se>
> >> An: "Frank Wunderlich" <frank-w at public-files.de>, "Simon Glass" <sjg at chromium.org>
> >> Cc: "U-Boot Mailing List" <u-boot at lists.denx.de>, "Heinrich Schuchardt" <heinrich.schuchardt at canonical.com>, "Ilias Apalodimas" <ilias.apalodimas at linaro.org>
> >> Betreff: Re: Aw: Re: distro_boot vs. env-based bootmenu
> >>
> >> Hi Frank,
> >>
> >> On 2023-04-30 15:25, Frank Wunderlich wrote:
> >>> Hi
> >>>
> >>> I tried to find out why distroboot is enabled (i have not set it in my defconfig) and i think this is why:
> >>>
> >>>   │ Symbol: DISTRO_DEFAULTS [=y]                                            │  
> >>>   │ Type  : bool                                                            │  
> >>>   │ Prompt: Select defaults suitable for booting general purpose Linux dist │  
> >>>   │   Location:                                                             │  
> >>>   │ (3) -> Boot options                                                     │  
> >>>   │   Defined at boot/Kconfig:833                                           │  
> >>>   │   Selects: BOOT_DEFAULTS [=y] && AUTO_COMPLETE [=y] && CMDLINE_EDITING  │  
> >>>   │   Implied by [y]:                                                       │  
> >>>   │   - ARCH_ROCKCHIP [=y] && <choice> && !ROCKCHIP_RK3399 [=n]
> >>>
> >>> as far as i see you've got a response from Jonas about this option and he changed Kconfig file to BOOTSTD_DEFAULTS
> >>>
> >>> as i have not used BOOTSTD_DEFAULTS before, what needs to be changed to have it working?
> >>
> >> Please update to latest master branch, rk356x is not fully working
> >> with v2023.04 or earlier, especially BOOTSTD without extra CONFIGs.
> >>
> >> With latest master branch CONFIG_BOOTSTD_DEFAULTS=y should be set by
> >> default for all ARCH_ROCKCHIP. And should work very similar to if you
> >> used to have "run distro_bootcmd" as your bootcmd.
> > 
> > As i use builtin-environment there is no distro_bootcmd which i can run.
> >  
> >> It is still unclear what script/bootcmd you are trying to use, or if
> >> you used to have "run distro_bootcmd" as a fallback. Replacing
> >> "run distro_bootcmd" with "bootflow scan -lb" or "bootflow scan"
> >> could work as such fallback option.
> > 
> > but with "bootflow scan -lb" it works except 1 thing: old bootchain looked in config directory for the files (kernel+fdt) whereas new way looks in root of partition and now needs additional extlinux prefix.
> 
> This could be related to an issue that was fixed in v2023.07-rc5:
> 
>   bootstd: Fix relative path use in extlinux bootmeth
> 
> See https://source.denx.de/u-boot/u-boot/-/commit/a7e4dffcd8c582bf4344548270d2fc7ac6c0f9ec
> 
> If not then please provide more details, in case this is a bug.

thx, after rebase on rc5 it works as expected...rebased on rc4 a few hours before rc5 was relasted :p

as this commit was done by you thx for fixing this ;)

> > 
> > and yes i want distroboot as fallback...
> > 
> > is there a way to avoid this to hold the file compatible?
> 
> The intent is that the new standard boot should be as compatible as
> possible as the old script based distro boot, depending on you boot
> script.
> 
> If you use any of the script part that the old distro boot provided you
> will have to adjust your boot script, e.g. replace "run distro_bootcmd"
> with "bootflow scan -lb" or "bootflow scan", and modify boot_targets and
> bootmeths to control boot order.
> 
> See https://u-boot.readthedocs.io/en/latest/develop/bootstd.html#controlling-ordering

simply added this to my builtin-environment if anyone wants to run distro_bootcmd manually (was called automaticly before).

distro_bootcmd=bootflow scan -lb

now all looks good

> > 
> > why i use the environment bootmenu? i do a bit more in the menuitems (and before) e.g. loading a uEnv.txt to override some options
> > and for testing. have bootargs only defined once, have testkernels with initrd and some special stuff with asking for user input
> > (list kernels from mmc/tftp/... and let user choose which kernel/fdt/initrd/...). Such things are imho not possible with extlinux 
> > way.
> 
> I think there are some limited menu handling with standard boot, it may
> depend on a working video driver, something that RK356x does not have.
> 
> Regards,
> Jonas
> 
> > 
> > currently only bpi-r2pro uses extlinux boot and the other 3 boards using the builtin environment bootmenu. So to keep all boards nearly same i want to have the same for r2pro but allow users with extlinux still using this.
> > 
> >>> basicly my Plan is to script the bootup via env in script with a bootmenu (default entry + additional ones which can be 
> >>> changed by an env.txt file), but i do not want to break existing setups (using extlinux/*.conf behaviour) and no additional
> >>> bootmenu-entries.
> >>
> >> The "distro" bootmeth described at the documentation you linked to will
> >> looks for a file called extlinux/extlinux.conf.
> >>
> >> Is there a special reason why you need to use a custom bootmenu script
> >> and are moving from distro-boot (extlinux-config files)?
> >>
> >>>
> >>> is there any documentation describing the "Standard boot"?
> >>>
> >>> i found this, but it looks like the "old" distro-boot...or is is same from users PoV?
> >>>
> >>> https://u-boot.readthedocs.io/en/latest/develop/bootstd.html>>>
> >> This is the documentation for standard boot.
> >>
> >> I recommend you try out the commands bootdev, bootflow and bootmeth with
> >> CONFIG_BOOTSTD_FULL=y to get a better handling on how it would work on
> >> your device and how you can use them in your script.
> >>
> >> Regards,
> >> Jonas
> > 
regards Frank