GENERICSD images?

[Bernd Walter]

On Sat, Nov 03, 2018 at 03:18:21PM -0600, Warner Losh wrote:
> On Sat, Nov 3, 2018 at 1:11 PM Bernd Walter <ticso at cicely7.cicely.de> wrote:
> 
> > On Sat, Nov 03, 2018 at 11:51:38AM -0700, Russell Haley wrote:
> > > On Sat, Nov 3, 2018 at 8:28 AM Bernd Walter <ticso at cicely7.cicely.de>
> > wrote:
> > >
> > > > When and how would you use the GENERICSD images?
> > > > I assume they have a generic kernel, but do they need a specific u-boot
> > > > installed before they can get used?
> > > > What systems are supported?
> > > >
> > >
> > > Hi Bernd,
> > >
> > > I could be mistaken, but I think you are referring to the SD images that
> > > can be downloaded for various Arm boards found here:
> > > https://www.freebsd.org/where.html
> > >
> > > See the SD Image column for each currently supported FreeBSD version.
> > These
> > > images are for "well supported" Arm boards and are an easy way to get up
> > > and running. To apply an image to an SD card, I typically use
> > > xzcat <img-name-here>.img.xz | dd of=/dev/da0 bs=1M
> > >
> > > where ./dev/da0 is whatever device your SD card is found at (check dmesg
> > if
> > > you're not sure. "geom part list /dev/da0" can also be helpful )
> > >
> > > UFS will automatically grow the partition to the size of the SD card on
> > > first boot.
> > >
> > > If you wish to create your own image, you can look at crochet (a build
> > too
> > > written in bash) or there is an excellent write up by Udit on building
> > > custom images here:
> > >
> > http://uditagarwal.in/index.php/2018/04/17/building-freebsds-sdio-driver-for-beaglebone-black/
> > >
> > > Hope that helps?
> >
> > No, I didn't ask about those images in general, I specifically asked about
> > the use case of the GENERICSD image.
> > AFAIK crochet isn't advised anymore.
> > But the link is interesting, although unrelated to my question and it is
> > specifically about beaglebones - Allwinner based boards have to be handled
> > differently as they expect their bootcode at a specific media location.
> >
> 
> We now have a GENERIC kernel. This image is built with that kernel. You're
> expected to roll your own u-boot into this image for the board you are
> using. There are several u-boot ports that are known to work (or worked at
> one time).

That's a good simplification.
I already had known about the GENERIC kernel, but this image was new for
me as I wondered how it is handling the board specific boot code.

> There's a script that will add u-boot for the board based on metadata the
> port installs, but I'm having trouble finding it at the moment to give you
> more specifics...

Would be cool to know when you or someone else find it.
So far searching for GENERICSD only showed several fileservers.

-- 
B.Walter <bernd at bwct.de> http://www.bwct.de
Modbus/TCP Ethernet I/O Baugruppen, ARM basierte FreeBSD Rechner uvm.