FreeBSD's embedded agenda

[Jim Thompson]

On May 25, 2006, at 5:38 AM, Poul-Henning Kamp wrote:

> In message <472414CE-94E8-4C8A-9586-DCA9E02A53C3 at netgate.com>, Jim  
> Thompson wri
> tes:
>
>>> NanoBSD caters only to the "run read-only from flash" area, call
>>> it if you will the "soekris" area.  I need to investigate if it
>>> makes sense to use the FreeSBIE framework to build nanobsd images.
>>
>> All soekris boards have CF, which looks, for all the world like an
>> IDE drive.
>>
>> "real" flash is quite different.
>
> NanoBSD works fine with "raw" flash as well because it is practically
> read-only.

OK, there are other read-only distros too (the pfsense 'embedded' one  
is all but RO).   Technically,
if one could squeeze NanoBSD into 4-8MB, we could use the pfsense/ 
m0n0 XML-based config system,
and just keep the config file in a single (or small number) of flash  
sectors at the end of the device.

A similar configuration system that didn't require PHP would be even  
better.

Then we just need to (perhaps) re-implement/replace the linux "mtd"  
system, and a F(F)FS can wait a bit.

> Writing a flash-friendly-filesystem would be a good project.

Indeed.

Is there any reason to not approach Intel about a bit of 'funding'  
for FreeBSD on Xscale?  They poured some cash on Wasabi
for a similar effort on NetBSD.