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authorBernhard Walle <bwalle@suse.de>2008-06-27 13:12:54 +0200
committerIngo Molnar <mingo@elte.hu>2008-07-08 17:55:41 +0200
commit69ac9cd629ca96e59f34eb4ccd12d00b2c8276a7 (patch)
treee9bb108c5ec36c666d64a52ca35ccf0197c84306 /Documentation
parent6247943d8ab699b57653afd453a4940cca70ef8a (diff)
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sysfs: add /sys/firmware/memmap
This patch adds /sys/firmware/memmap interface that represents the BIOS (or Firmware) provided memory map. The tree looks like: /sys/firmware/memmap/0/start (hex number) end (hex number) type (string) ... /1/start end type With the following shell snippet one can print the memory map in the same form the kernel prints itself when booting on x86 (the E820 map). --------- 8< -------------------------- #!/bin/sh cd /sys/firmware/memmap for dir in * ; do start=$(cat $dir/start) end=$(cat $dir/end) type=$(cat $dir/type) printf "%016x-%016x (%s)\n" $start $[ $end +1] "$type" done --------- >8 -------------------------- That patch only provides the needed interface: 1. The sysfs interface. 2. The structure and enumeration definition. 3. The function firmware_map_add() and firmware_map_add_early() that should be called from architecture code (E820/EFI, for example) to add the contents to the interface. If the kernel is compiled without CONFIG_FIRMWARE_MEMMAP, the interface does nothing without cluttering the architecture-specific code with #ifdef's. The purpose of the new interface is kexec: While /proc/iomem represents the *used* memory map (e.g. modified via kernel parameters like 'memmap' and 'mem'), the /sys/firmware/memmap tree represents the unmodified memory map provided via the firmware. So kexec can: - use the original memory map for rebooting, - use the /proc/iomem for setting up the ELF core headers for kdump case that should only represent the memory of the system. The patch has been tested on i386 and x86_64. Signed-off-by: Bernhard Walle <bwalle@suse.de> Acked-by: Greg KH <gregkh@suse.de> Acked-by: Vivek Goyal <vgoyal@redhat.com> Cc: kexec@lists.infradead.org Cc: yhlu.kernel@gmail.com Signed-off-by: Ingo Molnar <mingo@elte.hu>
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+What: /sys/firmware/memmap/
+Date: June 2008
+Contact: Bernhard Walle <bwalle@suse.de>
+Description:
+ On all platforms, the firmware provides a memory map which the
+ kernel reads. The resources from that memory map are registered
+ in the kernel resource tree and exposed to userspace via
+ /proc/iomem (together with other resources).
+
+ However, on most architectures that firmware-provided memory
+ map is modified afterwards by the kernel itself, either because
+ the kernel merges that memory map with other information or
+ just because the user overwrites that memory map via command
+ line.
+
+ kexec needs the raw firmware-provided memory map to setup the
+ parameter segment of the kernel that should be booted with
+ kexec. Also, the raw memory map is useful for debugging. For
+ that reason, /sys/firmware/memmap is an interface that provides
+ the raw memory map to userspace.
+
+ The structure is as follows: Under /sys/firmware/memmap there
+ are subdirectories with the number of the entry as their name:
+
+ /sys/firmware/memmap/0
+ /sys/firmware/memmap/1
+ /sys/firmware/memmap/2
+ /sys/firmware/memmap/3
+ ...
+
+ The maximum depends on the number of memory map entries provided
+ by the firmware. The order is just the order that the firmware
+ provides.
+
+ Each directory contains three files:
+
+ start : The start address (as hexadecimal number with the
+ '0x' prefix).
+ end : The end address, inclusive (regardless whether the
+ firmware provides inclusive or exclusive ranges).
+ type : Type of the entry as string. See below for a list of
+ valid types.
+
+ So, for example:
+
+ /sys/firmware/memmap/0/start
+ /sys/firmware/memmap/0/end
+ /sys/firmware/memmap/0/type
+ /sys/firmware/memmap/1/start
+ ...
+
+ Currently following types exist:
+
+ - System RAM
+ - ACPI Tables
+ - ACPI Non-volatile Storage
+ - reserved
+
+ Following shell snippet can be used to display that memory
+ map in a human-readable format:
+
+ -------------------- 8< ----------------------------------------
+ #!/bin/bash
+ cd /sys/firmware/memmap
+ for dir in * ; do
+ start=$(cat $dir/start)
+ end=$(cat $dir/end)
+ type=$(cat $dir/type)
+ printf "%016x-%016x (%s)\n" $start $[ $end +1] "$type"
+ done
+ -------------------- >8 ----------------------------------------