Re: [ECOS] Modifying RedBoot to support multiple flash devices

[Bart Veer <bartv at ecoscentric dot com>]

>>>>> "Grant" == Grant Mills <gmills@ucsd.edu> writes:

    Grant> All,
    Grant>     I am potentially going to be adding support to
    Grant> eCos/RedBoot to support multiple flash types in the same
    Grant> executable. The reason for this is the desire to use the
    Grant> cheapest flash available at any given time. That
    Grant> potentially means bouncing between Intel, AMD/Spansion,
    Grant> .... We currently support this in our products using custom
    Grant> boot code. We are looking to migrate to RedBoot. For us
    Grant> this is a requirement.

    Grant>     First, I must ask this question, "Has this already been
    Grant> done or is somebody in the process of doing this?" Second,
    Grant> will the configuration tool support something like this? It
    Grant> would require the ability to select an item to support
    Grant> multiple parts, which would enable selecting multiple flash
    Grant> types/vendors.

    Grant>     Looking forward to the replies. Thanks in advance.

If you are talking about switching between parts within one family,
e.g. just AMD parts or compatibles, then this can already be achieved
with V1 flash to some extent. Look at e.g. devs/flash/powerpc/viper,
that supports three different AMD flash parts. You'll still need to
specify in advance which parts you might want to use in future.

For a more general solution you'll want the V2 branch in anoncvs. In
particular the V2 version of the AMD flash driver has an option for
CFI support, i.e. the device parameters will be determined at run-time
and you can bounce around between devices within a family all you
like. If you want to switch between families, e.g. between
AMD-compatible and Intel Strata flash, then in theory the V2 code
should allow for that as well. However that is not a common scenario.

Bart

-- 
Bart Veer                       eCos Configuration Architect
http://www.ecoscentric.com/     The eCos and RedBoot experts


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