Hi Mathieu,
On 11/18/2017 06:32 PM, Mathieu Malaterre wrote:
Well that's surprising. Thanks for the detailed explanation. I've
filled #882076 and forwarded upstream.
Sorry for not being specific enough, but grub-ofpathname is currently
not shipped in any GRUB package for powerpc or ppc64. I only tested a
manually compiled version after installing Debian Sid on my PowerMac11,2.
As I recognized that ofpathname is called from GRUB code:
```
## E.g. result for `grub-install [...]` on a PowerMac7,3 from just now:
root@powermac-g5-2:~# grub-install -v --macppc-directory=/boot/grub
[...]
grub-install: info: copying `/boot/grub/powerpc-ieee1275/core.elf' ->
`/boot/grub/grub'.
grub-install: info: copying `/usr/lib/grub/powerpc-ieee1275/grub.chrp'
-> `/boot/grub/System/Library/CoreServices/BootX'.
grub-install: info: copying `/boot/grub/powerpc-ieee1275/core.elf' ->
`/boot/grub/System/Library/CoreServices/grub.elf'.
grub-install: info: rendering label debian 2.02-2.
grub-install: info: label rendered.
grub-install: info: drive = 0.
grub-install: info: the size of hostdisk//dev/sda is 1953525168.
grub-install: info: blessing /boot/grub/System/Library/CoreServices.
grub-install: info: blessed.
grub-install: info: Looking for /dev/sda2.
grub-install: info: executing ofpathname --version </dev/null >/dev/null.
/usr/sbin/ofpathname: line 812: warning: command substitution: ignored
null byte in input
grub-install: info: executing nvsetenv boot-device
/ht@0,f2000000/pci@7/k2-sata-root@c/scsi@0/sd@0,0:2,\\BootX.
Installation finished. No error reported.
## The above warning output is not from the `ofpathname --version [...]`
## call, as this call gives no output at all, not even on stderr
root@powermac-g5-2:~# ofpathname --version </dev/null >/dev/null
root@powermac-g5-2:~#
```
...to set the OF path for the boot-device NVRAM variable but fails to
give a working OF path:
```
## Trying to boot from this path in OF gives:
0 > boot can't OPEN:
/ht@0,f2000000/pci@7/k2-sata-root@c/scsi@0/sd@0,0:2,\\BootX
Can't open device or file
0 > _
```
...I searched for alternatives and recognized that there is code for a
grub-ofpathname tool in an ieee1275 subdirectory of the GRUB repo (see
[1]). I compiled that tool and tried to see if maybe this tool
translates device nodes correctly to OF paths, but it didn't. Hence I
fell back to the available ofpath tool, which worked correctly.
[1]:
http://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/grub.git/tree/util/ieee1275/grub-ofpathname.c
I originally assumed that grub-install would also use the output of
ofpathname to set "&device;" and "&partition;" in the CHRP boot script
("BootX", see [2] for the template), but this doesn't seem the case, as
it looks like the file gets installed as is, as I just found out.
[2]:
http://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/grub.git/tree/grub-core/boot/powerpc/grub.chrp.in
I fail to understand how people
would install grub on ppc64 if grub-ofpathname does not return the
correct path.
With the current d-i/grub-installer code (v1.146 without my patches)
GRUB cannot be installed on powerpc/newworld or ppc64/newworld target
machines.
It only works for ppc64el machines and ppc64/chrp and related machines
thanks to patches from Adrian. And as ofpathname is from
powerpc-ibm-utils it might just work for these machines, so no complains
from users.
Cheers,
Frank
