+++ /dev/null
-Most (all) Intel-MP compliant SMP boards have the so-called 'IO-APIC',
-which is an enhanced interrupt controller. It enables us to route
-hardware interrupts to multiple CPUs, or to CPU groups. Without an
-IO-APIC, interrupts from hardware will be delivered only to the
-CPU which boots the operating system (usually CPU#0).
-
-Linux supports all variants of compliant SMP boards, including ones with
-multiple IO-APICs. Multiple IO-APICs are used in high-end servers to
-distribute IRQ load further.
-
-There are (a few) known breakages in certain older boards, such bugs are
-usually worked around by the kernel. If your MP-compliant SMP board does
-not boot Linux, then consult the linux-smp mailing list archives first.
-
-If your box boots fine with enabled IO-APIC IRQs, then your
-/proc/interrupts will look like this one:
-
- ---------------------------->
- hell:~> cat /proc/interrupts
- CPU0
- 0: 1360293 IO-APIC-edge timer
- 1: 4 IO-APIC-edge keyboard
- 2: 0 XT-PIC cascade
- 13: 1 XT-PIC fpu
- 14: 1448 IO-APIC-edge ide0
- 16: 28232 IO-APIC-level Intel EtherExpress Pro 10/100 Ethernet
- 17: 51304 IO-APIC-level eth0
- NMI: 0
- ERR: 0
- hell:~>
- <----------------------------
-
-Some interrupts are still listed as 'XT PIC', but this is not a problem;
-none of those IRQ sources is performance-critical.
-
-
-In the unlikely case that your board does not create a working mp-table,
-you can use the pirq= boot parameter to 'hand-construct' IRQ entries. This
-is non-trivial though and cannot be automated. One sample /etc/lilo.conf
-entry:
-
- append="pirq=15,11,10"
-
-The actual numbers depend on your system, on your PCI cards and on their
-PCI slot position. Usually PCI slots are 'daisy chained' before they are
-connected to the PCI chipset IRQ routing facility (the incoming PIRQ1-4
-lines):
-
- ,-. ,-. ,-. ,-. ,-.
- PIRQ4 ----| |-. ,-| |-. ,-| |-. ,-| |--------| |
- |S| \ / |S| \ / |S| \ / |S| |S|
- PIRQ3 ----|l|-. `/---|l|-. `/---|l|-. `/---|l|--------|l|
- |o| \/ |o| \/ |o| \/ |o| |o|
- PIRQ2 ----|t|-./`----|t|-./`----|t|-./`----|t|--------|t|
- |1| /\ |2| /\ |3| /\ |4| |5|
- PIRQ1 ----| |- `----| |- `----| |- `----| |--------| |
- `-' `-' `-' `-' `-'
-
-Every PCI card emits a PCI IRQ, which can be INTA, INTB, INTC or INTD:
-
- ,-.
- INTD--| |
- |S|
- INTC--|l|
- |o|
- INTB--|t|
- |x|
- INTA--| |
- `-'
-
-These INTA-D PCI IRQs are always 'local to the card', their real meaning
-depends on which slot they are in. If you look at the daisy chaining diagram,
-a card in slot4, issuing INTA IRQ, it will end up as a signal on PIRQ4 of
-the PCI chipset. Most cards issue INTA, this creates optimal distribution
-between the PIRQ lines. (distributing IRQ sources properly is not a
-necessity, PCI IRQs can be shared at will, but it's a good for performance
-to have non shared interrupts). Slot5 should be used for videocards, they
-do not use interrupts normally, thus they are not daisy chained either.
-
-so if you have your SCSI card (IRQ11) in Slot1, Tulip card (IRQ9) in
-Slot2, then you'll have to specify this pirq= line:
-
- append="pirq=11,9"
-
-the following script tries to figure out such a default pirq= line from
-your PCI configuration:
-
- echo -n pirq=; echo `scanpci | grep T_L | cut -c56-` | sed 's/ /,/g'
-
-note that this script wont work if you have skipped a few slots or if your
-board does not do default daisy-chaining. (or the IO-APIC has the PIRQ pins
-connected in some strange way). E.g. if in the above case you have your SCSI
-card (IRQ11) in Slot3, and have Slot1 empty:
-
- append="pirq=0,9,11"
-
-[value '0' is a generic 'placeholder', reserved for empty (or non-IRQ emitting)
-slots.]
-
-Generally, it's always possible to find out the correct pirq= settings, just
-permute all IRQ numbers properly ... it will take some time though. An
-'incorrect' pirq line will cause the booting process to hang, or a device
-won't function properly (e.g. if it's inserted as a module).
-
-If you have 2 PCI buses, then you can use up to 8 pirq values, although such
-boards tend to have a good configuration.
-
-Be prepared that it might happen that you need some strange pirq line:
-
- append="pirq=0,0,0,0,0,0,9,11"
-
-Use smart trial-and-error techniques to find out the correct pirq line ...
-
-Good luck and mail to linux-smp@vger.kernel.org or
-linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org if you have any problems that are not covered
-by this document.
-
--- mingo
-
+++ /dev/null
- THE LINUX/x86 BOOT PROTOCOL
- ---------------------------
-
-On the x86 platform, the Linux kernel uses a rather complicated boot
-convention. This has evolved partially due to historical aspects, as
-well as the desire in the early days to have the kernel itself be a
-bootable image, the complicated PC memory model and due to changed
-expectations in the PC industry caused by the effective demise of
-real-mode DOS as a mainstream operating system.
-
-Currently, the following versions of the Linux/x86 boot protocol exist.
-
-Old kernels: zImage/Image support only. Some very early kernels
- may not even support a command line.
-
-Protocol 2.00: (Kernel 1.3.73) Added bzImage and initrd support, as
- well as a formalized way to communicate between the
- boot loader and the kernel. setup.S made relocatable,
- although the traditional setup area still assumed
- writable.
-
-Protocol 2.01: (Kernel 1.3.76) Added a heap overrun warning.
-
-Protocol 2.02: (Kernel 2.4.0-test3-pre3) New command line protocol.
- Lower the conventional memory ceiling. No overwrite
- of the traditional setup area, thus making booting
- safe for systems which use the EBDA from SMM or 32-bit
- BIOS entry points. zImage deprecated but still
- supported.
-
-Protocol 2.03: (Kernel 2.4.18-pre1) Explicitly makes the highest possible
- initrd address available to the bootloader.
-
-Protocol 2.04: (Kernel 2.6.14) Extend the syssize field to four bytes.
-
-Protocol 2.05: (Kernel 2.6.20) Make protected mode kernel relocatable.
- Introduce relocatable_kernel and kernel_alignment fields.
-
-Protocol 2.06: (Kernel 2.6.22) Added a field that contains the size of
- the boot command line.
-
-Protocol 2.07: (Kernel 2.6.24) Added paravirtualised boot protocol.
- Introduced hardware_subarch and hardware_subarch_data
- and KEEP_SEGMENTS flag in load_flags.
-
-Protocol 2.08: (Kernel 2.6.26) Added crc32 checksum and ELF format
- payload. Introduced payload_offset and payload length
- fields to aid in locating the payload.
-
-Protocol 2.09: (Kernel 2.6.26) Added a field of 64-bit physical
- pointer to single linked list of struct setup_data.
-
-**** MEMORY LAYOUT
-
-The traditional memory map for the kernel loader, used for Image or
-zImage kernels, typically looks like:
-
- | |
-0A0000 +------------------------+
- | Reserved for BIOS | Do not use. Reserved for BIOS EBDA.
-09A000 +------------------------+
- | Command line |
- | Stack/heap | For use by the kernel real-mode code.
-098000 +------------------------+
- | Kernel setup | The kernel real-mode code.
-090200 +------------------------+
- | Kernel boot sector | The kernel legacy boot sector.
-090000 +------------------------+
- | Protected-mode kernel | The bulk of the kernel image.
-010000 +------------------------+
- | Boot loader | <- Boot sector entry point 0000:7C00
-001000 +------------------------+
- | Reserved for MBR/BIOS |
-000800 +------------------------+
- | Typically used by MBR |
-000600 +------------------------+
- | BIOS use only |
-000000 +------------------------+
-
-
-When using bzImage, the protected-mode kernel was relocated to
-0x100000 ("high memory"), and the kernel real-mode block (boot sector,
-setup, and stack/heap) was made relocatable to any address between
-0x10000 and end of low memory. Unfortunately, in protocols 2.00 and
-2.01 the 0x90000+ memory range is still used internally by the kernel;
-the 2.02 protocol resolves that problem.
-
-It is desirable to keep the "memory ceiling" -- the highest point in
-low memory touched by the boot loader -- as low as possible, since
-some newer BIOSes have begun to allocate some rather large amounts of
-memory, called the Extended BIOS Data Area, near the top of low
-memory. The boot loader should use the "INT 12h" BIOS call to verify
-how much low memory is available.
-
-Unfortunately, if INT 12h reports that the amount of memory is too
-low, there is usually nothing the boot loader can do but to report an
-error to the user. The boot loader should therefore be designed to
-take up as little space in low memory as it reasonably can. For
-zImage or old bzImage kernels, which need data written into the
-0x90000 segment, the boot loader should make sure not to use memory
-above the 0x9A000 point; too many BIOSes will break above that point.
-
-For a modern bzImage kernel with boot protocol version >= 2.02, a
-memory layout like the following is suggested:
-
- ~ ~
- | Protected-mode kernel |
-100000 +------------------------+
- | I/O memory hole |
-0A0000 +------------------------+
- | Reserved for BIOS | Leave as much as possible unused
- ~ ~
- | Command line | (Can also be below the X+10000 mark)
-X+10000 +------------------------+
- | Stack/heap | For use by the kernel real-mode code.
-X+08000 +------------------------+
- | Kernel setup | The kernel real-mode code.
- | Kernel boot sector | The kernel legacy boot sector.
-X +------------------------+
- | Boot loader | <- Boot sector entry point 0000:7C00
-001000 +------------------------+
- | Reserved for MBR/BIOS |
-000800 +------------------------+
- | Typically used by MBR |
-000600 +------------------------+
- | BIOS use only |
-000000 +------------------------+
-
-... where the address X is as low as the design of the boot loader
-permits.
-
-
-**** THE REAL-MODE KERNEL HEADER
-
-In the following text, and anywhere in the kernel boot sequence, "a
-sector" refers to 512 bytes. It is independent of the actual sector
-size of the underlying medium.
-
-The first step in loading a Linux kernel should be to load the
-real-mode code (boot sector and setup code) and then examine the
-following header at offset 0x01f1. The real-mode code can total up to
-32K, although the boot loader may choose to load only the first two
-sectors (1K) and then examine the bootup sector size.
-
-The header looks like:
-
-Offset Proto Name Meaning
-/Size
-
-01F1/1 ALL(1 setup_sects The size of the setup in sectors
-01F2/2 ALL root_flags If set, the root is mounted readonly
-01F4/4 2.04+(2 syssize The size of the 32-bit code in 16-byte paras
-01F8/2 ALL ram_size DO NOT USE - for bootsect.S use only
-01FA/2 ALL vid_mode Video mode control
-01FC/2 ALL root_dev Default root device number
-01FE/2 ALL boot_flag 0xAA55 magic number
-0200/2 2.00+ jump Jump instruction
-0202/4 2.00+ header Magic signature "HdrS"
-0206/2 2.00+ version Boot protocol version supported
-0208/4 2.00+ realmode_swtch Boot loader hook (see below)
-020C/2 2.00+ start_sys The load-low segment (0x1000) (obsolete)
-020E/2 2.00+ kernel_version Pointer to kernel version string
-0210/1 2.00+ type_of_loader Boot loader identifier
-0211/1 2.00+ loadflags Boot protocol option flags
-0212/2 2.00+ setup_move_size Move to high memory size (used with hooks)
-0214/4 2.00+ code32_start Boot loader hook (see below)
-0218/4 2.00+ ramdisk_image initrd load address (set by boot loader)
-021C/4 2.00+ ramdisk_size initrd size (set by boot loader)
-0220/4 2.00+ bootsect_kludge DO NOT USE - for bootsect.S use only
-0224/2 2.01+ heap_end_ptr Free memory after setup end
-0226/2 N/A pad1 Unused
-0228/4 2.02+ cmd_line_ptr 32-bit pointer to the kernel command line
-022C/4 2.03+ initrd_addr_max Highest legal initrd address
-0230/4 2.05+ kernel_alignment Physical addr alignment required for kernel
-0234/1 2.05+ relocatable_kernel Whether kernel is relocatable or not
-0235/3 N/A pad2 Unused
-0238/4 2.06+ cmdline_size Maximum size of the kernel command line
-023C/4 2.07+ hardware_subarch Hardware subarchitecture
-0240/8 2.07+ hardware_subarch_data Subarchitecture-specific data
-0248/4 2.08+ payload_offset Offset of kernel payload
-024C/4 2.08+ payload_length Length of kernel payload
-0250/8 2.09+ setup_data 64-bit physical pointer to linked list
- of struct setup_data
-
-(1) For backwards compatibility, if the setup_sects field contains 0, the
- real value is 4.
-
-(2) For boot protocol prior to 2.04, the upper two bytes of the syssize
- field are unusable, which means the size of a bzImage kernel
- cannot be determined.
-
-If the "HdrS" (0x53726448) magic number is not found at offset 0x202,
-the boot protocol version is "old". Loading an old kernel, the
-following parameters should be assumed:
-
- Image type = zImage
- initrd not supported
- Real-mode kernel must be located at 0x90000.
-
-Otherwise, the "version" field contains the protocol version,
-e.g. protocol version 2.01 will contain 0x0201 in this field. When
-setting fields in the header, you must make sure only to set fields
-supported by the protocol version in use.
-
-
-**** DETAILS OF HEADER FIELDS
-
-For each field, some are information from the kernel to the bootloader
-("read"), some are expected to be filled out by the bootloader
-("write"), and some are expected to be read and modified by the
-bootloader ("modify").
-
-All general purpose boot loaders should write the fields marked
-(obligatory). Boot loaders who want to load the kernel at a
-nonstandard address should fill in the fields marked (reloc); other
-boot loaders can ignore those fields.
-
-The byte order of all fields is littleendian (this is x86, after all.)
-
-Field name: setup_sects
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x1f1/1
-Protocol: ALL
-
- The size of the setup code in 512-byte sectors. If this field is
- 0, the real value is 4. The real-mode code consists of the boot
- sector (always one 512-byte sector) plus the setup code.
-
-Field name: root_flags
-Type: modify (optional)
-Offset/size: 0x1f2/2
-Protocol: ALL
-
- If this field is nonzero, the root defaults to readonly. The use of
- this field is deprecated; use the "ro" or "rw" options on the
- command line instead.
-
-Field name: syssize
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x1f4/4 (protocol 2.04+) 0x1f4/2 (protocol ALL)
-Protocol: 2.04+
-
- The size of the protected-mode code in units of 16-byte paragraphs.
- For protocol versions older than 2.04 this field is only two bytes
- wide, and therefore cannot be trusted for the size of a kernel if
- the LOAD_HIGH flag is set.
-
-Field name: ram_size
-Type: kernel internal
-Offset/size: 0x1f8/2
-Protocol: ALL
-
- This field is obsolete.
-
-Field name: vid_mode
-Type: modify (obligatory)
-Offset/size: 0x1fa/2
-
- Please see the section on SPECIAL COMMAND LINE OPTIONS.
-
-Field name: root_dev
-Type: modify (optional)
-Offset/size: 0x1fc/2
-Protocol: ALL
-
- The default root device device number. The use of this field is
- deprecated, use the "root=" option on the command line instead.
-
-Field name: boot_flag
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x1fe/2
-Protocol: ALL
-
- Contains 0xAA55. This is the closest thing old Linux kernels have
- to a magic number.
-
-Field name: jump
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x200/2
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- Contains an x86 jump instruction, 0xEB followed by a signed offset
- relative to byte 0x202. This can be used to determine the size of
- the header.
-
-Field name: header
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x202/4
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- Contains the magic number "HdrS" (0x53726448).
-
-Field name: version
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x206/2
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- Contains the boot protocol version, in (major << 8)+minor format,
- e.g. 0x0204 for version 2.04, and 0x0a11 for a hypothetical version
- 10.17.
-
-Field name: readmode_swtch
-Type: modify (optional)
-Offset/size: 0x208/4
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- Boot loader hook (see ADVANCED BOOT LOADER HOOKS below.)
-
-Field name: start_sys
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x20c/4
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- The load low segment (0x1000). Obsolete.
-
-Field name: kernel_version
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x20e/2
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- If set to a nonzero value, contains a pointer to a NUL-terminated
- human-readable kernel version number string, less 0x200. This can
- be used to display the kernel version to the user. This value
- should be less than (0x200*setup_sects).
-
- For example, if this value is set to 0x1c00, the kernel version
- number string can be found at offset 0x1e00 in the kernel file.
- This is a valid value if and only if the "setup_sects" field
- contains the value 15 or higher, as:
-
- 0x1c00 < 15*0x200 (= 0x1e00) but
- 0x1c00 >= 14*0x200 (= 0x1c00)
-
- 0x1c00 >> 9 = 14, so the minimum value for setup_secs is 15.
-
-Field name: type_of_loader
-Type: write (obligatory)
-Offset/size: 0x210/1
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- If your boot loader has an assigned id (see table below), enter
- 0xTV here, where T is an identifier for the boot loader and V is
- a version number. Otherwise, enter 0xFF here.
-
- Assigned boot loader ids:
- 0 LILO (0x00 reserved for pre-2.00 bootloader)
- 1 Loadlin
- 2 bootsect-loader (0x20, all other values reserved)
- 3 SYSLINUX
- 4 EtherBoot
- 5 ELILO
- 7 GRuB
- 8 U-BOOT
- 9 Xen
- A Gujin
- B Qemu
-
- Please contact <hpa@zytor.com> if you need a bootloader ID
- value assigned.
-
-Field name: loadflags
-Type: modify (obligatory)
-Offset/size: 0x211/1
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- This field is a bitmask.
-
- Bit 0 (read): LOADED_HIGH
- - If 0, the protected-mode code is loaded at 0x10000.
- - If 1, the protected-mode code is loaded at 0x100000.
-
- Bit 5 (write): QUIET_FLAG
- - If 0, print early messages.
- - If 1, suppress early messages.
- This requests to the kernel (decompressor and early
- kernel) to not write early messages that require
- accessing the display hardware directly.
-
- Bit 6 (write): KEEP_SEGMENTS
- Protocol: 2.07+
- - If 0, reload the segment registers in the 32bit entry point.
- - If 1, do not reload the segment registers in the 32bit entry point.
- Assume that %cs %ds %ss %es are all set to flat segments with
- a base of 0 (or the equivalent for their environment).
-
- Bit 7 (write): CAN_USE_HEAP
- Set this bit to 1 to indicate that the value entered in the
- heap_end_ptr is valid. If this field is clear, some setup code
- functionality will be disabled.
-
-Field name: setup_move_size
-Type: modify (obligatory)
-Offset/size: 0x212/2
-Protocol: 2.00-2.01
-
- When using protocol 2.00 or 2.01, if the real mode kernel is not
- loaded at 0x90000, it gets moved there later in the loading
- sequence. Fill in this field if you want additional data (such as
- the kernel command line) moved in addition to the real-mode kernel
- itself.
-
- The unit is bytes starting with the beginning of the boot sector.
-
- This field is can be ignored when the protocol is 2.02 or higher, or
- if the real-mode code is loaded at 0x90000.
-
-Field name: code32_start
-Type: modify (optional, reloc)
-Offset/size: 0x214/4
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- The address to jump to in protected mode. This defaults to the load
- address of the kernel, and can be used by the boot loader to
- determine the proper load address.
-
- This field can be modified for two purposes:
-
- 1. as a boot loader hook (see ADVANCED BOOT LOADER HOOKS below.)
-
- 2. if a bootloader which does not install a hook loads a
- relocatable kernel at a nonstandard address it will have to modify
- this field to point to the load address.
-
-Field name: ramdisk_image
-Type: write (obligatory)
-Offset/size: 0x218/4
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- The 32-bit linear address of the initial ramdisk or ramfs. Leave at
- zero if there is no initial ramdisk/ramfs.
-
-Field name: ramdisk_size
-Type: write (obligatory)
-Offset/size: 0x21c/4
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- Size of the initial ramdisk or ramfs. Leave at zero if there is no
- initial ramdisk/ramfs.
-
-Field name: bootsect_kludge
-Type: kernel internal
-Offset/size: 0x220/4
-Protocol: 2.00+
-
- This field is obsolete.
-
-Field name: heap_end_ptr
-Type: write (obligatory)
-Offset/size: 0x224/2
-Protocol: 2.01+
-
- Set this field to the offset (from the beginning of the real-mode
- code) of the end of the setup stack/heap, minus 0x0200.
-
-Field name: cmd_line_ptr
-Type: write (obligatory)
-Offset/size: 0x228/4
-Protocol: 2.02+
-
- Set this field to the linear address of the kernel command line.
- The kernel command line can be located anywhere between the end of
- the setup heap and 0xA0000; it does not have to be located in the
- same 64K segment as the real-mode code itself.
-
- Fill in this field even if your boot loader does not support a
- command line, in which case you can point this to an empty string
- (or better yet, to the string "auto".) If this field is left at
- zero, the kernel will assume that your boot loader does not support
- the 2.02+ protocol.
-
-Field name: initrd_addr_max
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x22c/4
-Protocol: 2.03+
-
- The maximum address that may be occupied by the initial
- ramdisk/ramfs contents. For boot protocols 2.02 or earlier, this
- field is not present, and the maximum address is 0x37FFFFFF. (This
- address is defined as the address of the highest safe byte, so if
- your ramdisk is exactly 131072 bytes long and this field is
- 0x37FFFFFF, you can start your ramdisk at 0x37FE0000.)
-
-Field name: kernel_alignment
-Type: read (reloc)
-Offset/size: 0x230/4
-Protocol: 2.05+
-
- Alignment unit required by the kernel (if relocatable_kernel is true.)
-
-Field name: relocatable_kernel
-Type: read (reloc)
-Offset/size: 0x234/1
-Protocol: 2.05+
-
- If this field is nonzero, the protected-mode part of the kernel can
- be loaded at any address that satisfies the kernel_alignment field.
- After loading, the boot loader must set the code32_start field to
- point to the loaded code, or to a boot loader hook.
-
-Field name: cmdline_size
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x238/4
-Protocol: 2.06+
-
- The maximum size of the command line without the terminating
- zero. This means that the command line can contain at most
- cmdline_size characters. With protocol version 2.05 and earlier, the
- maximum size was 255.
-
-Field name: hardware_subarch
-Type: write (optional, defaults to x86/PC)
-Offset/size: 0x23c/4
-Protocol: 2.07+
-
- In a paravirtualized environment the hardware low level architectural
- pieces such as interrupt handling, page table handling, and
- accessing process control registers needs to be done differently.
-
- This field allows the bootloader to inform the kernel we are in one
- one of those environments.
-
- 0x00000000 The default x86/PC environment
- 0x00000001 lguest
- 0x00000002 Xen
-
-Field name: hardware_subarch_data
-Type: write (subarch-dependent)
-Offset/size: 0x240/8
-Protocol: 2.07+
-
- A pointer to data that is specific to hardware subarch
- This field is currently unused for the default x86/PC environment,
- do not modify.
-
-Field name: payload_offset
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x248/4
-Protocol: 2.08+
-
- If non-zero then this field contains the offset from the end of the
- real-mode code to the payload.
-
- The payload may be compressed. The format of both the compressed and
- uncompressed data should be determined using the standard magic
- numbers. Currently only gzip compressed ELF is used.
-
-Field name: payload_length
-Type: read
-Offset/size: 0x24c/4
-Protocol: 2.08+
-
- The length of the payload.
-
-Field name: setup_data
-Type: write (special)
-Offset/size: 0x250/8
-Protocol: 2.09+
-
- The 64-bit physical pointer to NULL terminated single linked list of
- struct setup_data. This is used to define a more extensible boot
- parameters passing mechanism. The definition of struct setup_data is
- as follow:
-
- struct setup_data {
- u64 next;
- u32 type;
- u32 len;
- u8 data[0];
- };
-
- Where, the next is a 64-bit physical pointer to the next node of
- linked list, the next field of the last node is 0; the type is used
- to identify the contents of data; the len is the length of data
- field; the data holds the real payload.
-
- This list may be modified at a number of points during the bootup
- process. Therefore, when modifying this list one should always make
- sure to consider the case where the linked list already contains
- entries.
-
-
-**** THE IMAGE CHECKSUM
-
-From boot protocol version 2.08 onwards the CRC-32 is calculated over
-the entire file using the characteristic polynomial 0x04C11DB7 and an
-initial remainder of 0xffffffff. The checksum is appended to the
-file; therefore the CRC of the file up to the limit specified in the
-syssize field of the header is always 0.
-
-
-**** THE KERNEL COMMAND LINE
-
-The kernel command line has become an important way for the boot
-loader to communicate with the kernel. Some of its options are also
-relevant to the boot loader itself, see "special command line options"
-below.
-
-The kernel command line is a null-terminated string. The maximum
-length can be retrieved from the field cmdline_size. Before protocol
-version 2.06, the maximum was 255 characters. A string that is too
-long will be automatically truncated by the kernel.
-
-If the boot protocol version is 2.02 or later, the address of the
-kernel command line is given by the header field cmd_line_ptr (see
-above.) This address can be anywhere between the end of the setup
-heap and 0xA0000.
-
-If the protocol version is *not* 2.02 or higher, the kernel
-command line is entered using the following protocol:
-
- At offset 0x0020 (word), "cmd_line_magic", enter the magic
- number 0xA33F.
-
- At offset 0x0022 (word), "cmd_line_offset", enter the offset
- of the kernel command line (relative to the start of the
- real-mode kernel).
-
- The kernel command line *must* be within the memory region
- covered by setup_move_size, so you may need to adjust this
- field.
-
-
-**** MEMORY LAYOUT OF THE REAL-MODE CODE
-
-The real-mode code requires a stack/heap to be set up, as well as
-memory allocated for the kernel command line. This needs to be done
-in the real-mode accessible memory in bottom megabyte.
-
-It should be noted that modern machines often have a sizable Extended
-BIOS Data Area (EBDA). As a result, it is advisable to use as little
-of the low megabyte as possible.
-
-Unfortunately, under the following circumstances the 0x90000 memory
-segment has to be used:
-
- - When loading a zImage kernel ((loadflags & 0x01) == 0).
- - When loading a 2.01 or earlier boot protocol kernel.
-
- -> For the 2.00 and 2.01 boot protocols, the real-mode code
- can be loaded at another address, but it is internally
- relocated to 0x90000. For the "old" protocol, the
- real-mode code must be loaded at 0x90000.
-
-When loading at 0x90000, avoid using memory above 0x9a000.
-
-For boot protocol 2.02 or higher, the command line does not have to be
-located in the same 64K segment as the real-mode setup code; it is
-thus permitted to give the stack/heap the full 64K segment and locate
-the command line above it.
-
-The kernel command line should not be located below the real-mode
-code, nor should it be located in high memory.
-
-
-**** SAMPLE BOOT CONFIGURATION
-
-As a sample configuration, assume the following layout of the real
-mode segment:
-
- When loading below 0x90000, use the entire segment:
-
- 0x0000-0x7fff Real mode kernel
- 0x8000-0xdfff Stack and heap
- 0xe000-0xffff Kernel command line
-
- When loading at 0x90000 OR the protocol version is 2.01 or earlier:
-
- 0x0000-0x7fff Real mode kernel
- 0x8000-0x97ff Stack and heap
- 0x9800-0x9fff Kernel command line
-
-Such a boot loader should enter the following fields in the header:
-
- unsigned long base_ptr; /* base address for real-mode segment */
-
- if ( setup_sects == 0 ) {
- setup_sects = 4;
- }
-
- if ( protocol >= 0x0200 ) {
- type_of_loader = <type code>;
- if ( loading_initrd ) {
- ramdisk_image = <initrd_address>;
- ramdisk_size = <initrd_size>;
- }
-
- if ( protocol >= 0x0202 && loadflags & 0x01 )
- heap_end = 0xe000;
- else
- heap_end = 0x9800;
-
- if ( protocol >= 0x0201 ) {
- heap_end_ptr = heap_end - 0x200;
- loadflags |= 0x80; /* CAN_USE_HEAP */
- }
-
- if ( protocol >= 0x0202 ) {
- cmd_line_ptr = base_ptr + heap_end;
- strcpy(cmd_line_ptr, cmdline);
- } else {
- cmd_line_magic = 0xA33F;
- cmd_line_offset = heap_end;
- setup_move_size = heap_end + strlen(cmdline)+1;
- strcpy(base_ptr+cmd_line_offset, cmdline);
- }
- } else {
- /* Very old kernel */
-
- heap_end = 0x9800;
-
- cmd_line_magic = 0xA33F;
- cmd_line_offset = heap_end;
-
- /* A very old kernel MUST have its real-mode code
- loaded at 0x90000 */
-
- if ( base_ptr != 0x90000 ) {
- /* Copy the real-mode kernel */
- memcpy(0x90000, base_ptr, (setup_sects+1)*512);
- base_ptr = 0x90000; /* Relocated */
- }
-
- strcpy(0x90000+cmd_line_offset, cmdline);
-
- /* It is recommended to clear memory up to the 32K mark */
- memset(0x90000 + (setup_sects+1)*512, 0,
- (64-(setup_sects+1))*512);
- }
-
-
-**** LOADING THE REST OF THE KERNEL
-
-The 32-bit (non-real-mode) kernel starts at offset (setup_sects+1)*512
-in the kernel file (again, if setup_sects == 0 the real value is 4.)
-It should be loaded at address 0x10000 for Image/zImage kernels and
-0x100000 for bzImage kernels.
-
-The kernel is a bzImage kernel if the protocol >= 2.00 and the 0x01
-bit (LOAD_HIGH) in the loadflags field is set:
-
- is_bzImage = (protocol >= 0x0200) && (loadflags & 0x01);
- load_address = is_bzImage ? 0x100000 : 0x10000;
-
-Note that Image/zImage kernels can be up to 512K in size, and thus use
-the entire 0x10000-0x90000 range of memory. This means it is pretty
-much a requirement for these kernels to load the real-mode part at
-0x90000. bzImage kernels allow much more flexibility.
-
-
-**** SPECIAL COMMAND LINE OPTIONS
-
-If the command line provided by the boot loader is entered by the
-user, the user may expect the following command line options to work.
-They should normally not be deleted from the kernel command line even
-though not all of them are actually meaningful to the kernel. Boot
-loader authors who need additional command line options for the boot
-loader itself should get them registered in
-Documentation/kernel-parameters.txt to make sure they will not
-conflict with actual kernel options now or in the future.
-
- vga=<mode>
- <mode> here is either an integer (in C notation, either
- decimal, octal, or hexadecimal) or one of the strings
- "normal" (meaning 0xFFFF), "ext" (meaning 0xFFFE) or "ask"
- (meaning 0xFFFD). This value should be entered into the
- vid_mode field, as it is used by the kernel before the command
- line is parsed.
-
- mem=<size>
- <size> is an integer in C notation optionally followed by
- (case insensitive) K, M, G, T, P or E (meaning << 10, << 20,
- << 30, << 40, << 50 or << 60). This specifies the end of
- memory to the kernel. This affects the possible placement of
- an initrd, since an initrd should be placed near end of
- memory. Note that this is an option to *both* the kernel and
- the bootloader!
-
- initrd=<file>
- An initrd should be loaded. The meaning of <file> is
- obviously bootloader-dependent, and some boot loaders
- (e.g. LILO) do not have such a command.
-
-In addition, some boot loaders add the following options to the
-user-specified command line:
-
- BOOT_IMAGE=<file>
- The boot image which was loaded. Again, the meaning of <file>
- is obviously bootloader-dependent.
-
- auto
- The kernel was booted without explicit user intervention.
-
-If these options are added by the boot loader, it is highly
-recommended that they are located *first*, before the user-specified
-or configuration-specified command line. Otherwise, "init=/bin/sh"
-gets confused by the "auto" option.
-
-
-**** RUNNING THE KERNEL
-
-The kernel is started by jumping to the kernel entry point, which is
-located at *segment* offset 0x20 from the start of the real mode
-kernel. This means that if you loaded your real-mode kernel code at
-0x90000, the kernel entry point is 9020:0000.
-
-At entry, ds = es = ss should point to the start of the real-mode
-kernel code (0x9000 if the code is loaded at 0x90000), sp should be
-set up properly, normally pointing to the top of the heap, and
-interrupts should be disabled. Furthermore, to guard against bugs in
-the kernel, it is recommended that the boot loader sets fs = gs = ds =
-es = ss.
-
-In our example from above, we would do:
-
- /* Note: in the case of the "old" kernel protocol, base_ptr must
- be == 0x90000 at this point; see the previous sample code */
-
- seg = base_ptr >> 4;
-
- cli(); /* Enter with interrupts disabled! */
-
- /* Set up the real-mode kernel stack */
- _SS = seg;
- _SP = heap_end;
-
- _DS = _ES = _FS = _GS = seg;
- jmp_far(seg+0x20, 0); /* Run the kernel */
-
-If your boot sector accesses a floppy drive, it is recommended to
-switch off the floppy motor before running the kernel, since the
-kernel boot leaves interrupts off and thus the motor will not be
-switched off, especially if the loaded kernel has the floppy driver as
-a demand-loaded module!
-
-
-**** ADVANCED BOOT LOADER HOOKS
-
-If the boot loader runs in a particularly hostile environment (such as
-LOADLIN, which runs under DOS) it may be impossible to follow the
-standard memory location requirements. Such a boot loader may use the
-following hooks that, if set, are invoked by the kernel at the
-appropriate time. The use of these hooks should probably be
-considered an absolutely last resort!
-
-IMPORTANT: All the hooks are required to preserve %esp, %ebp, %esi and
-%edi across invocation.
-
- realmode_swtch:
- A 16-bit real mode far subroutine invoked immediately before
- entering protected mode. The default routine disables NMI, so
- your routine should probably do so, too.
-
- code32_start:
- A 32-bit flat-mode routine *jumped* to immediately after the
- transition to protected mode, but before the kernel is
- uncompressed. No segments, except CS, are guaranteed to be
- set up (current kernels do, but older ones do not); you should
- set them up to BOOT_DS (0x18) yourself.
-
- After completing your hook, you should jump to the address
- that was in this field before your boot loader overwrote it
- (relocated, if appropriate.)
-
-
-**** 32-bit BOOT PROTOCOL
-
-For machine with some new BIOS other than legacy BIOS, such as EFI,
-LinuxBIOS, etc, and kexec, the 16-bit real mode setup code in kernel
-based on legacy BIOS can not be used, so a 32-bit boot protocol needs
-to be defined.
-
-In 32-bit boot protocol, the first step in loading a Linux kernel
-should be to setup the boot parameters (struct boot_params,
-traditionally known as "zero page"). The memory for struct boot_params
-should be allocated and initialized to all zero. Then the setup header
-from offset 0x01f1 of kernel image on should be loaded into struct
-boot_params and examined. The end of setup header can be calculated as
-follow:
-
- 0x0202 + byte value at offset 0x0201
-
-In addition to read/modify/write the setup header of the struct
-boot_params as that of 16-bit boot protocol, the boot loader should
-also fill the additional fields of the struct boot_params as that
-described in zero-page.txt.
-
-After setupping the struct boot_params, the boot loader can load the
-32/64-bit kernel in the same way as that of 16-bit boot protocol.
-
-In 32-bit boot protocol, the kernel is started by jumping to the
-32-bit kernel entry point, which is the start address of loaded
-32/64-bit kernel.
-
-At entry, the CPU must be in 32-bit protected mode with paging
-disabled; a GDT must be loaded with the descriptors for selectors
-__BOOT_CS(0x10) and __BOOT_DS(0x18); both descriptors must be 4G flat
-segment; __BOOS_CS must have execute/read permission, and __BOOT_DS
-must have read/write permission; CS must be __BOOT_CS and DS, ES, SS
-must be __BOOT_DS; interrupt must be disabled; %esi must hold the base
-address of the struct boot_params; %ebp, %edi and %ebx must be zero.
+++ /dev/null
-USB Legacy support
-~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-
-Vojtech Pavlik <vojtech@suse.cz>, January 2004
-
-
-Also known as "USB Keyboard" or "USB Mouse support" in the BIOS Setup is a
-feature that allows one to use the USB mouse and keyboard as if they were
-their classic PS/2 counterparts. This means one can use an USB keyboard to
-type in LILO for example.
-
-It has several drawbacks, though:
-
-1) On some machines, the emulated PS/2 mouse takes over even when no USB
- mouse is present and a real PS/2 mouse is present. In that case the extra
- features (wheel, extra buttons, touchpad mode) of the real PS/2 mouse may
- not be available.
-
-2) If CONFIG_HIGHMEM64G is enabled, the PS/2 mouse emulation can cause
- system crashes, because the SMM BIOS is not expecting to be in PAE mode.
- The Intel E7505 is a typical machine where this happens.
-
-3) If AMD64 64-bit mode is enabled, again system crashes often happen,
- because the SMM BIOS isn't expecting the CPU to be in 64-bit mode. The
- BIOS manufacturers only test with Windows, and Windows doesn't do 64-bit
- yet.
-
-Solutions:
-
-Problem 1) can be solved by loading the USB drivers prior to loading the
-PS/2 mouse driver. Since the PS/2 mouse driver is in 2.6 compiled into
-the kernel unconditionally, this means the USB drivers need to be
-compiled-in, too.
-
-Problem 2) can currently only be solved by either disabling HIGHMEM64G
-in the kernel config or USB Legacy support in the BIOS. A BIOS update
-could help, but so far no such update exists.
-
-Problem 3) is usually fixed by a BIOS update. Check the board
-manufacturers web site. If an update is not available, disable USB
-Legacy support in the BIOS. If this alone doesn't help, try also adding
-idle=poll on the kernel command line. The BIOS may be entering the SMM
-on the HLT instruction as well.
-
+++ /dev/null
-The additional fields in struct boot_params as a part of 32-bit boot
-protocol of kernel. These should be filled by bootloader or 16-bit
-real-mode setup code of the kernel. References/settings to it mainly
-are in:
-
- include/asm-x86/bootparam.h
-
-
-Offset Proto Name Meaning
-/Size
-
-000/040 ALL screen_info Text mode or frame buffer information
- (struct screen_info)
-040/014 ALL apm_bios_info APM BIOS information (struct apm_bios_info)
-060/010 ALL ist_info Intel SpeedStep (IST) BIOS support information
- (struct ist_info)
-080/010 ALL hd0_info hd0 disk parameter, OBSOLETE!!
-090/010 ALL hd1_info hd1 disk parameter, OBSOLETE!!
-0A0/010 ALL sys_desc_table System description table (struct sys_desc_table)
-140/080 ALL edid_info Video mode setup (struct edid_info)
-1C0/020 ALL efi_info EFI 32 information (struct efi_info)
-1E0/004 ALL alk_mem_k Alternative mem check, in KB
-1E4/004 ALL scratch Scratch field for the kernel setup code
-1E8/001 ALL e820_entries Number of entries in e820_map (below)
-1E9/001 ALL eddbuf_entries Number of entries in eddbuf (below)
-1EA/001 ALL edd_mbr_sig_buf_entries Number of entries in edd_mbr_sig_buffer
- (below)
-290/040 ALL edd_mbr_sig_buffer EDD MBR signatures
-2D0/A00 ALL e820_map E820 memory map table
- (array of struct e820entry)
-D00/1EC ALL eddbuf EDD data (array of struct edd_info)
--- /dev/null
+Most (all) Intel-MP compliant SMP boards have the so-called 'IO-APIC',
+which is an enhanced interrupt controller. It enables us to route
+hardware interrupts to multiple CPUs, or to CPU groups. Without an
+IO-APIC, interrupts from hardware will be delivered only to the
+CPU which boots the operating system (usually CPU#0).
+
+Linux supports all variants of compliant SMP boards, including ones with
+multiple IO-APICs. Multiple IO-APICs are used in high-end servers to
+distribute IRQ load further.
+
+There are (a few) known breakages in certain older boards, such bugs are
+usually worked around by the kernel. If your MP-compliant SMP board does
+not boot Linux, then consult the linux-smp mailing list archives first.
+
+If your box boots fine with enabled IO-APIC IRQs, then your
+/proc/interrupts will look like this one:
+
+ ---------------------------->
+ hell:~> cat /proc/interrupts
+ CPU0
+ 0: 1360293 IO-APIC-edge timer
+ 1: 4 IO-APIC-edge keyboard
+ 2: 0 XT-PIC cascade
+ 13: 1 XT-PIC fpu
+ 14: 1448 IO-APIC-edge ide0
+ 16: 28232 IO-APIC-level Intel EtherExpress Pro 10/100 Ethernet
+ 17: 51304 IO-APIC-level eth0
+ NMI: 0
+ ERR: 0
+ hell:~>
+ <----------------------------
+
+Some interrupts are still listed as 'XT PIC', but this is not a problem;
+none of those IRQ sources is performance-critical.
+
+
+In the unlikely case that your board does not create a working mp-table,
+you can use the pirq= boot parameter to 'hand-construct' IRQ entries. This
+is non-trivial though and cannot be automated. One sample /etc/lilo.conf
+entry:
+
+ append="pirq=15,11,10"
+
+The actual numbers depend on your system, on your PCI cards and on their
+PCI slot position. Usually PCI slots are 'daisy chained' before they are
+connected to the PCI chipset IRQ routing facility (the incoming PIRQ1-4
+lines):
+
+ ,-. ,-. ,-. ,-. ,-.
+ PIRQ4 ----| |-. ,-| |-. ,-| |-. ,-| |--------| |
+ |S| \ / |S| \ / |S| \ / |S| |S|
+ PIRQ3 ----|l|-. `/---|l|-. `/---|l|-. `/---|l|--------|l|
+ |o| \/ |o| \/ |o| \/ |o| |o|
+ PIRQ2 ----|t|-./`----|t|-./`----|t|-./`----|t|--------|t|
+ |1| /\ |2| /\ |3| /\ |4| |5|
+ PIRQ1 ----| |- `----| |- `----| |- `----| |--------| |
+ `-' `-' `-' `-' `-'
+
+Every PCI card emits a PCI IRQ, which can be INTA, INTB, INTC or INTD:
+
+ ,-.
+ INTD--| |
+ |S|
+ INTC--|l|
+ |o|
+ INTB--|t|
+ |x|
+ INTA--| |
+ `-'
+
+These INTA-D PCI IRQs are always 'local to the card', their real meaning
+depends on which slot they are in. If you look at the daisy chaining diagram,
+a card in slot4, issuing INTA IRQ, it will end up as a signal on PIRQ4 of
+the PCI chipset. Most cards issue INTA, this creates optimal distribution
+between the PIRQ lines. (distributing IRQ sources properly is not a
+necessity, PCI IRQs can be shared at will, but it's a good for performance
+to have non shared interrupts). Slot5 should be used for videocards, they
+do not use interrupts normally, thus they are not daisy chained either.
+
+so if you have your SCSI card (IRQ11) in Slot1, Tulip card (IRQ9) in
+Slot2, then you'll have to specify this pirq= line:
+
+ append="pirq=11,9"
+
+the following script tries to figure out such a default pirq= line from
+your PCI configuration:
+
+ echo -n pirq=; echo `scanpci | grep T_L | cut -c56-` | sed 's/ /,/g'
+
+note that this script wont work if you have skipped a few slots or if your
+board does not do default daisy-chaining. (or the IO-APIC has the PIRQ pins
+connected in some strange way). E.g. if in the above case you have your SCSI
+card (IRQ11) in Slot3, and have Slot1 empty:
+
+ append="pirq=0,9,11"
+
+[value '0' is a generic 'placeholder', reserved for empty (or non-IRQ emitting)
+slots.]
+
+Generally, it's always possible to find out the correct pirq= settings, just
+permute all IRQ numbers properly ... it will take some time though. An
+'incorrect' pirq line will cause the booting process to hang, or a device
+won't function properly (e.g. if it's inserted as a module).
+
+If you have 2 PCI buses, then you can use up to 8 pirq values, although such
+boards tend to have a good configuration.
+
+Be prepared that it might happen that you need some strange pirq line:
+
+ append="pirq=0,0,0,0,0,0,9,11"
+
+Use smart trial-and-error techniques to find out the correct pirq line ...
+
+Good luck and mail to linux-smp@vger.kernel.org or
+linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org if you have any problems that are not covered
+by this document.
+
+-- mingo
+
--- /dev/null
+ THE LINUX/x86 BOOT PROTOCOL
+ ---------------------------
+
+On the x86 platform, the Linux kernel uses a rather complicated boot
+convention. This has evolved partially due to historical aspects, as
+well as the desire in the early days to have the kernel itself be a
+bootable image, the complicated PC memory model and due to changed
+expectations in the PC industry caused by the effective demise of
+real-mode DOS as a mainstream operating system.
+
+Currently, the following versions of the Linux/x86 boot protocol exist.
+
+Old kernels: zImage/Image support only. Some very early kernels
+ may not even support a command line.
+
+Protocol 2.00: (Kernel 1.3.73) Added bzImage and initrd support, as
+ well as a formalized way to communicate between the
+ boot loader and the kernel. setup.S made relocatable,
+ although the traditional setup area still assumed
+ writable.
+
+Protocol 2.01: (Kernel 1.3.76) Added a heap overrun warning.
+
+Protocol 2.02: (Kernel 2.4.0-test3-pre3) New command line protocol.
+ Lower the conventional memory ceiling. No overwrite
+ of the traditional setup area, thus making booting
+ safe for systems which use the EBDA from SMM or 32-bit
+ BIOS entry points. zImage deprecated but still
+ supported.
+
+Protocol 2.03: (Kernel 2.4.18-pre1) Explicitly makes the highest possible
+ initrd address available to the bootloader.
+
+Protocol 2.04: (Kernel 2.6.14) Extend the syssize field to four bytes.
+
+Protocol 2.05: (Kernel 2.6.20) Make protected mode kernel relocatable.
+ Introduce relocatable_kernel and kernel_alignment fields.
+
+Protocol 2.06: (Kernel 2.6.22) Added a field that contains the size of
+ the boot command line.
+
+Protocol 2.07: (Kernel 2.6.24) Added paravirtualised boot protocol.
+ Introduced hardware_subarch and hardware_subarch_data
+ and KEEP_SEGMENTS flag in load_flags.
+
+Protocol 2.08: (Kernel 2.6.26) Added crc32 checksum and ELF format
+ payload. Introduced payload_offset and payload length
+ fields to aid in locating the payload.
+
+Protocol 2.09: (Kernel 2.6.26) Added a field of 64-bit physical
+ pointer to single linked list of struct setup_data.
+
+**** MEMORY LAYOUT
+
+The traditional memory map for the kernel loader, used for Image or
+zImage kernels, typically looks like:
+
+ | |
+0A0000 +------------------------+
+ | Reserved for BIOS | Do not use. Reserved for BIOS EBDA.
+09A000 +------------------------+
+ | Command line |
+ | Stack/heap | For use by the kernel real-mode code.
+098000 +------------------------+
+ | Kernel setup | The kernel real-mode code.
+090200 +------------------------+
+ | Kernel boot sector | The kernel legacy boot sector.
+090000 +------------------------+
+ | Protected-mode kernel | The bulk of the kernel image.
+010000 +------------------------+
+ | Boot loader | <- Boot sector entry point 0000:7C00
+001000 +------------------------+
+ | Reserved for MBR/BIOS |
+000800 +------------------------+
+ | Typically used by MBR |
+000600 +------------------------+
+ | BIOS use only |
+000000 +------------------------+
+
+
+When using bzImage, the protected-mode kernel was relocated to
+0x100000 ("high memory"), and the kernel real-mode block (boot sector,
+setup, and stack/heap) was made relocatable to any address between
+0x10000 and end of low memory. Unfortunately, in protocols 2.00 and
+2.01 the 0x90000+ memory range is still used internally by the kernel;
+the 2.02 protocol resolves that problem.
+
+It is desirable to keep the "memory ceiling" -- the highest point in
+low memory touched by the boot loader -- as low as possible, since
+some newer BIOSes have begun to allocate some rather large amounts of
+memory, called the Extended BIOS Data Area, near the top of low
+memory. The boot loader should use the "INT 12h" BIOS call to verify
+how much low memory is available.
+
+Unfortunately, if INT 12h reports that the amount of memory is too
+low, there is usually nothing the boot loader can do but to report an
+error to the user. The boot loader should therefore be designed to
+take up as little space in low memory as it reasonably can. For
+zImage or old bzImage kernels, which need data written into the
+0x90000 segment, the boot loader should make sure not to use memory
+above the 0x9A000 point; too many BIOSes will break above that point.
+
+For a modern bzImage kernel with boot protocol version >= 2.02, a
+memory layout like the following is suggested:
+
+ ~ ~
+ | Protected-mode kernel |
+100000 +------------------------+
+ | I/O memory hole |
+0A0000 +------------------------+
+ | Reserved for BIOS | Leave as much as possible unused
+ ~ ~
+ | Command line | (Can also be below the X+10000 mark)
+X+10000 +------------------------+
+ | Stack/heap | For use by the kernel real-mode code.
+X+08000 +------------------------+
+ | Kernel setup | The kernel real-mode code.
+ | Kernel boot sector | The kernel legacy boot sector.
+X +------------------------+
+ | Boot loader | <- Boot sector entry point 0000:7C00
+001000 +------------------------+
+ | Reserved for MBR/BIOS |
+000800 +------------------------+
+ | Typically used by MBR |
+000600 +------------------------+
+ | BIOS use only |
+000000 +------------------------+
+
+... where the address X is as low as the design of the boot loader
+permits.
+
+
+**** THE REAL-MODE KERNEL HEADER
+
+In the following text, and anywhere in the kernel boot sequence, "a
+sector" refers to 512 bytes. It is independent of the actual sector
+size of the underlying medium.
+
+The first step in loading a Linux kernel should be to load the
+real-mode code (boot sector and setup code) and then examine the
+following header at offset 0x01f1. The real-mode code can total up to
+32K, although the boot loader may choose to load only the first two
+sectors (1K) and then examine the bootup sector size.
+
+The header looks like:
+
+Offset Proto Name Meaning
+/Size
+
+01F1/1 ALL(1 setup_sects The size of the setup in sectors
+01F2/2 ALL root_flags If set, the root is mounted readonly
+01F4/4 2.04+(2 syssize The size of the 32-bit code in 16-byte paras
+01F8/2 ALL ram_size DO NOT USE - for bootsect.S use only
+01FA/2 ALL vid_mode Video mode control
+01FC/2 ALL root_dev Default root device number
+01FE/2 ALL boot_flag 0xAA55 magic number
+0200/2 2.00+ jump Jump instruction
+0202/4 2.00+ header Magic signature "HdrS"
+0206/2 2.00+ version Boot protocol version supported
+0208/4 2.00+ realmode_swtch Boot loader hook (see below)
+020C/2 2.00+ start_sys The load-low segment (0x1000) (obsolete)
+020E/2 2.00+ kernel_version Pointer to kernel version string
+0210/1 2.00+ type_of_loader Boot loader identifier
+0211/1 2.00+ loadflags Boot protocol option flags
+0212/2 2.00+ setup_move_size Move to high memory size (used with hooks)
+0214/4 2.00+ code32_start Boot loader hook (see below)
+0218/4 2.00+ ramdisk_image initrd load address (set by boot loader)
+021C/4 2.00+ ramdisk_size initrd size (set by boot loader)
+0220/4 2.00+ bootsect_kludge DO NOT USE - for bootsect.S use only
+0224/2 2.01+ heap_end_ptr Free memory after setup end
+0226/2 N/A pad1 Unused
+0228/4 2.02+ cmd_line_ptr 32-bit pointer to the kernel command line
+022C/4 2.03+ initrd_addr_max Highest legal initrd address
+0230/4 2.05+ kernel_alignment Physical addr alignment required for kernel
+0234/1 2.05+ relocatable_kernel Whether kernel is relocatable or not
+0235/3 N/A pad2 Unused
+0238/4 2.06+ cmdline_size Maximum size of the kernel command line
+023C/4 2.07+ hardware_subarch Hardware subarchitecture
+0240/8 2.07+ hardware_subarch_data Subarchitecture-specific data
+0248/4 2.08+ payload_offset Offset of kernel payload
+024C/4 2.08+ payload_length Length of kernel payload
+0250/8 2.09+ setup_data 64-bit physical pointer to linked list
+ of struct setup_data
+
+(1) For backwards compatibility, if the setup_sects field contains 0, the
+ real value is 4.
+
+(2) For boot protocol prior to 2.04, the upper two bytes of the syssize
+ field are unusable, which means the size of a bzImage kernel
+ cannot be determined.
+
+If the "HdrS" (0x53726448) magic number is not found at offset 0x202,
+the boot protocol version is "old". Loading an old kernel, the
+following parameters should be assumed:
+
+ Image type = zImage
+ initrd not supported
+ Real-mode kernel must be located at 0x90000.
+
+Otherwise, the "version" field contains the protocol version,
+e.g. protocol version 2.01 will contain 0x0201 in this field. When
+setting fields in the header, you must make sure only to set fields
+supported by the protocol version in use.
+
+
+**** DETAILS OF HEADER FIELDS
+
+For each field, some are information from the kernel to the bootloader
+("read"), some are expected to be filled out by the bootloader
+("write"), and some are expected to be read and modified by the
+bootloader ("modify").
+
+All general purpose boot loaders should write the fields marked
+(obligatory). Boot loaders who want to load the kernel at a
+nonstandard address should fill in the fields marked (reloc); other
+boot loaders can ignore those fields.
+
+The byte order of all fields is littleendian (this is x86, after all.)
+
+Field name: setup_sects
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x1f1/1
+Protocol: ALL
+
+ The size of the setup code in 512-byte sectors. If this field is
+ 0, the real value is 4. The real-mode code consists of the boot
+ sector (always one 512-byte sector) plus the setup code.
+
+Field name: root_flags
+Type: modify (optional)
+Offset/size: 0x1f2/2
+Protocol: ALL
+
+ If this field is nonzero, the root defaults to readonly. The use of
+ this field is deprecated; use the "ro" or "rw" options on the
+ command line instead.
+
+Field name: syssize
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x1f4/4 (protocol 2.04+) 0x1f4/2 (protocol ALL)
+Protocol: 2.04+
+
+ The size of the protected-mode code in units of 16-byte paragraphs.
+ For protocol versions older than 2.04 this field is only two bytes
+ wide, and therefore cannot be trusted for the size of a kernel if
+ the LOAD_HIGH flag is set.
+
+Field name: ram_size
+Type: kernel internal
+Offset/size: 0x1f8/2
+Protocol: ALL
+
+ This field is obsolete.
+
+Field name: vid_mode
+Type: modify (obligatory)
+Offset/size: 0x1fa/2
+
+ Please see the section on SPECIAL COMMAND LINE OPTIONS.
+
+Field name: root_dev
+Type: modify (optional)
+Offset/size: 0x1fc/2
+Protocol: ALL
+
+ The default root device device number. The use of this field is
+ deprecated, use the "root=" option on the command line instead.
+
+Field name: boot_flag
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x1fe/2
+Protocol: ALL
+
+ Contains 0xAA55. This is the closest thing old Linux kernels have
+ to a magic number.
+
+Field name: jump
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x200/2
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ Contains an x86 jump instruction, 0xEB followed by a signed offset
+ relative to byte 0x202. This can be used to determine the size of
+ the header.
+
+Field name: header
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x202/4
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ Contains the magic number "HdrS" (0x53726448).
+
+Field name: version
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x206/2
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ Contains the boot protocol version, in (major << 8)+minor format,
+ e.g. 0x0204 for version 2.04, and 0x0a11 for a hypothetical version
+ 10.17.
+
+Field name: readmode_swtch
+Type: modify (optional)
+Offset/size: 0x208/4
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ Boot loader hook (see ADVANCED BOOT LOADER HOOKS below.)
+
+Field name: start_sys
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x20c/4
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ The load low segment (0x1000). Obsolete.
+
+Field name: kernel_version
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x20e/2
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ If set to a nonzero value, contains a pointer to a NUL-terminated
+ human-readable kernel version number string, less 0x200. This can
+ be used to display the kernel version to the user. This value
+ should be less than (0x200*setup_sects).
+
+ For example, if this value is set to 0x1c00, the kernel version
+ number string can be found at offset 0x1e00 in the kernel file.
+ This is a valid value if and only if the "setup_sects" field
+ contains the value 15 or higher, as:
+
+ 0x1c00 < 15*0x200 (= 0x1e00) but
+ 0x1c00 >= 14*0x200 (= 0x1c00)
+
+ 0x1c00 >> 9 = 14, so the minimum value for setup_secs is 15.
+
+Field name: type_of_loader
+Type: write (obligatory)
+Offset/size: 0x210/1
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ If your boot loader has an assigned id (see table below), enter
+ 0xTV here, where T is an identifier for the boot loader and V is
+ a version number. Otherwise, enter 0xFF here.
+
+ Assigned boot loader ids:
+ 0 LILO (0x00 reserved for pre-2.00 bootloader)
+ 1 Loadlin
+ 2 bootsect-loader (0x20, all other values reserved)
+ 3 SYSLINUX
+ 4 EtherBoot
+ 5 ELILO
+ 7 GRuB
+ 8 U-BOOT
+ 9 Xen
+ A Gujin
+ B Qemu
+
+ Please contact <hpa@zytor.com> if you need a bootloader ID
+ value assigned.
+
+Field name: loadflags
+Type: modify (obligatory)
+Offset/size: 0x211/1
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ This field is a bitmask.
+
+ Bit 0 (read): LOADED_HIGH
+ - If 0, the protected-mode code is loaded at 0x10000.
+ - If 1, the protected-mode code is loaded at 0x100000.
+
+ Bit 5 (write): QUIET_FLAG
+ - If 0, print early messages.
+ - If 1, suppress early messages.
+ This requests to the kernel (decompressor and early
+ kernel) to not write early messages that require
+ accessing the display hardware directly.
+
+ Bit 6 (write): KEEP_SEGMENTS
+ Protocol: 2.07+
+ - If 0, reload the segment registers in the 32bit entry point.
+ - If 1, do not reload the segment registers in the 32bit entry point.
+ Assume that %cs %ds %ss %es are all set to flat segments with
+ a base of 0 (or the equivalent for their environment).
+
+ Bit 7 (write): CAN_USE_HEAP
+ Set this bit to 1 to indicate that the value entered in the
+ heap_end_ptr is valid. If this field is clear, some setup code
+ functionality will be disabled.
+
+Field name: setup_move_size
+Type: modify (obligatory)
+Offset/size: 0x212/2
+Protocol: 2.00-2.01
+
+ When using protocol 2.00 or 2.01, if the real mode kernel is not
+ loaded at 0x90000, it gets moved there later in the loading
+ sequence. Fill in this field if you want additional data (such as
+ the kernel command line) moved in addition to the real-mode kernel
+ itself.
+
+ The unit is bytes starting with the beginning of the boot sector.
+
+ This field is can be ignored when the protocol is 2.02 or higher, or
+ if the real-mode code is loaded at 0x90000.
+
+Field name: code32_start
+Type: modify (optional, reloc)
+Offset/size: 0x214/4
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ The address to jump to in protected mode. This defaults to the load
+ address of the kernel, and can be used by the boot loader to
+ determine the proper load address.
+
+ This field can be modified for two purposes:
+
+ 1. as a boot loader hook (see ADVANCED BOOT LOADER HOOKS below.)
+
+ 2. if a bootloader which does not install a hook loads a
+ relocatable kernel at a nonstandard address it will have to modify
+ this field to point to the load address.
+
+Field name: ramdisk_image
+Type: write (obligatory)
+Offset/size: 0x218/4
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ The 32-bit linear address of the initial ramdisk or ramfs. Leave at
+ zero if there is no initial ramdisk/ramfs.
+
+Field name: ramdisk_size
+Type: write (obligatory)
+Offset/size: 0x21c/4
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ Size of the initial ramdisk or ramfs. Leave at zero if there is no
+ initial ramdisk/ramfs.
+
+Field name: bootsect_kludge
+Type: kernel internal
+Offset/size: 0x220/4
+Protocol: 2.00+
+
+ This field is obsolete.
+
+Field name: heap_end_ptr
+Type: write (obligatory)
+Offset/size: 0x224/2
+Protocol: 2.01+
+
+ Set this field to the offset (from the beginning of the real-mode
+ code) of the end of the setup stack/heap, minus 0x0200.
+
+Field name: cmd_line_ptr
+Type: write (obligatory)
+Offset/size: 0x228/4
+Protocol: 2.02+
+
+ Set this field to the linear address of the kernel command line.
+ The kernel command line can be located anywhere between the end of
+ the setup heap and 0xA0000; it does not have to be located in the
+ same 64K segment as the real-mode code itself.
+
+ Fill in this field even if your boot loader does not support a
+ command line, in which case you can point this to an empty string
+ (or better yet, to the string "auto".) If this field is left at
+ zero, the kernel will assume that your boot loader does not support
+ the 2.02+ protocol.
+
+Field name: initrd_addr_max
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x22c/4
+Protocol: 2.03+
+
+ The maximum address that may be occupied by the initial
+ ramdisk/ramfs contents. For boot protocols 2.02 or earlier, this
+ field is not present, and the maximum address is 0x37FFFFFF. (This
+ address is defined as the address of the highest safe byte, so if
+ your ramdisk is exactly 131072 bytes long and this field is
+ 0x37FFFFFF, you can start your ramdisk at 0x37FE0000.)
+
+Field name: kernel_alignment
+Type: read (reloc)
+Offset/size: 0x230/4
+Protocol: 2.05+
+
+ Alignment unit required by the kernel (if relocatable_kernel is true.)
+
+Field name: relocatable_kernel
+Type: read (reloc)
+Offset/size: 0x234/1
+Protocol: 2.05+
+
+ If this field is nonzero, the protected-mode part of the kernel can
+ be loaded at any address that satisfies the kernel_alignment field.
+ After loading, the boot loader must set the code32_start field to
+ point to the loaded code, or to a boot loader hook.
+
+Field name: cmdline_size
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x238/4
+Protocol: 2.06+
+
+ The maximum size of the command line without the terminating
+ zero. This means that the command line can contain at most
+ cmdline_size characters. With protocol version 2.05 and earlier, the
+ maximum size was 255.
+
+Field name: hardware_subarch
+Type: write (optional, defaults to x86/PC)
+Offset/size: 0x23c/4
+Protocol: 2.07+
+
+ In a paravirtualized environment the hardware low level architectural
+ pieces such as interrupt handling, page table handling, and
+ accessing process control registers needs to be done differently.
+
+ This field allows the bootloader to inform the kernel we are in one
+ one of those environments.
+
+ 0x00000000 The default x86/PC environment
+ 0x00000001 lguest
+ 0x00000002 Xen
+
+Field name: hardware_subarch_data
+Type: write (subarch-dependent)
+Offset/size: 0x240/8
+Protocol: 2.07+
+
+ A pointer to data that is specific to hardware subarch
+ This field is currently unused for the default x86/PC environment,
+ do not modify.
+
+Field name: payload_offset
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x248/4
+Protocol: 2.08+
+
+ If non-zero then this field contains the offset from the end of the
+ real-mode code to the payload.
+
+ The payload may be compressed. The format of both the compressed and
+ uncompressed data should be determined using the standard magic
+ numbers. Currently only gzip compressed ELF is used.
+
+Field name: payload_length
+Type: read
+Offset/size: 0x24c/4
+Protocol: 2.08+
+
+ The length of the payload.
+
+Field name: setup_data
+Type: write (special)
+Offset/size: 0x250/8
+Protocol: 2.09+
+
+ The 64-bit physical pointer to NULL terminated single linked list of
+ struct setup_data. This is used to define a more extensible boot
+ parameters passing mechanism. The definition of struct setup_data is
+ as follow:
+
+ struct setup_data {
+ u64 next;
+ u32 type;
+ u32 len;
+ u8 data[0];
+ };
+
+ Where, the next is a 64-bit physical pointer to the next node of
+ linked list, the next field of the last node is 0; the type is used
+ to identify the contents of data; the len is the length of data
+ field; the data holds the real payload.
+
+ This list may be modified at a number of points during the bootup
+ process. Therefore, when modifying this list one should always make
+ sure to consider the case where the linked list already contains
+ entries.
+
+
+**** THE IMAGE CHECKSUM
+
+From boot protocol version 2.08 onwards the CRC-32 is calculated over
+the entire file using the characteristic polynomial 0x04C11DB7 and an
+initial remainder of 0xffffffff. The checksum is appended to the
+file; therefore the CRC of the file up to the limit specified in the
+syssize field of the header is always 0.
+
+
+**** THE KERNEL COMMAND LINE
+
+The kernel command line has become an important way for the boot
+loader to communicate with the kernel. Some of its options are also
+relevant to the boot loader itself, see "special command line options"
+below.
+
+The kernel command line is a null-terminated string. The maximum
+length can be retrieved from the field cmdline_size. Before protocol
+version 2.06, the maximum was 255 characters. A string that is too
+long will be automatically truncated by the kernel.
+
+If the boot protocol version is 2.02 or later, the address of the
+kernel command line is given by the header field cmd_line_ptr (see
+above.) This address can be anywhere between the end of the setup
+heap and 0xA0000.
+
+If the protocol version is *not* 2.02 or higher, the kernel
+command line is entered using the following protocol:
+
+ At offset 0x0020 (word), "cmd_line_magic", enter the magic
+ number 0xA33F.
+
+ At offset 0x0022 (word), "cmd_line_offset", enter the offset
+ of the kernel command line (relative to the start of the
+ real-mode kernel).
+
+ The kernel command line *must* be within the memory region
+ covered by setup_move_size, so you may need to adjust this
+ field.
+
+
+**** MEMORY LAYOUT OF THE REAL-MODE CODE
+
+The real-mode code requires a stack/heap to be set up, as well as
+memory allocated for the kernel command line. This needs to be done
+in the real-mode accessible memory in bottom megabyte.
+
+It should be noted that modern machines often have a sizable Extended
+BIOS Data Area (EBDA). As a result, it is advisable to use as little
+of the low megabyte as possible.
+
+Unfortunately, under the following circumstances the 0x90000 memory
+segment has to be used:
+
+ - When loading a zImage kernel ((loadflags & 0x01) == 0).
+ - When loading a 2.01 or earlier boot protocol kernel.
+
+ -> For the 2.00 and 2.01 boot protocols, the real-mode code
+ can be loaded at another address, but it is internally
+ relocated to 0x90000. For the "old" protocol, the
+ real-mode code must be loaded at 0x90000.
+
+When loading at 0x90000, avoid using memory above 0x9a000.
+
+For boot protocol 2.02 or higher, the command line does not have to be
+located in the same 64K segment as the real-mode setup code; it is
+thus permitted to give the stack/heap the full 64K segment and locate
+the command line above it.
+
+The kernel command line should not be located below the real-mode
+code, nor should it be located in high memory.
+
+
+**** SAMPLE BOOT CONFIGURATION
+
+As a sample configuration, assume the following layout of the real
+mode segment:
+
+ When loading below 0x90000, use the entire segment:
+
+ 0x0000-0x7fff Real mode kernel
+ 0x8000-0xdfff Stack and heap
+ 0xe000-0xffff Kernel command line
+
+ When loading at 0x90000 OR the protocol version is 2.01 or earlier:
+
+ 0x0000-0x7fff Real mode kernel
+ 0x8000-0x97ff Stack and heap
+ 0x9800-0x9fff Kernel command line
+
+Such a boot loader should enter the following fields in the header:
+
+ unsigned long base_ptr; /* base address for real-mode segment */
+
+ if ( setup_sects == 0 ) {
+ setup_sects = 4;
+ }
+
+ if ( protocol >= 0x0200 ) {
+ type_of_loader = <type code>;
+ if ( loading_initrd ) {
+ ramdisk_image = <initrd_address>;
+ ramdisk_size = <initrd_size>;
+ }
+
+ if ( protocol >= 0x0202 && loadflags & 0x01 )
+ heap_end = 0xe000;
+ else
+ heap_end = 0x9800;
+
+ if ( protocol >= 0x0201 ) {
+ heap_end_ptr = heap_end - 0x200;
+ loadflags |= 0x80; /* CAN_USE_HEAP */
+ }
+
+ if ( protocol >= 0x0202 ) {
+ cmd_line_ptr = base_ptr + heap_end;
+ strcpy(cmd_line_ptr, cmdline);
+ } else {
+ cmd_line_magic = 0xA33F;
+ cmd_line_offset = heap_end;
+ setup_move_size = heap_end + strlen(cmdline)+1;
+ strcpy(base_ptr+cmd_line_offset, cmdline);
+ }
+ } else {
+ /* Very old kernel */
+
+ heap_end = 0x9800;
+
+ cmd_line_magic = 0xA33F;
+ cmd_line_offset = heap_end;
+
+ /* A very old kernel MUST have its real-mode code
+ loaded at 0x90000 */
+
+ if ( base_ptr != 0x90000 ) {
+ /* Copy the real-mode kernel */
+ memcpy(0x90000, base_ptr, (setup_sects+1)*512);
+ base_ptr = 0x90000; /* Relocated */
+ }
+
+ strcpy(0x90000+cmd_line_offset, cmdline);
+
+ /* It is recommended to clear memory up to the 32K mark */
+ memset(0x90000 + (setup_sects+1)*512, 0,
+ (64-(setup_sects+1))*512);
+ }
+
+
+**** LOADING THE REST OF THE KERNEL
+
+The 32-bit (non-real-mode) kernel starts at offset (setup_sects+1)*512
+in the kernel file (again, if setup_sects == 0 the real value is 4.)
+It should be loaded at address 0x10000 for Image/zImage kernels and
+0x100000 for bzImage kernels.
+
+The kernel is a bzImage kernel if the protocol >= 2.00 and the 0x01
+bit (LOAD_HIGH) in the loadflags field is set:
+
+ is_bzImage = (protocol >= 0x0200) && (loadflags & 0x01);
+ load_address = is_bzImage ? 0x100000 : 0x10000;
+
+Note that Image/zImage kernels can be up to 512K in size, and thus use
+the entire 0x10000-0x90000 range of memory. This means it is pretty
+much a requirement for these kernels to load the real-mode part at
+0x90000. bzImage kernels allow much more flexibility.
+
+
+**** SPECIAL COMMAND LINE OPTIONS
+
+If the command line provided by the boot loader is entered by the
+user, the user may expect the following command line options to work.
+They should normally not be deleted from the kernel command line even
+though not all of them are actually meaningful to the kernel. Boot
+loader authors who need additional command line options for the boot
+loader itself should get them registered in
+Documentation/kernel-parameters.txt to make sure they will not
+conflict with actual kernel options now or in the future.
+
+ vga=<mode>
+ <mode> here is either an integer (in C notation, either
+ decimal, octal, or hexadecimal) or one of the strings
+ "normal" (meaning 0xFFFF), "ext" (meaning 0xFFFE) or "ask"
+ (meaning 0xFFFD). This value should be entered into the
+ vid_mode field, as it is used by the kernel before the command
+ line is parsed.
+
+ mem=<size>
+ <size> is an integer in C notation optionally followed by
+ (case insensitive) K, M, G, T, P or E (meaning << 10, << 20,
+ << 30, << 40, << 50 or << 60). This specifies the end of
+ memory to the kernel. This affects the possible placement of
+ an initrd, since an initrd should be placed near end of
+ memory. Note that this is an option to *both* the kernel and
+ the bootloader!
+
+ initrd=<file>
+ An initrd should be loaded. The meaning of <file> is
+ obviously bootloader-dependent, and some boot loaders
+ (e.g. LILO) do not have such a command.
+
+In addition, some boot loaders add the following options to the
+user-specified command line:
+
+ BOOT_IMAGE=<file>
+ The boot image which was loaded. Again, the meaning of <file>
+ is obviously bootloader-dependent.
+
+ auto
+ The kernel was booted without explicit user intervention.
+
+If these options are added by the boot loader, it is highly
+recommended that they are located *first*, before the user-specified
+or configuration-specified command line. Otherwise, "init=/bin/sh"
+gets confused by the "auto" option.
+
+
+**** RUNNING THE KERNEL
+
+The kernel is started by jumping to the kernel entry point, which is
+located at *segment* offset 0x20 from the start of the real mode
+kernel. This means that if you loaded your real-mode kernel code at
+0x90000, the kernel entry point is 9020:0000.
+
+At entry, ds = es = ss should point to the start of the real-mode
+kernel code (0x9000 if the code is loaded at 0x90000), sp should be
+set up properly, normally pointing to the top of the heap, and
+interrupts should be disabled. Furthermore, to guard against bugs in
+the kernel, it is recommended that the boot loader sets fs = gs = ds =
+es = ss.
+
+In our example from above, we would do:
+
+ /* Note: in the case of the "old" kernel protocol, base_ptr must
+ be == 0x90000 at this point; see the previous sample code */
+
+ seg = base_ptr >> 4;
+
+ cli(); /* Enter with interrupts disabled! */
+
+ /* Set up the real-mode kernel stack */
+ _SS = seg;
+ _SP = heap_end;
+
+ _DS = _ES = _FS = _GS = seg;
+ jmp_far(seg+0x20, 0); /* Run the kernel */
+
+If your boot sector accesses a floppy drive, it is recommended to
+switch off the floppy motor before running the kernel, since the
+kernel boot leaves interrupts off and thus the motor will not be
+switched off, especially if the loaded kernel has the floppy driver as
+a demand-loaded module!
+
+
+**** ADVANCED BOOT LOADER HOOKS
+
+If the boot loader runs in a particularly hostile environment (such as
+LOADLIN, which runs under DOS) it may be impossible to follow the
+standard memory location requirements. Such a boot loader may use the
+following hooks that, if set, are invoked by the kernel at the
+appropriate time. The use of these hooks should probably be
+considered an absolutely last resort!
+
+IMPORTANT: All the hooks are required to preserve %esp, %ebp, %esi and
+%edi across invocation.
+
+ realmode_swtch:
+ A 16-bit real mode far subroutine invoked immediately before
+ entering protected mode. The default routine disables NMI, so
+ your routine should probably do so, too.
+
+ code32_start:
+ A 32-bit flat-mode routine *jumped* to immediately after the
+ transition to protected mode, but before the kernel is
+ uncompressed. No segments, except CS, are guaranteed to be
+ set up (current kernels do, but older ones do not); you should
+ set them up to BOOT_DS (0x18) yourself.
+
+ After completing your hook, you should jump to the address
+ that was in this field before your boot loader overwrote it
+ (relocated, if appropriate.)
+
+
+**** 32-bit BOOT PROTOCOL
+
+For machine with some new BIOS other than legacy BIOS, such as EFI,
+LinuxBIOS, etc, and kexec, the 16-bit real mode setup code in kernel
+based on legacy BIOS can not be used, so a 32-bit boot protocol needs
+to be defined.
+
+In 32-bit boot protocol, the first step in loading a Linux kernel
+should be to setup the boot parameters (struct boot_params,
+traditionally known as "zero page"). The memory for struct boot_params
+should be allocated and initialized to all zero. Then the setup header
+from offset 0x01f1 of kernel image on should be loaded into struct
+boot_params and examined. The end of setup header can be calculated as
+follow:
+
+ 0x0202 + byte value at offset 0x0201
+
+In addition to read/modify/write the setup header of the struct
+boot_params as that of 16-bit boot protocol, the boot loader should
+also fill the additional fields of the struct boot_params as that
+described in zero-page.txt.
+
+After setupping the struct boot_params, the boot loader can load the
+32/64-bit kernel in the same way as that of 16-bit boot protocol.
+
+In 32-bit boot protocol, the kernel is started by jumping to the
+32-bit kernel entry point, which is the start address of loaded
+32/64-bit kernel.
+
+At entry, the CPU must be in 32-bit protected mode with paging
+disabled; a GDT must be loaded with the descriptors for selectors
+__BOOT_CS(0x10) and __BOOT_DS(0x18); both descriptors must be 4G flat
+segment; __BOOS_CS must have execute/read permission, and __BOOT_DS
+must have read/write permission; CS must be __BOOT_CS and DS, ES, SS
+must be __BOOT_DS; interrupt must be disabled; %esi must hold the base
+address of the struct boot_params; %ebp, %edi and %ebx must be zero.
--- /dev/null
+USB Legacy support
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+Vojtech Pavlik <vojtech@suse.cz>, January 2004
+
+
+Also known as "USB Keyboard" or "USB Mouse support" in the BIOS Setup is a
+feature that allows one to use the USB mouse and keyboard as if they were
+their classic PS/2 counterparts. This means one can use an USB keyboard to
+type in LILO for example.
+
+It has several drawbacks, though:
+
+1) On some machines, the emulated PS/2 mouse takes over even when no USB
+ mouse is present and a real PS/2 mouse is present. In that case the extra
+ features (wheel, extra buttons, touchpad mode) of the real PS/2 mouse may
+ not be available.
+
+2) If CONFIG_HIGHMEM64G is enabled, the PS/2 mouse emulation can cause
+ system crashes, because the SMM BIOS is not expecting to be in PAE mode.
+ The Intel E7505 is a typical machine where this happens.
+
+3) If AMD64 64-bit mode is enabled, again system crashes often happen,
+ because the SMM BIOS isn't expecting the CPU to be in 64-bit mode. The
+ BIOS manufacturers only test with Windows, and Windows doesn't do 64-bit
+ yet.
+
+Solutions:
+
+Problem 1) can be solved by loading the USB drivers prior to loading the
+PS/2 mouse driver. Since the PS/2 mouse driver is in 2.6 compiled into
+the kernel unconditionally, this means the USB drivers need to be
+compiled-in, too.
+
+Problem 2) can currently only be solved by either disabling HIGHMEM64G
+in the kernel config or USB Legacy support in the BIOS. A BIOS update
+could help, but so far no such update exists.
+
+Problem 3) is usually fixed by a BIOS update. Check the board
+manufacturers web site. If an update is not available, disable USB
+Legacy support in the BIOS. If this alone doesn't help, try also adding
+idle=poll on the kernel command line. The BIOS may be entering the SMM
+on the HLT instruction as well.
+
--- /dev/null
+The additional fields in struct boot_params as a part of 32-bit boot
+protocol of kernel. These should be filled by bootloader or 16-bit
+real-mode setup code of the kernel. References/settings to it mainly
+are in:
+
+ include/asm-x86/bootparam.h
+
+
+Offset Proto Name Meaning
+/Size
+
+000/040 ALL screen_info Text mode or frame buffer information
+ (struct screen_info)
+040/014 ALL apm_bios_info APM BIOS information (struct apm_bios_info)
+060/010 ALL ist_info Intel SpeedStep (IST) BIOS support information
+ (struct ist_info)
+080/010 ALL hd0_info hd0 disk parameter, OBSOLETE!!
+090/010 ALL hd1_info hd1 disk parameter, OBSOLETE!!
+0A0/010 ALL sys_desc_table System description table (struct sys_desc_table)
+140/080 ALL edid_info Video mode setup (struct edid_info)
+1C0/020 ALL efi_info EFI 32 information (struct efi_info)
+1E0/004 ALL alk_mem_k Alternative mem check, in KB
+1E4/004 ALL scratch Scratch field for the kernel setup code
+1E8/001 ALL e820_entries Number of entries in e820_map (below)
+1E9/001 ALL eddbuf_entries Number of entries in eddbuf (below)
+1EA/001 ALL edd_mbr_sig_buf_entries Number of entries in edd_mbr_sig_buffer
+ (below)
+290/040 ALL edd_mbr_sig_buffer EDD MBR signatures
+2D0/A00 ALL e820_map E820 memory map table
+ (array of struct e820entry)
+D00/1EC ALL eddbuf EDD data (array of struct edd_info)
--- /dev/null
+00-INDEX
+ - This file
+boot-options.txt
+ - AMD64-specific boot options.
+cpu-hotplug-spec
+ - Firmware support for CPU hotplug under Linux/x86-64
+fake-numa-for-cpusets
+ - Using numa=fake and CPUSets for Resource Management
+kernel-stacks
+ - Context-specific per-processor interrupt stacks.
+machinecheck
+ - Configurable sysfs parameters for the x86-64 machine check code.
+mm.txt
+ - Memory layout of x86-64 (4 level page tables, 46 bits physical).
+uefi.txt
+ - Booting Linux via Unified Extensible Firmware Interface.
--- /dev/null
+AMD64 specific boot options
+
+There are many others (usually documented in driver documentation), but
+only the AMD64 specific ones are listed here.
+
+Machine check
+
+ mce=off disable machine check
+ mce=bootlog Enable logging of machine checks left over from booting.
+ Disabled by default on AMD because some BIOS leave bogus ones.
+ If your BIOS doesn't do that it's a good idea to enable though
+ to make sure you log even machine check events that result
+ in a reboot. On Intel systems it is enabled by default.
+ mce=nobootlog
+ Disable boot machine check logging.
+ mce=tolerancelevel (number)
+ 0: always panic on uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
+ 1: panic or SIGBUS on uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
+ 2: SIGBUS or log uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
+ 3: never panic or SIGBUS, log all errors (for testing only)
+ Default is 1
+ Can be also set using sysfs which is preferable.
+
+ nomce (for compatibility with i386): same as mce=off
+
+ Everything else is in sysfs now.
+
+APICs
+
+ apic Use IO-APIC. Default
+
+ noapic Don't use the IO-APIC.
+
+ disableapic Don't use the local APIC
+
+ nolapic Don't use the local APIC (alias for i386 compatibility)
+
+ pirq=... See Documentation/i386/IO-APIC.txt
+
+ noapictimer Don't set up the APIC timer
+
+ no_timer_check Don't check the IO-APIC timer. This can work around
+ problems with incorrect timer initialization on some boards.
+
+ apicmaintimer Run time keeping from the local APIC timer instead
+ of using the PIT/HPET interrupt for this. This is useful
+ when the PIT/HPET interrupts are unreliable.
+
+ noapicmaintimer Don't do time keeping using the APIC timer.
+ Useful when this option was auto selected, but doesn't work.
+
+ apicpmtimer
+ Do APIC timer calibration using the pmtimer. Implies
+ apicmaintimer. Useful when your PIT timer is totally
+ broken.
+
+ disable_8254_timer / enable_8254_timer
+ Enable interrupt 0 timer routing over the 8254 in addition to over
+ the IO-APIC. The kernel tries to set a sensible default.
+
+Early Console
+
+ syntax: earlyprintk=vga
+ earlyprintk=serial[,ttySn[,baudrate]]
+
+ The early console is useful when the kernel crashes before the
+ normal console is initialized. It is not enabled by
+ default because it has some cosmetic problems.
+ Append ,keep to not disable it when the real console takes over.
+ Only vga or serial at a time, not both.
+ Currently only ttyS0 and ttyS1 are supported.
+ Interaction with the standard serial driver is not very good.
+ The VGA output is eventually overwritten by the real console.
+
+Timing
+
+ notsc
+ Don't use the CPU time stamp counter to read the wall time.
+ This can be used to work around timing problems on multiprocessor systems
+ with not properly synchronized CPUs.
+
+ report_lost_ticks
+ Report when timer interrupts are lost because some code turned off
+ interrupts for too long.
+
+ nmi_watchdog=NUMBER[,panic]
+ NUMBER can be:
+ 0 don't use an NMI watchdog
+ 1 use the IO-APIC timer for the NMI watchdog
+ 2 use the local APIC for the NMI watchdog using a performance counter. Note
+ This will use one performance counter and the local APIC's performance
+ vector.
+ When panic is specified panic when an NMI watchdog timeout occurs.
+ This is useful when you use a panic=... timeout and need the box
+ quickly up again.
+
+ nohpet
+ Don't use the HPET timer.
+
+Idle loop
+
+ idle=poll
+ Don't do power saving in the idle loop using HLT, but poll for rescheduling
+ event. This will make the CPUs eat a lot more power, but may be useful
+ to get slightly better performance in multiprocessor benchmarks. It also
+ makes some profiling using performance counters more accurate.
+ Please note that on systems with MONITOR/MWAIT support (like Intel EM64T
+ CPUs) this option has no performance advantage over the normal idle loop.
+ It may also interact badly with hyperthreading.
+
+Rebooting
+
+ reboot=b[ios] | t[riple] | k[bd] | a[cpi] | e[fi] [, [w]arm | [c]old]
+ bios Use the CPU reboot vector for warm reset
+ warm Don't set the cold reboot flag
+ cold Set the cold reboot flag
+ triple Force a triple fault (init)
+ kbd Use the keyboard controller. cold reset (default)
+ acpi Use the ACPI RESET_REG in the FADT. If ACPI is not configured or the
+ ACPI reset does not work, the reboot path attempts the reset using
+ the keyboard controller.
+ efi Use efi reset_system runtime service. If EFI is not configured or the
+ EFI reset does not work, the reboot path attempts the reset using
+ the keyboard controller.
+
+ Using warm reset will be much faster especially on big memory
+ systems because the BIOS will not go through the memory check.
+ Disadvantage is that not all hardware will be completely reinitialized
+ on reboot so there may be boot problems on some systems.
+
+ reboot=force
+
+ Don't stop other CPUs on reboot. This can make reboot more reliable
+ in some cases.
+
+Non Executable Mappings
+
+ noexec=on|off
+
+ on Enable(default)
+ off Disable
+
+SMP
+
+ additional_cpus=NUM Allow NUM more CPUs for hotplug
+ (defaults are specified by the BIOS, see Documentation/x86_64/cpu-hotplug-spec)
+
+NUMA
+
+ numa=off Only set up a single NUMA node spanning all memory.
+
+ numa=noacpi Don't parse the SRAT table for NUMA setup
+
+ numa=fake=CMDLINE
+ If a number, fakes CMDLINE nodes and ignores NUMA setup of the
+ actual machine. Otherwise, system memory is configured
+ depending on the sizes and coefficients listed. For example:
+ numa=fake=2*512,1024,4*256,*128
+ gives two 512M nodes, a 1024M node, four 256M nodes, and the
+ rest split into 128M chunks. If the last character of CMDLINE
+ is a *, the remaining memory is divided up equally among its
+ coefficient:
+ numa=fake=2*512,2*
+ gives two 512M nodes and the rest split into two nodes.
+ Otherwise, the remaining system RAM is allocated to an
+ additional node.
+
+ numa=hotadd=percent
+ Only allow hotadd memory to preallocate page structures upto
+ percent of already available memory.
+ numa=hotadd=0 will disable hotadd memory.
+
+ACPI
+
+ acpi=off Don't enable ACPI
+ acpi=ht Use ACPI boot table parsing, but don't enable ACPI
+ interpreter
+ acpi=force Force ACPI on (currently not needed)
+
+ acpi=strict Disable out of spec ACPI workarounds.
+
+ acpi_sci={edge,level,high,low} Set up ACPI SCI interrupt.
+
+ acpi=noirq Don't route interrupts
+
+PCI
+
+ pci=off Don't use PCI
+ pci=conf1 Use conf1 access.
+ pci=conf2 Use conf2 access.
+ pci=rom Assign ROMs.
+ pci=assign-busses Assign busses
+ pci=irqmask=MASK Set PCI interrupt mask to MASK
+ pci=lastbus=NUMBER Scan upto NUMBER busses, no matter what the mptable says.
+ pci=noacpi Don't use ACPI to set up PCI interrupt routing.
+
+IOMMU (input/output memory management unit)
+
+ Currently four x86-64 PCI-DMA mapping implementations exist:
+
+ 1. <arch/x86_64/kernel/pci-nommu.c>: use no hardware/software IOMMU at all
+ (e.g. because you have < 3 GB memory).
+ Kernel boot message: "PCI-DMA: Disabling IOMMU"
+
+ 2. <arch/x86_64/kernel/pci-gart.c>: AMD GART based hardware IOMMU.
+ Kernel boot message: "PCI-DMA: using GART IOMMU"
+
+ 3. <arch/x86_64/kernel/pci-swiotlb.c> : Software IOMMU implementation. Used
+ e.g. if there is no hardware IOMMU in the system and it is need because
+ you have >3GB memory or told the kernel to us it (iommu=soft))
+ Kernel boot message: "PCI-DMA: Using software bounce buffering
+ for IO (SWIOTLB)"
+
+ 4. <arch/x86_64/pci-calgary.c> : IBM Calgary hardware IOMMU. Used in IBM
+ pSeries and xSeries servers. This hardware IOMMU supports DMA address
+ mapping with memory protection, etc.
+ Kernel boot message: "PCI-DMA: Using Calgary IOMMU"
+
+ iommu=[<size>][,noagp][,off][,force][,noforce][,leak[=<nr_of_leak_pages>]
+ [,memaper[=<order>]][,merge][,forcesac][,fullflush][,nomerge]
+ [,noaperture][,calgary]
+
+ General iommu options:
+ off Don't initialize and use any kind of IOMMU.
+ noforce Don't force hardware IOMMU usage when it is not needed.
+ (default).
+ force Force the use of the hardware IOMMU even when it is
+ not actually needed (e.g. because < 3 GB memory).
+ soft Use software bounce buffering (SWIOTLB) (default for
+ Intel machines). This can be used to prevent the usage
+ of an available hardware IOMMU.
+
+ iommu options only relevant to the AMD GART hardware IOMMU:
+ <size> Set the size of the remapping area in bytes.
+ allowed Overwrite iommu off workarounds for specific chipsets.
+ fullflush Flush IOMMU on each allocation (default).
+ nofullflush Don't use IOMMU fullflush.
+ leak Turn on simple iommu leak tracing (only when
+ CONFIG_IOMMU_LEAK is on). Default number of leak pages
+ is 20.
+ memaper[=<order>] Allocate an own aperture over RAM with size 32MB<<order.
+ (default: order=1, i.e. 64MB)
+ merge Do scatter-gather (SG) merging. Implies "force"
+ (experimental).
+ nomerge Don't do scatter-gather (SG) merging.
+ noaperture Ask the IOMMU not to touch the aperture for AGP.
+ forcesac Force single-address cycle (SAC) mode for masks <40bits
+ (experimental).
+ noagp Don't initialize the AGP driver and use full aperture.
+ allowdac Allow double-address cycle (DAC) mode, i.e. DMA >4GB.
+ DAC is used with 32-bit PCI to push a 64-bit address in
+ two cycles. When off all DMA over >4GB is forced through
+ an IOMMU or software bounce buffering.
+ nodac Forbid DAC mode, i.e. DMA >4GB.
+ panic Always panic when IOMMU overflows.
+ calgary Use the Calgary IOMMU if it is available
+
+ iommu options only relevant to the software bounce buffering (SWIOTLB) IOMMU
+ implementation:
+ swiotlb=<pages>[,force]
+ <pages> Prereserve that many 128K pages for the software IO
+ bounce buffering.
+ force Force all IO through the software TLB.
+
+ Settings for the IBM Calgary hardware IOMMU currently found in IBM
+ pSeries and xSeries machines:
+
+ calgary=[64k,128k,256k,512k,1M,2M,4M,8M]
+ calgary=[translate_empty_slots]
+ calgary=[disable=<PCI bus number>]
+ panic Always panic when IOMMU overflows
+
+ 64k,...,8M - Set the size of each PCI slot's translation table
+ when using the Calgary IOMMU. This is the size of the translation
+ table itself in main memory. The smallest table, 64k, covers an IO
+ space of 32MB; the largest, 8MB table, can cover an IO space of
+ 4GB. Normally the kernel will make the right choice by itself.
+
+ translate_empty_slots - Enable translation even on slots that have
+ no devices attached to them, in case a device will be hotplugged
+ in the future.
+
+ disable=<PCI bus number> - Disable translation on a given PHB. For
+ example, the built-in graphics adapter resides on the first bridge
+ (PCI bus number 0); if translation (isolation) is enabled on this
+ bridge, X servers that access the hardware directly from user
+ space might stop working. Use this option if you have devices that
+ are accessed from userspace directly on some PCI host bridge.
+
+Debugging
+
+ oops=panic Always panic on oopses. Default is to just kill the process,
+ but there is a small probability of deadlocking the machine.
+ This will also cause panics on machine check exceptions.
+ Useful together with panic=30 to trigger a reboot.
+
+ kstack=N Print N words from the kernel stack in oops dumps.
+
+ pagefaulttrace Dump all page faults. Only useful for extreme debugging
+ and will create a lot of output.
+
+ call_trace=[old|both|newfallback|new]
+ old: use old inexact backtracer
+ new: use new exact dwarf2 unwinder
+ both: print entries from both
+ newfallback: use new unwinder but fall back to old if it gets
+ stuck (default)
+
+Miscellaneous
+
+ nogbpages
+ Do not use GB pages for kernel direct mappings.
+ gbpages
+ Use GB pages for kernel direct mappings.
--- /dev/null
+Firmware support for CPU hotplug under Linux/x86-64
+---------------------------------------------------
+
+Linux/x86-64 supports CPU hotplug now. For various reasons Linux wants to
+know in advance of boot time the maximum number of CPUs that could be plugged
+into the system. ACPI 3.0 currently has no official way to supply
+this information from the firmware to the operating system.
+
+In ACPI each CPU needs an LAPIC object in the MADT table (5.2.11.5 in the
+ACPI 3.0 specification). ACPI already has the concept of disabled LAPIC
+objects by setting the Enabled bit in the LAPIC object to zero.
+
+For CPU hotplug Linux/x86-64 expects now that any possible future hotpluggable
+CPU is already available in the MADT. If the CPU is not available yet
+it should have its LAPIC Enabled bit set to 0. Linux will use the number
+of disabled LAPICs to compute the maximum number of future CPUs.
+
+In the worst case the user can overwrite this choice using a command line
+option (additional_cpus=...), but it is recommended to supply the correct
+number (or a reasonable approximation of it, with erring towards more not less)
+in the MADT to avoid manual configuration.
--- /dev/null
+Using numa=fake and CPUSets for Resource Management
+Written by David Rientjes <rientjes@cs.washington.edu>
+
+This document describes how the numa=fake x86_64 command-line option can be used
+in conjunction with cpusets for coarse memory management. Using this feature,
+you can create fake NUMA nodes that represent contiguous chunks of memory and
+assign them to cpusets and their attached tasks. This is a way of limiting the
+amount of system memory that are available to a certain class of tasks.
+
+For more information on the features of cpusets, see Documentation/cpusets.txt.
+There are a number of different configurations you can use for your needs. For
+more information on the numa=fake command line option and its various ways of
+configuring fake nodes, see Documentation/x86_64/boot-options.txt.
+
+For the purposes of this introduction, we'll assume a very primitive NUMA
+emulation setup of "numa=fake=4*512,". This will split our system memory into
+four equal chunks of 512M each that we can now use to assign to cpusets. As
+you become more familiar with using this combination for resource control,
+you'll determine a better setup to minimize the number of nodes you have to deal
+with.
+
+A machine may be split as follows with "numa=fake=4*512," as reported by dmesg:
+
+ Faking node 0 at 0000000000000000-0000000020000000 (512MB)
+ Faking node 1 at 0000000020000000-0000000040000000 (512MB)
+ Faking node 2 at 0000000040000000-0000000060000000 (512MB)
+ Faking node 3 at 0000000060000000-0000000080000000 (512MB)
+ ...
+ On node 0 totalpages: 130975
+ On node 1 totalpages: 131072
+ On node 2 totalpages: 131072
+ On node 3 totalpages: 131072
+
+Now following the instructions for mounting the cpusets filesystem from
+Documentation/cpusets.txt, you can assign fake nodes (i.e. contiguous memory
+address spaces) to individual cpusets:
+
+ [root@xroads /]# mkdir exampleset
+ [root@xroads /]# mount -t cpuset none exampleset
+ [root@xroads /]# mkdir exampleset/ddset
+ [root@xroads /]# cd exampleset/ddset
+ [root@xroads /exampleset/ddset]# echo 0-1 > cpus
+ [root@xroads /exampleset/ddset]# echo 0-1 > mems
+
+Now this cpuset, 'ddset', will only allowed access to fake nodes 0 and 1 for
+memory allocations (1G).
+
+You can now assign tasks to these cpusets to limit the memory resources
+available to them according to the fake nodes assigned as mems:
+
+ [root@xroads /exampleset/ddset]# echo $$ > tasks
+ [root@xroads /exampleset/ddset]# dd if=/dev/zero of=tmp bs=1024 count=1G
+ [1] 13425
+
+Notice the difference between the system memory usage as reported by
+/proc/meminfo between the restricted cpuset case above and the unrestricted
+case (i.e. running the same 'dd' command without assigning it to a fake NUMA
+cpuset):
+ Unrestricted Restricted
+ MemTotal: 3091900 kB 3091900 kB
+ MemFree: 42113 kB 1513236 kB
+
+This allows for coarse memory management for the tasks you assign to particular
+cpusets. Since cpusets can form a hierarchy, you can create some pretty
+interesting combinations of use-cases for various classes of tasks for your
+memory management needs.
--- /dev/null
+Most of the text from Keith Owens, hacked by AK
+
+x86_64 page size (PAGE_SIZE) is 4K.
+
+Like all other architectures, x86_64 has a kernel stack for every
+active thread. These thread stacks are THREAD_SIZE (2*PAGE_SIZE) big.
+These stacks contain useful data as long as a thread is alive or a
+zombie. While the thread is in user space the kernel stack is empty
+except for the thread_info structure at the bottom.
+
+In addition to the per thread stacks, there are specialized stacks
+associated with each CPU. These stacks are only used while the kernel
+is in control on that CPU; when a CPU returns to user space the
+specialized stacks contain no useful data. The main CPU stacks are:
+
+* Interrupt stack. IRQSTACKSIZE
+
+ Used for external hardware interrupts. If this is the first external
+ hardware interrupt (i.e. not a nested hardware interrupt) then the
+ kernel switches from the current task to the interrupt stack. Like
+ the split thread and interrupt stacks on i386 (with CONFIG_4KSTACKS),
+ this gives more room for kernel interrupt processing without having
+ to increase the size of every per thread stack.
+
+ The interrupt stack is also used when processing a softirq.
+
+Switching to the kernel interrupt stack is done by software based on a
+per CPU interrupt nest counter. This is needed because x86-64 "IST"
+hardware stacks cannot nest without races.
+
+x86_64 also has a feature which is not available on i386, the ability
+to automatically switch to a new stack for designated events such as
+double fault or NMI, which makes it easier to handle these unusual
+events on x86_64. This feature is called the Interrupt Stack Table
+(IST). There can be up to 7 IST entries per CPU. The IST code is an
+index into the Task State Segment (TSS). The IST entries in the TSS
+point to dedicated stacks; each stack can be a different size.
+
+An IST is selected by a non-zero value in the IST field of an
+interrupt-gate descriptor. When an interrupt occurs and the hardware
+loads such a descriptor, the hardware automatically sets the new stack
+pointer based on the IST value, then invokes the interrupt handler. If
+software wants to allow nested IST interrupts then the handler must
+adjust the IST values on entry to and exit from the interrupt handler.
+(This is occasionally done, e.g. for debug exceptions.)
+
+Events with different IST codes (i.e. with different stacks) can be
+nested. For example, a debug interrupt can safely be interrupted by an
+NMI. arch/x86_64/kernel/entry.S::paranoidentry adjusts the stack
+pointers on entry to and exit from all IST events, in theory allowing
+IST events with the same code to be nested. However in most cases, the
+stack size allocated to an IST assumes no nesting for the same code.
+If that assumption is ever broken then the stacks will become corrupt.
+
+The currently assigned IST stacks are :-
+
+* STACKFAULT_STACK. EXCEPTION_STKSZ (PAGE_SIZE).
+
+ Used for interrupt 12 - Stack Fault Exception (#SS).
+
+ This allows the CPU to recover from invalid stack segments. Rarely
+ happens.
+
+* DOUBLEFAULT_STACK. EXCEPTION_STKSZ (PAGE_SIZE).
+
+ Used for interrupt 8 - Double Fault Exception (#DF).
+
+ Invoked when handling one exception causes another exception. Happens
+ when the kernel is very confused (e.g. kernel stack pointer corrupt).
+ Using a separate stack allows the kernel to recover from it well enough
+ in many cases to still output an oops.
+
+* NMI_STACK. EXCEPTION_STKSZ (PAGE_SIZE).
+
+ Used for non-maskable interrupts (NMI).
+
+ NMI can be delivered at any time, including when the kernel is in the
+ middle of switching stacks. Using IST for NMI events avoids making
+ assumptions about the previous state of the kernel stack.
+
+* DEBUG_STACK. DEBUG_STKSZ
+
+ Used for hardware debug interrupts (interrupt 1) and for software
+ debug interrupts (INT3).
+
+ When debugging a kernel, debug interrupts (both hardware and
+ software) can occur at any time. Using IST for these interrupts
+ avoids making assumptions about the previous state of the kernel
+ stack.
+
+* MCE_STACK. EXCEPTION_STKSZ (PAGE_SIZE).
+
+ Used for interrupt 18 - Machine Check Exception (#MC).
+
+ MCE can be delivered at any time, including when the kernel is in the
+ middle of switching stacks. Using IST for MCE events avoids making
+ assumptions about the previous state of the kernel stack.
+
+For more details see the Intel IA32 or AMD AMD64 architecture manuals.
--- /dev/null
+
+Configurable sysfs parameters for the x86-64 machine check code.
+
+Machine checks report internal hardware error conditions detected
+by the CPU. Uncorrected errors typically cause a machine check
+(often with panic), corrected ones cause a machine check log entry.
+
+Machine checks are organized in banks (normally associated with
+a hardware subsystem) and subevents in a bank. The exact meaning
+of the banks and subevent is CPU specific.
+
+mcelog knows how to decode them.
+
+When you see the "Machine check errors logged" message in the system
+log then mcelog should run to collect and decode machine check entries
+from /dev/mcelog. Normally mcelog should be run regularly from a cronjob.
+
+Each CPU has a directory in /sys/devices/system/machinecheck/machinecheckN
+(N = CPU number)
+
+The directory contains some configurable entries:
+
+Entries:
+
+bankNctl
+(N bank number)
+ 64bit Hex bitmask enabling/disabling specific subevents for bank N
+ When a bit in the bitmask is zero then the respective
+ subevent will not be reported.
+ By default all events are enabled.
+ Note that BIOS maintain another mask to disable specific events
+ per bank. This is not visible here
+
+The following entries appear for each CPU, but they are truly shared
+between all CPUs.
+
+check_interval
+ How often to poll for corrected machine check errors, in seconds
+ (Note output is hexademical). Default 5 minutes. When the poller
+ finds MCEs it triggers an exponential speedup (poll more often) on
+ the polling interval. When the poller stops finding MCEs, it
+ triggers an exponential backoff (poll less often) on the polling
+ interval. The check_interval variable is both the initial and
+ maximum polling interval.
+
+tolerant
+ Tolerance level. When a machine check exception occurs for a non
+ corrected machine check the kernel can take different actions.
+ Since machine check exceptions can happen any time it is sometimes
+ risky for the kernel to kill a process because it defies
+ normal kernel locking rules. The tolerance level configures
+ how hard the kernel tries to recover even at some risk of
+ deadlock. Higher tolerant values trade potentially better uptime
+ with the risk of a crash or even corruption (for tolerant >= 3).
+
+ 0: always panic on uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
+ 1: panic or SIGBUS on uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
+ 2: SIGBUS or log uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
+ 3: never panic or SIGBUS, log all errors (for testing only)
+
+ Default: 1
+
+ Note this only makes a difference if the CPU allows recovery
+ from a machine check exception. Current x86 CPUs generally do not.
+
+trigger
+ Program to run when a machine check event is detected.
+ This is an alternative to running mcelog regularly from cron
+ and allows to detect events faster.
+
+TBD document entries for AMD threshold interrupt configuration
+
+For more details about the x86 machine check architecture
+see the Intel and AMD architecture manuals from their developer websites.
+
+For more details about the architecture see
+see http://one.firstfloor.org/~andi/mce.pdf
--- /dev/null
+
+<previous description obsolete, deleted>
+
+Virtual memory map with 4 level page tables:
+
+0000000000000000 - 00007fffffffffff (=47 bits) user space, different per mm
+hole caused by [48:63] sign extension
+ffff800000000000 - ffff80ffffffffff (=40 bits) guard hole
+ffff810000000000 - ffffc0ffffffffff (=46 bits) direct mapping of all phys. memory
+ffffc10000000000 - ffffc1ffffffffff (=40 bits) hole
+ffffc20000000000 - ffffe1ffffffffff (=45 bits) vmalloc/ioremap space
+ffffe20000000000 - ffffe2ffffffffff (=40 bits) virtual memory map (1TB)
+... unused hole ...
+ffffffff80000000 - ffffffff82800000 (=40 MB) kernel text mapping, from phys 0
+... unused hole ...
+ffffffff88000000 - fffffffffff00000 (=1919 MB) module mapping space
+
+The direct mapping covers all memory in the system up to the highest
+memory address (this means in some cases it can also include PCI memory
+holes).
+
+vmalloc space is lazily synchronized into the different PML4 pages of
+the processes using the page fault handler, with init_level4_pgt as
+reference.
+
+Current X86-64 implementations only support 40 bits of address space,
+but we support up to 46 bits. This expands into MBZ space in the page tables.
+
+-Andi Kleen, Jul 2004
--- /dev/null
+General note on [U]EFI x86_64 support
+-------------------------------------
+
+The nomenclature EFI and UEFI are used interchangeably in this document.
+
+Although the tools below are _not_ needed for building the kernel,
+the needed bootloader support and associated tools for x86_64 platforms
+with EFI firmware and specifications are listed below.
+
+1. UEFI specification: http://www.uefi.org
+
+2. Booting Linux kernel on UEFI x86_64 platform requires bootloader
+ support. Elilo with x86_64 support can be used.
+
+3. x86_64 platform with EFI/UEFI firmware.
+
+Mechanics:
+---------
+- Build the kernel with the following configuration.
+ CONFIG_FB_EFI=y
+ CONFIG_FRAMEBUFFER_CONSOLE=y
+ If EFI runtime services are expected, the following configuration should
+ be selected.
+ CONFIG_EFI=y
+ CONFIG_EFI_VARS=y or m # optional
+- Create a VFAT partition on the disk
+- Copy the following to the VFAT partition:
+ elilo bootloader with x86_64 support, elilo configuration file,
+ kernel image built in first step and corresponding
+ initrd. Instructions on building elilo and its dependencies
+ can be found in the elilo sourceforge project.
+- Boot to EFI shell and invoke elilo choosing the kernel image built
+ in first step.
+- If some or all EFI runtime services don't work, you can try following
+ kernel command line parameters to turn off some or all EFI runtime
+ services.
+ noefi turn off all EFI runtime services
+ reboot_type=k turn off EFI reboot runtime service
+++ /dev/null
-00-INDEX
- - This file
-boot-options.txt
- - AMD64-specific boot options.
-cpu-hotplug-spec
- - Firmware support for CPU hotplug under Linux/x86-64
-fake-numa-for-cpusets
- - Using numa=fake and CPUSets for Resource Management
-kernel-stacks
- - Context-specific per-processor interrupt stacks.
-machinecheck
- - Configurable sysfs parameters for the x86-64 machine check code.
-mm.txt
- - Memory layout of x86-64 (4 level page tables, 46 bits physical).
-uefi.txt
- - Booting Linux via Unified Extensible Firmware Interface.
+++ /dev/null
-AMD64 specific boot options
-
-There are many others (usually documented in driver documentation), but
-only the AMD64 specific ones are listed here.
-
-Machine check
-
- mce=off disable machine check
- mce=bootlog Enable logging of machine checks left over from booting.
- Disabled by default on AMD because some BIOS leave bogus ones.
- If your BIOS doesn't do that it's a good idea to enable though
- to make sure you log even machine check events that result
- in a reboot. On Intel systems it is enabled by default.
- mce=nobootlog
- Disable boot machine check logging.
- mce=tolerancelevel (number)
- 0: always panic on uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
- 1: panic or SIGBUS on uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
- 2: SIGBUS or log uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
- 3: never panic or SIGBUS, log all errors (for testing only)
- Default is 1
- Can be also set using sysfs which is preferable.
-
- nomce (for compatibility with i386): same as mce=off
-
- Everything else is in sysfs now.
-
-APICs
-
- apic Use IO-APIC. Default
-
- noapic Don't use the IO-APIC.
-
- disableapic Don't use the local APIC
-
- nolapic Don't use the local APIC (alias for i386 compatibility)
-
- pirq=... See Documentation/i386/IO-APIC.txt
-
- noapictimer Don't set up the APIC timer
-
- no_timer_check Don't check the IO-APIC timer. This can work around
- problems with incorrect timer initialization on some boards.
-
- apicmaintimer Run time keeping from the local APIC timer instead
- of using the PIT/HPET interrupt for this. This is useful
- when the PIT/HPET interrupts are unreliable.
-
- noapicmaintimer Don't do time keeping using the APIC timer.
- Useful when this option was auto selected, but doesn't work.
-
- apicpmtimer
- Do APIC timer calibration using the pmtimer. Implies
- apicmaintimer. Useful when your PIT timer is totally
- broken.
-
- disable_8254_timer / enable_8254_timer
- Enable interrupt 0 timer routing over the 8254 in addition to over
- the IO-APIC. The kernel tries to set a sensible default.
-
-Early Console
-
- syntax: earlyprintk=vga
- earlyprintk=serial[,ttySn[,baudrate]]
-
- The early console is useful when the kernel crashes before the
- normal console is initialized. It is not enabled by
- default because it has some cosmetic problems.
- Append ,keep to not disable it when the real console takes over.
- Only vga or serial at a time, not both.
- Currently only ttyS0 and ttyS1 are supported.
- Interaction with the standard serial driver is not very good.
- The VGA output is eventually overwritten by the real console.
-
-Timing
-
- notsc
- Don't use the CPU time stamp counter to read the wall time.
- This can be used to work around timing problems on multiprocessor systems
- with not properly synchronized CPUs.
-
- report_lost_ticks
- Report when timer interrupts are lost because some code turned off
- interrupts for too long.
-
- nmi_watchdog=NUMBER[,panic]
- NUMBER can be:
- 0 don't use an NMI watchdog
- 1 use the IO-APIC timer for the NMI watchdog
- 2 use the local APIC for the NMI watchdog using a performance counter. Note
- This will use one performance counter and the local APIC's performance
- vector.
- When panic is specified panic when an NMI watchdog timeout occurs.
- This is useful when you use a panic=... timeout and need the box
- quickly up again.
-
- nohpet
- Don't use the HPET timer.
-
-Idle loop
-
- idle=poll
- Don't do power saving in the idle loop using HLT, but poll for rescheduling
- event. This will make the CPUs eat a lot more power, but may be useful
- to get slightly better performance in multiprocessor benchmarks. It also
- makes some profiling using performance counters more accurate.
- Please note that on systems with MONITOR/MWAIT support (like Intel EM64T
- CPUs) this option has no performance advantage over the normal idle loop.
- It may also interact badly with hyperthreading.
-
-Rebooting
-
- reboot=b[ios] | t[riple] | k[bd] | a[cpi] | e[fi] [, [w]arm | [c]old]
- bios Use the CPU reboot vector for warm reset
- warm Don't set the cold reboot flag
- cold Set the cold reboot flag
- triple Force a triple fault (init)
- kbd Use the keyboard controller. cold reset (default)
- acpi Use the ACPI RESET_REG in the FADT. If ACPI is not configured or the
- ACPI reset does not work, the reboot path attempts the reset using
- the keyboard controller.
- efi Use efi reset_system runtime service. If EFI is not configured or the
- EFI reset does not work, the reboot path attempts the reset using
- the keyboard controller.
-
- Using warm reset will be much faster especially on big memory
- systems because the BIOS will not go through the memory check.
- Disadvantage is that not all hardware will be completely reinitialized
- on reboot so there may be boot problems on some systems.
-
- reboot=force
-
- Don't stop other CPUs on reboot. This can make reboot more reliable
- in some cases.
-
-Non Executable Mappings
-
- noexec=on|off
-
- on Enable(default)
- off Disable
-
-SMP
-
- additional_cpus=NUM Allow NUM more CPUs for hotplug
- (defaults are specified by the BIOS, see Documentation/x86_64/cpu-hotplug-spec)
-
-NUMA
-
- numa=off Only set up a single NUMA node spanning all memory.
-
- numa=noacpi Don't parse the SRAT table for NUMA setup
-
- numa=fake=CMDLINE
- If a number, fakes CMDLINE nodes and ignores NUMA setup of the
- actual machine. Otherwise, system memory is configured
- depending on the sizes and coefficients listed. For example:
- numa=fake=2*512,1024,4*256,*128
- gives two 512M nodes, a 1024M node, four 256M nodes, and the
- rest split into 128M chunks. If the last character of CMDLINE
- is a *, the remaining memory is divided up equally among its
- coefficient:
- numa=fake=2*512,2*
- gives two 512M nodes and the rest split into two nodes.
- Otherwise, the remaining system RAM is allocated to an
- additional node.
-
- numa=hotadd=percent
- Only allow hotadd memory to preallocate page structures upto
- percent of already available memory.
- numa=hotadd=0 will disable hotadd memory.
-
-ACPI
-
- acpi=off Don't enable ACPI
- acpi=ht Use ACPI boot table parsing, but don't enable ACPI
- interpreter
- acpi=force Force ACPI on (currently not needed)
-
- acpi=strict Disable out of spec ACPI workarounds.
-
- acpi_sci={edge,level,high,low} Set up ACPI SCI interrupt.
-
- acpi=noirq Don't route interrupts
-
-PCI
-
- pci=off Don't use PCI
- pci=conf1 Use conf1 access.
- pci=conf2 Use conf2 access.
- pci=rom Assign ROMs.
- pci=assign-busses Assign busses
- pci=irqmask=MASK Set PCI interrupt mask to MASK
- pci=lastbus=NUMBER Scan upto NUMBER busses, no matter what the mptable says.
- pci=noacpi Don't use ACPI to set up PCI interrupt routing.
-
-IOMMU (input/output memory management unit)
-
- Currently four x86-64 PCI-DMA mapping implementations exist:
-
- 1. <arch/x86_64/kernel/pci-nommu.c>: use no hardware/software IOMMU at all
- (e.g. because you have < 3 GB memory).
- Kernel boot message: "PCI-DMA: Disabling IOMMU"
-
- 2. <arch/x86_64/kernel/pci-gart.c>: AMD GART based hardware IOMMU.
- Kernel boot message: "PCI-DMA: using GART IOMMU"
-
- 3. <arch/x86_64/kernel/pci-swiotlb.c> : Software IOMMU implementation. Used
- e.g. if there is no hardware IOMMU in the system and it is need because
- you have >3GB memory or told the kernel to us it (iommu=soft))
- Kernel boot message: "PCI-DMA: Using software bounce buffering
- for IO (SWIOTLB)"
-
- 4. <arch/x86_64/pci-calgary.c> : IBM Calgary hardware IOMMU. Used in IBM
- pSeries and xSeries servers. This hardware IOMMU supports DMA address
- mapping with memory protection, etc.
- Kernel boot message: "PCI-DMA: Using Calgary IOMMU"
-
- iommu=[<size>][,noagp][,off][,force][,noforce][,leak[=<nr_of_leak_pages>]
- [,memaper[=<order>]][,merge][,forcesac][,fullflush][,nomerge]
- [,noaperture][,calgary]
-
- General iommu options:
- off Don't initialize and use any kind of IOMMU.
- noforce Don't force hardware IOMMU usage when it is not needed.
- (default).
- force Force the use of the hardware IOMMU even when it is
- not actually needed (e.g. because < 3 GB memory).
- soft Use software bounce buffering (SWIOTLB) (default for
- Intel machines). This can be used to prevent the usage
- of an available hardware IOMMU.
-
- iommu options only relevant to the AMD GART hardware IOMMU:
- <size> Set the size of the remapping area in bytes.
- allowed Overwrite iommu off workarounds for specific chipsets.
- fullflush Flush IOMMU on each allocation (default).
- nofullflush Don't use IOMMU fullflush.
- leak Turn on simple iommu leak tracing (only when
- CONFIG_IOMMU_LEAK is on). Default number of leak pages
- is 20.
- memaper[=<order>] Allocate an own aperture over RAM with size 32MB<<order.
- (default: order=1, i.e. 64MB)
- merge Do scatter-gather (SG) merging. Implies "force"
- (experimental).
- nomerge Don't do scatter-gather (SG) merging.
- noaperture Ask the IOMMU not to touch the aperture for AGP.
- forcesac Force single-address cycle (SAC) mode for masks <40bits
- (experimental).
- noagp Don't initialize the AGP driver and use full aperture.
- allowdac Allow double-address cycle (DAC) mode, i.e. DMA >4GB.
- DAC is used with 32-bit PCI to push a 64-bit address in
- two cycles. When off all DMA over >4GB is forced through
- an IOMMU or software bounce buffering.
- nodac Forbid DAC mode, i.e. DMA >4GB.
- panic Always panic when IOMMU overflows.
- calgary Use the Calgary IOMMU if it is available
-
- iommu options only relevant to the software bounce buffering (SWIOTLB) IOMMU
- implementation:
- swiotlb=<pages>[,force]
- <pages> Prereserve that many 128K pages for the software IO
- bounce buffering.
- force Force all IO through the software TLB.
-
- Settings for the IBM Calgary hardware IOMMU currently found in IBM
- pSeries and xSeries machines:
-
- calgary=[64k,128k,256k,512k,1M,2M,4M,8M]
- calgary=[translate_empty_slots]
- calgary=[disable=<PCI bus number>]
- panic Always panic when IOMMU overflows
-
- 64k,...,8M - Set the size of each PCI slot's translation table
- when using the Calgary IOMMU. This is the size of the translation
- table itself in main memory. The smallest table, 64k, covers an IO
- space of 32MB; the largest, 8MB table, can cover an IO space of
- 4GB. Normally the kernel will make the right choice by itself.
-
- translate_empty_slots - Enable translation even on slots that have
- no devices attached to them, in case a device will be hotplugged
- in the future.
-
- disable=<PCI bus number> - Disable translation on a given PHB. For
- example, the built-in graphics adapter resides on the first bridge
- (PCI bus number 0); if translation (isolation) is enabled on this
- bridge, X servers that access the hardware directly from user
- space might stop working. Use this option if you have devices that
- are accessed from userspace directly on some PCI host bridge.
-
-Debugging
-
- oops=panic Always panic on oopses. Default is to just kill the process,
- but there is a small probability of deadlocking the machine.
- This will also cause panics on machine check exceptions.
- Useful together with panic=30 to trigger a reboot.
-
- kstack=N Print N words from the kernel stack in oops dumps.
-
- pagefaulttrace Dump all page faults. Only useful for extreme debugging
- and will create a lot of output.
-
- call_trace=[old|both|newfallback|new]
- old: use old inexact backtracer
- new: use new exact dwarf2 unwinder
- both: print entries from both
- newfallback: use new unwinder but fall back to old if it gets
- stuck (default)
-
-Miscellaneous
-
- nogbpages
- Do not use GB pages for kernel direct mappings.
- gbpages
- Use GB pages for kernel direct mappings.
+++ /dev/null
-Firmware support for CPU hotplug under Linux/x86-64
----------------------------------------------------
-
-Linux/x86-64 supports CPU hotplug now. For various reasons Linux wants to
-know in advance of boot time the maximum number of CPUs that could be plugged
-into the system. ACPI 3.0 currently has no official way to supply
-this information from the firmware to the operating system.
-
-In ACPI each CPU needs an LAPIC object in the MADT table (5.2.11.5 in the
-ACPI 3.0 specification). ACPI already has the concept of disabled LAPIC
-objects by setting the Enabled bit in the LAPIC object to zero.
-
-For CPU hotplug Linux/x86-64 expects now that any possible future hotpluggable
-CPU is already available in the MADT. If the CPU is not available yet
-it should have its LAPIC Enabled bit set to 0. Linux will use the number
-of disabled LAPICs to compute the maximum number of future CPUs.
-
-In the worst case the user can overwrite this choice using a command line
-option (additional_cpus=...), but it is recommended to supply the correct
-number (or a reasonable approximation of it, with erring towards more not less)
-in the MADT to avoid manual configuration.
+++ /dev/null
-Using numa=fake and CPUSets for Resource Management
-Written by David Rientjes <rientjes@cs.washington.edu>
-
-This document describes how the numa=fake x86_64 command-line option can be used
-in conjunction with cpusets for coarse memory management. Using this feature,
-you can create fake NUMA nodes that represent contiguous chunks of memory and
-assign them to cpusets and their attached tasks. This is a way of limiting the
-amount of system memory that are available to a certain class of tasks.
-
-For more information on the features of cpusets, see Documentation/cpusets.txt.
-There are a number of different configurations you can use for your needs. For
-more information on the numa=fake command line option and its various ways of
-configuring fake nodes, see Documentation/x86_64/boot-options.txt.
-
-For the purposes of this introduction, we'll assume a very primitive NUMA
-emulation setup of "numa=fake=4*512,". This will split our system memory into
-four equal chunks of 512M each that we can now use to assign to cpusets. As
-you become more familiar with using this combination for resource control,
-you'll determine a better setup to minimize the number of nodes you have to deal
-with.
-
-A machine may be split as follows with "numa=fake=4*512," as reported by dmesg:
-
- Faking node 0 at 0000000000000000-0000000020000000 (512MB)
- Faking node 1 at 0000000020000000-0000000040000000 (512MB)
- Faking node 2 at 0000000040000000-0000000060000000 (512MB)
- Faking node 3 at 0000000060000000-0000000080000000 (512MB)
- ...
- On node 0 totalpages: 130975
- On node 1 totalpages: 131072
- On node 2 totalpages: 131072
- On node 3 totalpages: 131072
-
-Now following the instructions for mounting the cpusets filesystem from
-Documentation/cpusets.txt, you can assign fake nodes (i.e. contiguous memory
-address spaces) to individual cpusets:
-
- [root@xroads /]# mkdir exampleset
- [root@xroads /]# mount -t cpuset none exampleset
- [root@xroads /]# mkdir exampleset/ddset
- [root@xroads /]# cd exampleset/ddset
- [root@xroads /exampleset/ddset]# echo 0-1 > cpus
- [root@xroads /exampleset/ddset]# echo 0-1 > mems
-
-Now this cpuset, 'ddset', will only allowed access to fake nodes 0 and 1 for
-memory allocations (1G).
-
-You can now assign tasks to these cpusets to limit the memory resources
-available to them according to the fake nodes assigned as mems:
-
- [root@xroads /exampleset/ddset]# echo $$ > tasks
- [root@xroads /exampleset/ddset]# dd if=/dev/zero of=tmp bs=1024 count=1G
- [1] 13425
-
-Notice the difference between the system memory usage as reported by
-/proc/meminfo between the restricted cpuset case above and the unrestricted
-case (i.e. running the same 'dd' command without assigning it to a fake NUMA
-cpuset):
- Unrestricted Restricted
- MemTotal: 3091900 kB 3091900 kB
- MemFree: 42113 kB 1513236 kB
-
-This allows for coarse memory management for the tasks you assign to particular
-cpusets. Since cpusets can form a hierarchy, you can create some pretty
-interesting combinations of use-cases for various classes of tasks for your
-memory management needs.
+++ /dev/null
-Most of the text from Keith Owens, hacked by AK
-
-x86_64 page size (PAGE_SIZE) is 4K.
-
-Like all other architectures, x86_64 has a kernel stack for every
-active thread. These thread stacks are THREAD_SIZE (2*PAGE_SIZE) big.
-These stacks contain useful data as long as a thread is alive or a
-zombie. While the thread is in user space the kernel stack is empty
-except for the thread_info structure at the bottom.
-
-In addition to the per thread stacks, there are specialized stacks
-associated with each CPU. These stacks are only used while the kernel
-is in control on that CPU; when a CPU returns to user space the
-specialized stacks contain no useful data. The main CPU stacks are:
-
-* Interrupt stack. IRQSTACKSIZE
-
- Used for external hardware interrupts. If this is the first external
- hardware interrupt (i.e. not a nested hardware interrupt) then the
- kernel switches from the current task to the interrupt stack. Like
- the split thread and interrupt stacks on i386 (with CONFIG_4KSTACKS),
- this gives more room for kernel interrupt processing without having
- to increase the size of every per thread stack.
-
- The interrupt stack is also used when processing a softirq.
-
-Switching to the kernel interrupt stack is done by software based on a
-per CPU interrupt nest counter. This is needed because x86-64 "IST"
-hardware stacks cannot nest without races.
-
-x86_64 also has a feature which is not available on i386, the ability
-to automatically switch to a new stack for designated events such as
-double fault or NMI, which makes it easier to handle these unusual
-events on x86_64. This feature is called the Interrupt Stack Table
-(IST). There can be up to 7 IST entries per CPU. The IST code is an
-index into the Task State Segment (TSS). The IST entries in the TSS
-point to dedicated stacks; each stack can be a different size.
-
-An IST is selected by a non-zero value in the IST field of an
-interrupt-gate descriptor. When an interrupt occurs and the hardware
-loads such a descriptor, the hardware automatically sets the new stack
-pointer based on the IST value, then invokes the interrupt handler. If
-software wants to allow nested IST interrupts then the handler must
-adjust the IST values on entry to and exit from the interrupt handler.
-(This is occasionally done, e.g. for debug exceptions.)
-
-Events with different IST codes (i.e. with different stacks) can be
-nested. For example, a debug interrupt can safely be interrupted by an
-NMI. arch/x86_64/kernel/entry.S::paranoidentry adjusts the stack
-pointers on entry to and exit from all IST events, in theory allowing
-IST events with the same code to be nested. However in most cases, the
-stack size allocated to an IST assumes no nesting for the same code.
-If that assumption is ever broken then the stacks will become corrupt.
-
-The currently assigned IST stacks are :-
-
-* STACKFAULT_STACK. EXCEPTION_STKSZ (PAGE_SIZE).
-
- Used for interrupt 12 - Stack Fault Exception (#SS).
-
- This allows the CPU to recover from invalid stack segments. Rarely
- happens.
-
-* DOUBLEFAULT_STACK. EXCEPTION_STKSZ (PAGE_SIZE).
-
- Used for interrupt 8 - Double Fault Exception (#DF).
-
- Invoked when handling one exception causes another exception. Happens
- when the kernel is very confused (e.g. kernel stack pointer corrupt).
- Using a separate stack allows the kernel to recover from it well enough
- in many cases to still output an oops.
-
-* NMI_STACK. EXCEPTION_STKSZ (PAGE_SIZE).
-
- Used for non-maskable interrupts (NMI).
-
- NMI can be delivered at any time, including when the kernel is in the
- middle of switching stacks. Using IST for NMI events avoids making
- assumptions about the previous state of the kernel stack.
-
-* DEBUG_STACK. DEBUG_STKSZ
-
- Used for hardware debug interrupts (interrupt 1) and for software
- debug interrupts (INT3).
-
- When debugging a kernel, debug interrupts (both hardware and
- software) can occur at any time. Using IST for these interrupts
- avoids making assumptions about the previous state of the kernel
- stack.
-
-* MCE_STACK. EXCEPTION_STKSZ (PAGE_SIZE).
-
- Used for interrupt 18 - Machine Check Exception (#MC).
-
- MCE can be delivered at any time, including when the kernel is in the
- middle of switching stacks. Using IST for MCE events avoids making
- assumptions about the previous state of the kernel stack.
-
-For more details see the Intel IA32 or AMD AMD64 architecture manuals.
+++ /dev/null
-
-Configurable sysfs parameters for the x86-64 machine check code.
-
-Machine checks report internal hardware error conditions detected
-by the CPU. Uncorrected errors typically cause a machine check
-(often with panic), corrected ones cause a machine check log entry.
-
-Machine checks are organized in banks (normally associated with
-a hardware subsystem) and subevents in a bank. The exact meaning
-of the banks and subevent is CPU specific.
-
-mcelog knows how to decode them.
-
-When you see the "Machine check errors logged" message in the system
-log then mcelog should run to collect and decode machine check entries
-from /dev/mcelog. Normally mcelog should be run regularly from a cronjob.
-
-Each CPU has a directory in /sys/devices/system/machinecheck/machinecheckN
-(N = CPU number)
-
-The directory contains some configurable entries:
-
-Entries:
-
-bankNctl
-(N bank number)
- 64bit Hex bitmask enabling/disabling specific subevents for bank N
- When a bit in the bitmask is zero then the respective
- subevent will not be reported.
- By default all events are enabled.
- Note that BIOS maintain another mask to disable specific events
- per bank. This is not visible here
-
-The following entries appear for each CPU, but they are truly shared
-between all CPUs.
-
-check_interval
- How often to poll for corrected machine check errors, in seconds
- (Note output is hexademical). Default 5 minutes. When the poller
- finds MCEs it triggers an exponential speedup (poll more often) on
- the polling interval. When the poller stops finding MCEs, it
- triggers an exponential backoff (poll less often) on the polling
- interval. The check_interval variable is both the initial and
- maximum polling interval.
-
-tolerant
- Tolerance level. When a machine check exception occurs for a non
- corrected machine check the kernel can take different actions.
- Since machine check exceptions can happen any time it is sometimes
- risky for the kernel to kill a process because it defies
- normal kernel locking rules. The tolerance level configures
- how hard the kernel tries to recover even at some risk of
- deadlock. Higher tolerant values trade potentially better uptime
- with the risk of a crash or even corruption (for tolerant >= 3).
-
- 0: always panic on uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
- 1: panic or SIGBUS on uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
- 2: SIGBUS or log uncorrected errors, log corrected errors
- 3: never panic or SIGBUS, log all errors (for testing only)
-
- Default: 1
-
- Note this only makes a difference if the CPU allows recovery
- from a machine check exception. Current x86 CPUs generally do not.
-
-trigger
- Program to run when a machine check event is detected.
- This is an alternative to running mcelog regularly from cron
- and allows to detect events faster.
-
-TBD document entries for AMD threshold interrupt configuration
-
-For more details about the x86 machine check architecture
-see the Intel and AMD architecture manuals from their developer websites.
-
-For more details about the architecture see
-see http://one.firstfloor.org/~andi/mce.pdf
+++ /dev/null
-
-<previous description obsolete, deleted>
-
-Virtual memory map with 4 level page tables:
-
-0000000000000000 - 00007fffffffffff (=47 bits) user space, different per mm
-hole caused by [48:63] sign extension
-ffff800000000000 - ffff80ffffffffff (=40 bits) guard hole
-ffff810000000000 - ffffc0ffffffffff (=46 bits) direct mapping of all phys. memory
-ffffc10000000000 - ffffc1ffffffffff (=40 bits) hole
-ffffc20000000000 - ffffe1ffffffffff (=45 bits) vmalloc/ioremap space
-ffffe20000000000 - ffffe2ffffffffff (=40 bits) virtual memory map (1TB)
-... unused hole ...
-ffffffff80000000 - ffffffff82800000 (=40 MB) kernel text mapping, from phys 0
-... unused hole ...
-ffffffff88000000 - fffffffffff00000 (=1919 MB) module mapping space
-
-The direct mapping covers all memory in the system up to the highest
-memory address (this means in some cases it can also include PCI memory
-holes).
-
-vmalloc space is lazily synchronized into the different PML4 pages of
-the processes using the page fault handler, with init_level4_pgt as
-reference.
-
-Current X86-64 implementations only support 40 bits of address space,
-but we support up to 46 bits. This expands into MBZ space in the page tables.
-
--Andi Kleen, Jul 2004
+++ /dev/null
-General note on [U]EFI x86_64 support
--------------------------------------
-
-The nomenclature EFI and UEFI are used interchangeably in this document.
-
-Although the tools below are _not_ needed for building the kernel,
-the needed bootloader support and associated tools for x86_64 platforms
-with EFI firmware and specifications are listed below.
-
-1. UEFI specification: http://www.uefi.org
-
-2. Booting Linux kernel on UEFI x86_64 platform requires bootloader
- support. Elilo with x86_64 support can be used.
-
-3. x86_64 platform with EFI/UEFI firmware.
-
-Mechanics:
----------
-- Build the kernel with the following configuration.
- CONFIG_FB_EFI=y
- CONFIG_FRAMEBUFFER_CONSOLE=y
- If EFI runtime services are expected, the following configuration should
- be selected.
- CONFIG_EFI=y
- CONFIG_EFI_VARS=y or m # optional
-- Create a VFAT partition on the disk
-- Copy the following to the VFAT partition:
- elilo bootloader with x86_64 support, elilo configuration file,
- kernel image built in first step and corresponding
- initrd. Instructions on building elilo and its dependencies
- can be found in the elilo sourceforge project.
-- Boot to EFI shell and invoke elilo choosing the kernel image built
- in first step.
-- If some or all EFI runtime services don't work, you can try following
- kernel command line parameters to turn off some or all EFI runtime
- services.
- noefi turn off all EFI runtime services
- reboot_type=k turn off EFI reboot runtime service
projects / deliverable / linux.git / commitdiff
