Re: Can OVMF run on an emulated QEMU ARM vexpress-a9?

[Leif Lindholm <leif.lindholm@linaro.org>]

On Mon, Jun 12, 2017 at 06:28:45PM +0200, Laszlo Ersek wrote:
> There used to be ArmPlatformPkg/ArmVExpressPkg (now defunct I think?),

Not quite defunct, just partially migrated to (and used by) the below.

> and there's
> <https://git.linaro.org/uefi/OpenPlatformPkg.git/tree/Platforms/ARM/VExpress>
> as well.
> 
> I think the latter might just give you what you want.

There would probably be some effort required, creating .dsc/.fdf files
- but the vast majority of code should be available. The only 32-bit
platform still supported is "TC2", described by ArmVExpress-CTA15-A7.dsc.

Depending on exactly how much the qemu vexpress-a9 platform models,
and how, some development and/or code archeology may be required.
vexpress-a15 could actually be a lot less effort, since the cortex-a15
contains only architectural caches, whereas the cortex-a9 hardware
platforms used an external L2 (PL310).

If someone would be keen enough to provide an ARM Trusted Firmware
port for CortexA9x4, I would be happy to resurrect that platform port.
But I wouldn't want to bring back the "start from EL3" version.

> You might get away running builds of existent firmware platforms (DSC
> files) in non-matching environments, but the platform integration will
> suffer. This ranges from "crashes without a single log message" to "some
> optional UEFI protocols are missing".

Indeed.

/
    Leif