Re: [edk2-devel] [Patch 1/2] OvmfPkg: Change default to disable MptScsi and PvScsi

["James Bottomley" <jejb@linux.ibm.com>]

On Wed, 2022-12-07 at 17:04 +0100, Ard Biesheuvel wrote:
> On Wed, 7 Dec 2022 at 17:02, Gerd Hoffmann <kraxel@redhat.com> wrote:
> > 
> > On Wed, Dec 07, 2022 at 09:14:39AM -0500, James Bottomley wrote:
> > > On Wed, 2022-12-07 at 15:09 +0100, Ard Biesheuvel wrote:
> > > > So at some point, these drivers will be removed rather than
> > > > kept
> > > > alive by the core team unless someone steps up.
> > > 
> > > How important is keeping them alive?
> > 
> > Most common use case is probably bootimg images created on other
> > hypervisors on qemu.  Otherwise there is little reason to use
> > something which is not virtio-scsi.
> > 
> > > I can volunteer to "maintain" them which I anticipate won't be
> > > much effort (plus I'm used to looking after obsolete SCSI
> > > equipment).  The hardware is obsolete, so the mechanics of their
> > > emulation isn't going to change, the only potential risk is
> > > changes in the guest to host transmission layer that breaks
> > > something.
> > 
> 
> Thanks James, that would be very helpful.
> 
> > Yes, I don't expect it being much effort, but knowing oldish scsi
> > stuff certainly helps understanding the driver code if needed.  If
> > you want step up sent a patch updating Maintainers.txt accordingly.
> > 
> 
> Having the informed opinion of a domain expert should allow us to
> diagnose issued related to these drivers with more confidence, and
> also give us insight in how obsolete those drivers actually are.
> 
> I can send the patch if you prefer.

Sure, who can resist someone else doing all the work.

I note we do have a maintained LSI driver: OvmfPkg/LsiScsiDxe.  It
seems to be based on the 53c896 which is really only a marginal subset
of the 1030 ... if I'm remembering correctly the 1030 did Low Voltage
Differential (so a faster SCSI Parallel bus), but since that's a SCSI
Bus protocol, it should have no real impact on the utility of the
emulation.  Is the LsiScsiDxe usable by Debian?

James