Bug#782574: installation-reports: d-i does not boot on beaglebone black
On Wed, 2015-04-15 at 23:39 +0200, Cyril Brulebois wrote:
> Karsten Merker <merker@debian.org> (2015-04-15):
> > On Tue, Apr 14, 2015 at 06:42:57PM -0700, Vagrant Cascadian wrote:
> > > Did some troubleshooting (far more than I expected, now I remember
> > > why I hadn't already done this for BBB), and came up with a patch
> > > for u-boot that makes it work with d-i by emulating some distro
> > > bootcmd variables (similar to the patch for wandboard), and a small
> > > patch to flash kernel to support the change in how the "bootpart"
> > > variable is used.
>
> Since Karsten mentions both have to reach jessie in lockstep, I'm
> wondering whether there should be a Breaks: somewhere to avoid some
> breakages in case of a partial update.
>
> > > I've tested that it boots the armhf daily hd-media installer and
> > > boots an installed system. I could upload a new version of u-boot if
> > > it's deemed worth it; otherwise we'll just need more complicated
> > > instructions for manually loading the installer on d-i. FWIW, The
> > > netboot media via tftp works without any changes.
> > >
> > > If the user ever used u-boot's "saveenv" command, it may take
> > > considerable effort resetting the environment using "env default -a"
> > > followed by manually setting board_name, findfdt and/or fdtfile
> > > variables so that it detects the correct .dtb. I didn't have
> > > consistant success zeroing out the boot device, but in theory that
> > > should work too.
> >
> > I had hoped to be able to spend some more time on the issue
> > today, but things didn't work out as planned and as things are
> > looking curently, I probably won't be able to dedicate time to it
> > tomorrow as well.
> >
> > As the deadline for d-i-relevant changes is Friday, the question
> > is what to do now. AFAICS due to the necessity to change the BBB
> > boot script in flash-kernel when the patch is applied to u-boot,
> > both flash-kernel and u-boot would have to enter Jessie in
> > lockstep. As there is not enough time for regular migration to
> > Jessie, the release team would have to urgent both packages in
> > addition to an unblock to keep the deadline. The involved DDs
> > are in vastly different timezones, which makes all this even more
> > problematic. As stated above, I probably won't be able to take
> > care of flash-kernel in time, so unless Ian would like to handle
> > that, I do not see a a realistic chance to get this solved for
> > Jessie.
> >
> > Ian, what is your take on the issue?
>
> So I've been thinking about this for a while and I'm not too happy about
> possibly rushing these changes at this point. What could be considered
> instead is having these changes staged into unstable, let them migrate
> to testing/stretch when the freeze is lifted, and possibly backport them
> in to the jessie first point release. A workaround can be documented in
> the D-I Jessie RC3 errata.
>
> Would that seem reasonable to all people involved?
Yes, IIRC from the thread the workaround is pretty simple, certainly in
comparison with the scope of the proposed changes.
Ian.
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