Re: accessing efivarfs in debian-installer

[Nicholas D Steeves <nsteeves@gmail.com>]

Hi Francesco,

On 24 May 2016 at 06:47, Francesco De Vita <fradev@inventati.org> wrote:
> As explained here [2], the wifi device requires a proprietary firmware
> and its nvram-file, a UEFI configuration variable from
> /sys/firmware/efi/efivars. Loading the firmware in the DI is not a
> problem but I'm unable to access the efivarfs interface.
>
> Using a tty console in the DI, I can see that the directory
> /sys/firmware/efi/efivars is there but it is empty. Mounting the
> efivarfs in this path [2] fails with the "no such device" message, and
> lsmod doesn't show the efivars and efivarfs modules, which I suppose
> are required.
>
> [1] https://wiki.debian.org/InstallingDebianOn/Asus/T100TA
> [2] https://wiki.debian.org/InstallingDebianOn/Asus/T100TA#WiFi
>

I seem to remember someone else writing about EFI not working poorly
with alpha5...  Could you please try alpha6?  The T100TA wiki states
either i386 or amd64+i386 grub-efi need to be used.  Here are links to
the netinst isos for your convenience.

http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/stretch_di_alpha6/i386/iso-cd/debian-stretch-DI-alpha6-i386-netinst.iso
http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/stretch_di_alpha6/multi-arch/iso-cd/debian-stretch-DI-alpha6-amd64-i386-netinst.iso

Alternatively, could someone please comment on how the following is
different from the multiarch iso?  Or does the multiarch iso install a
preconfigured amd64+i386 sources.list and packages out of the box,
while using a 64bit grub-efi?  The reason I mention this mac iso is
because I seem to remember that macs are infamous for using mixed-mode
EFI.
http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/stretch_di_alpha6/amd64/iso-cd/debian-mac-stretch-DI-alpha6-amd64-netinst.iso

Cheers,
Nicholas