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Raspberry Pi 2 Model B on OpenBSD

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Re: Raspberry Pi 2 Model B on OpenBSD

#11

Post by duaneb »

throwaway2048 wrote: post #6
ChuckMcM wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually if you read the comments from the developers in that thread they won't support it until there is documentation on the firmware "blobs" you need to have in order to even boot. I agree it is a fuzzy line but one which I happen to agree with. There is a probably a thesis to be had for the first person to build a provably trusted system using untrusted base hardware. I am not even sure how you would start such a…

It is a mischaracterization to say they have issues with the firmware, they clearly say they don't have the same objections to firmware running on the peripherals themselves. The issue here is that the rPI requires driver code running inside OpenBSD that is a closed source blob.

To my understanding, no distribution of a binary blob would be necessary. It is already flashed onto the raspberry pi. The original drivers are open source but not free, but it would be easy to at least get vga working.

Re: Raspberry Pi 2 Model B on OpenBSD

#12

Post by kbenson »

It's hard from this thread to determine if the OpenBSD developers have a point and are just expressing it unclearly, or if they are mistaken in some of their assertions and are unwilling to event engage on the issue enough to learn this.

The one time someone references a prior rPi discussion, it's to a message from Theo De Raadt that says:

Wow. Dream on. It is a mess of firmware. You know nothing of our history?

I understand maybe this has come up before and they are tired of the discussion, but this is just toxic. Is it really so hard to just reference a valid prior discussion when this comes up?

Re: Raspberry Pi 2 Model B on OpenBSD

#13

Post by popalop »

kbenson wrote: post #12

It's hard from this thread to determine if the OpenBSD developers have a point and are just expressing it unclearly, or if they are mistaken in some of their assertions and are unwilling to event engage on the issue enough to learn this. The one time someone references a prior rPi discussion, it's to a message from Theo De Raadt that says: Wow. Dream on. It is a mess of firmware. You know nothing of our history? I un…

The OpenBSD mailing lists tend to be extremely Spartan.

The guidelines users are expected to learn before using them generally involve (from most accepted to least accepted)

Read the mailing lists.

Read them again.

If you have a problem read the man pages.

If you still have a problem search the mailing lists for similar problems.

Make sure you really understand your problem then search again.

If after research you fully understand the problem but still don't have a solution post to the specific mailing list with diagnostic info.

Consider writing up a bug report/ creating your own solution as necessary.

and way way down the list, in the has virtually never been the correct thing to do category, is ask questions like "Will you support the RPi?" Those sort of questions have been asked for essentially every piece of hardware and subtechnology out there, and the answer is always either "No, because propritery whatever but you're free to do the work yourself" or "No, because we're busy and barely keeping the lights and servers on, but you're free to do the work yourself" or "Yes, and you'd know that if you read the mailing lists".

The mailing lists are famous for their get sh*t done attitude and any information about posting on them will relay that to new users.

Re: Raspberry Pi 2 Model B on OpenBSD

#15

Post by wolfgke »

Narishma wrote: post #10
throwaway2048 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a mischaracterization to say they have issues with the firmware, they clearly say they don't have the same objections to firmware running on the peripherals themselves. The issue here is that the rPI requires driver code running inside OpenBSD that is a closed source blob.

The blob runs on a different processor (the GPU), not inside OpenBSD.

But the GPU has access to the RAM.

Re: Raspberry Pi 2 Model B on OpenBSD

#18

Post by tedunangst »

Bluerise wrote: post #7
throwaway2048 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a mischaracterization to say they have issues with the firmware, they clearly say they don't have the same objections to firmware running on the peripherals themselves. The issue here is that the rPI requires driver code running inside OpenBSD that is a closed source blob.

I'm sorry, but that is wrong. The main blobs are being run on the GPU, as bootloaders, even before the actual operating system is loaded. OpenBSD does not need to run _any_ blob itself. There used to be a 3d graphics driver blob, but afaik that got open sourced. Also, if you don't do 3d, you wouldn't even need it.

So, to summarize, if somebody makes a port that doesn't use a blob, all is good. The question seems to be not so much if the blob runs before or after OpenBSD, but whether we would need to distribute it. If it's in the ROM, then this isn't even a question. But if it's something we are expected to write to the flash drive, that's a potential problem. Anyway, the question isn't very interesting given that the magic porting elves haven't yet gifted us with an OpenBSD RPi port.

I don't know exactly what the situation is. Don't care. I have a BeagleboneBlack if I wanted to watch the paint dry doing a build. :)

Re: Raspberry Pi 2 Model B on OpenBSD

#19

Post by bootload »

popalop wrote: post #13
kbenson wrote: post #12

It's hard from this thread to determine if the OpenBSD developers have a point and are just expressing it unclearly, or if they are mistaken in some of their assertions and are unwilling to event engage on the issue enough to learn this. The one time someone references a prior rPi discussion, it's to a message from Theo De Raadt that says: Wow. Dream on. It is a mess of firmware. You know nothing of our history? I un…

The OpenBSD mailing lists tend to be extremely Spartan. The guidelines users are expected to learn before using them generally involve (from most accepted to least accepted) Read the mailing lists. Read them again. If you have a problem read the man pages. If you still have a problem search the mailing lists for similar problems. Make sure you really understand your problem then search again. If after research you fu…

"The general guidelines users are expected to learn before using them generally involve (from most accepted to least accepted)"

Back in 2003 running 3.2 on ancient hardware that is indeed the process I went through. [0]

http://monkey.org/openbsd/archive/misc/0310/msg01026.html

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