| Welcome to OpenBIOS |
| ------------------- |
| |
| OpenBIOS is a free, portable implementation of IEEE 1275-1994 |
| (Open Firmware). Find detailed information about OpenBIOS at |
| http://www.openbios.org/ |
| |
| What is OpenBIOS? |
| ----------------- |
| |
| OpenBIOS can replace your system firmware (BIOS) partly or completely. It |
| can also be used as a bootloader to create an Open Firmware compatible |
| interface between legacy firmware and an operating system. |
| |
| This is achieved by a modular concept that consists of a portable Forth |
| kernel and three interfaces for user interaction, device initialization |
| and client (operating system) control. |
| |
| While far not all possible applications of OpenBIOS are implemented yet, |
| a lot of functionality is already there. OpenBIOS can be used to enhance |
| LinuxBIOS (http://www.linuxbios.org), or be booted from any multiboot |
| capable bootloader to bring Open Firmware to your machine. OpenBIOS can |
| also be used when an operating system is already running. It provides |
| the needed OpenFirmware functionality to MOL (MacOnLinux) to boot MacOS |
| 9 and X on PPC machines, as well as Linux (all supported platforms) |
| |
| OpenBIOS build options |
| --------------------- |
| |
| config/scripts/switch-arch <platform> - build for specified platform |
| Look in config/example for |
| platforms. |
| |
| make - build all configured binaries |
| |
| make run - run unix example. |
| |
| |
| How OpenBIOS works |
| ------------------ |
| |
| The OpenBIOS forth core is split into a forth kernel written in portable |
| C and a forth dictionary which operated on by the kernel. |
| |
| When building the forth core, you get different versions of |
| the forth kernel: |
| |
| * a unix executable program |
| |
| - to execute a forth dictionary from a file. This can be used for |
| easily testing and developing OpenBIOS on a unix host. |
| |
| - to create a dictionary file. Such a dictionary file sets up |
| all of the forth language. Primitives are indexed to save relocations. |
| |
| The default is to create a forth dictionary forth.dict from |
| forth/start.fs. This file includes all of the basic forth language |
| constructs from forth/bootstrap.fs and starts the interpreter. |
| |
| To achieve this, the hosted unix version contains a basic set of |
| forth words coded in C that allow creating a full dictionary. |
| |
| * a varying number of target specific binaries. On x86 you can start |
| openbios for example from GRUB or LinuxBIOS. They are all based on |
| the same forth engine consisting of a dictionary scheduler, primitive |
| words needed to build the forth environment, 2 stacks and a simple |
| set of console functions. These binaries can not be started directly |
| in the unix host environment. |
| |
| Requirements |
| ------------ |
| * gcc |
| * gnu make |
| * OpenBIOS FCode Utils |
| Download with svn co svn://openbios.org/openbios/fcode-utils |
| * grub or any other multiboot loader to run the multiboot |
| binary "openbios.multiboot" with it's module "openbios-<platform>.dict" |
| * xsltproc |
| |
| Building & Usage |
| ---------------- |
| |
| * make |
| |
| this builds "openbios.multiboot", the standalone image and "openbios-unix", |
| the hosted image. Additionally it creates a forth dictionary |
| file from forth/start.fs. All generated files are written to |
| the absolute directory held by the variable BUILDDIR, which defaults |
| to obj-[platform]. Some compile time parameters can be tweaked in |
| include/config.h |
| |
| * use "openbios-unix" to create a forth dictionary on your own: |
| $ obj-x86/openbios-unix -Iforth start.fs |
| creates the file forth.dict from forth source forth/start.fs. |
| |
| * use "openbios-unix" to run a created dictionary: |
| $ obj-x86/openbios-unix obj-x86/openbios-unix.dict |
| This is useful for testing |
| |
| * booting openbios |
| You can boot openbios i.e. in grub. Add the following lines to |
| your menu.lst: |
| |
| title openbios |
| kernel (hd0,2)/boot/openbios.multiboot |
| module (hd0,2)/boot/openbios-x86.dict |
| |
| Note: change (hd0,2) to the partition you copied the openbios image and |
| openbios-x86.dict to. |
| |
| To boot OpenBIOS from LinuxBIOS/etherboot, you can either use |
| "openbios-plain.elf" or "openbios-builtin.elf": |
| |
| - openbios-plain.elf is the pure kernel that loads the dictionary from a |
| hardcoded address in flash memory (0xfffe0000) |
| |
| - openbios-builtin.elf also includes the dictionary directly so that it |
| can be easily used from etherboot or the LinuxBIOS builtin ELF |
| loader without taking care of the dictionary |
| |
| CREDITS |
| ------- |
| OpenBIOS was developed by Stefan Reinauer, Samuel Rydh and Patrick Mauritz. |
| The OpenBIOS IDE driver was written by Jens Axboe. |
| For license details on this piece of software, see the file COPYING. |
| |
| |
| If you have patches, questions, comments, feel free to contact the OpenBIOS |
| mailinglist. |
| |
| Regards, |
| the OpenBIOS team |
