AMDGPU Firmware Blobs Updated For Video Encode/Decode

[duby229]

Wrong answer. I asked what is the difference apart from semantics. This is still semantics.

No it's not, a board is a board and a firmware is a firmware.

[starshipeleven]

I agree fully. It's not hardware, but it is what programs hardware to put it in a useful state.

Wrong. It's not initialization code, That's a BIOS or UEFI lower levels. or Coreboot.

A microcode is code executed all the time inside the device, that tells the programmable logic blocks in it how to react to specific stimuli, every time something happens. It is the same logic that in a distant past was implemented in silicon design or even board design, that now runs as very low level software so that designers can design ridiculously complex hardware at an acceptable speed. Programmable logic blocks can be tuned by changing this microcode, not the whole hardware design.

So while it is technically software, conceptually it is still the same thing as the core logic of fixed-logic silicon designs, and this means it would still make 0 sense to ask for its opensourcing on any grounds, as it's integral part of the hardware design, not something that may or may not run on top like an OS or a driver.

[duby229]

Wrong. It's not initialization code, That's a BIOS or UEFI lower levels. or Coreboot.

A microcode is code executed all the time inside the device, that tells the programmable logic blocks in it how to react to specific stimuli, every time something happens. It is the same logic that in a distant past was implemented in silicon design or even board design, that now runs as very low level software so that designers can design ridiculously complex hardware at an acceptable speed. Programmable logic blocks can be tuned by changing this microcode, not the whole hardware design.

So while it is technically software, conceptually it is still the same thing as the core logic of fixed-logic silicon designs, and this means it would still make 0 sense to ask for its opensourcing on any grounds, as it's integral part of the hardware design, not something that may or may not run on top like an OS or a driver.

That's not even at all what I said.

[starshipeleven]

No it's not, a board is a board and a firmware is a firmware.

And a horse is a horse. Again, this is just semantics.

Being a software does not automatically mean that it may make sense to opensource it, or that if it is closed source then it must be evil we must get rid of, so apart from stating that a horse is a horse, there isn't much more you can do here.

[starshipeleven]

That's not even at all what I said.

I read "what programs hardware to put it in a useful state." as initialization.

If you said something more like "what runs in hardware to keep it in a useful state." I would have thought more of what microcodes (or most hardware firmware blobs in general) do.

[duby229]

And a horse is a horse. Again, this is just semantics.

Being a software does not automatically mean that it may make sense to opensource it, or that if it is closed source then it must be evil we must get rid of, so apart from stating that a horse is a horse, there isn't much more you can do here.

I never said anything about open sourcing it. It doesn't make sense to do that.

[duby229]

I read "what programs hardware to put it in a useful state." as initialization.

If you said something more like "what runs in hardware to keep it in a useful state." I would have thought more of what microcodes (or most hardware firmware blobs in general) do.

That's more or less what I meant. Although it doesn't matter at all where it runs or when it runs and that includes initialization as well.

[smitty3268]

There's firmware and then there's "firmware".

For the most part, I think AMD is fine with what they're doing here. I have no issue at all with the really low-level stuff being in there without source code.

It's when they start putting higher-level stuff in that it becomes more troublesome. The video stuff belongs in that category, but obviously AMD decided they had to do things that way in order to keep the crypto keys/etc. private, which I can understand.

The real unfortunate thing is when you have bugs in the firmware and AMD stops supporting it, meaning you can never get that functionality fixed on your older hardware - such as what's happening with r600 right now (see Roland/Nicolai discussion on mesa dev).

[RussianNeuroMancer]

AMD, please fix this: https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=196683

[andrebrait]

We have the RTL source trees as well, but we are not opening up that part of the hardware design either.

The *drivers* are open source. The *hardware* (which includes microcode) is not.

Oh yeah, don't get me wrong here. I was just answering to the guy who said open sourcing the firmware would introduce too much code into the drivers and the kernel as a whole.

I know they're part of the hardware design.