New Features

For a while now, U-Boot’s EFI application (efi_app) has been a handy tool, but with one noticeable difference between architectures: x86 could show things on the screen, while ARM was stuck in the dark. If you wanted a splash screen or a graphical boot menu in your ARM EFI app, you were out of luck….

The Flattened Image Tree (FIT) is at the heart of modern U-Boot booting, providing a flexible and verifiable way to package kernels, ramdisks, and devicetrees. A new series introduces a significant enhancement to how U-Boot processes FITs, enabling a powerful two-stage boot process. This allows a “load-only” FIT to configure the system (like setting up…

In the world of embedded systems, a Flattened Image Tree (FIT) is the standard way to package a bootable OS, typically bundling the kernel, a ramdisk, and the necessary devicetree (FDT) into a single, verifiable file. While convenient, this approach tightly couples the OS with its hardware description. But what if the OS and the…

We’re excited to announce a significant new feature in U-Boot: a virtio-scsi driver. While U-Boot has long supported virtio-blk for block device access in virtualized environments, virtio-scsi offers greater flexibility, allowing a single virtio device to host multiple disks (LUNs) and supporting features like hotplug. This comprehensive 27-patch series, does more than just add a…

U-Boot Concept now supports the EFI Boot Graphics Resource Table (BGRT) feature. This enhancement allows for a more seamless and branded boot experience on devices that use EFI_LOADER, i.e. the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI). What is BGRT? The BGRT is a table in the ACPI (Advanced Configuration and Power Interface) that allows the firmware…