expand other.md

Signed-off-by: Leah Rowe <leah@libreboot.org>
master
Leah Rowe 2025-01-25 18:31:03 +00:00
parent 3b90750b4b
commit 5cf2ddde73
1 changed files with 135 additions and 1 deletions

View File

@ -208,7 +208,72 @@ website. We in the Libreboot project wish to see everyone using free boot
firmware, which was the primary motivation behind this page, in promoting the
various projects.
Non-coreboot free firmware
Organisations
-------------
This list will be populated over time. Several organisations exist out there
that pertain to *Free and Open Source firmware* development, supporting its
existence in general. Here are just a few of them:
### Open Source Firmware Foundation (OSFF)
Website: <https://opensourcefirmware.foundation/>
The OSFF is a non-profit organisation of Oregon, USA, whose mission it is to
coordinate communication between the various free boot projects (projects like
coreboot). Several coreboot developers are a part of
its [governance](https://opensourcefirmware.foundation/team/).
The OSFF also hosts an annual [Open Source Firmware
Conference](https://www.osfc.io/), where various projects, companies and
peoples can talk about their work in this field.
The OSFF exists precisely because nothing like it has existed before; the
world of boot firmware is largely dominated by proprietary IBVs (independent
BIOS vendors), the likes of e.g. AMI, Phoenix.
Organisations like OSFF are critical, if we ever wish to see *libre* boot
firmware become the default firmware, on computers that normal people actually
purchase. All the separate projects out there do great work, but it is critical
that we have a central *sorting ground*, a *point of contact* if you will,
to represent us, and the OSFF's mission is to be exactly that.
OSFF also has their own list of projects, similar to the list on *this* page
that you are reading now. See:
<https://opensourcefirmware.foundation/projects/>
Libreboot is currently not affiliated with the OSFF in any official capacity,
but it has our *full* support, and we will do what we can to help it, when we
can.
### Software Freedom Conservancy (SFC)
Although not strictly related to free/opensource firmware, the coreboot project
is an SFC member, which you can see here:
<https://sfconservancy.org/projects/current/>
The SFC is a non-profit organisation of New York, USA, dedicated to the
cause of [software freedom](https://writefreesoftware.org/learn), with a view
towards Copyleft advocacy, especially [copyleft
compliance enforcement](https://sfconservancy.org/copyleft-compliance/).
SFC provides services to *member projects*, such as coreboot, which you
can read about here:
* <https://sfconservancy.org/projects/>
* <https://sfconservancy.org/projects/services/>
Services such as donations infrastructure, legal services (including things
like copyright assignements and enforcement), advice/assistance about project
governance, help with fundraising and outreach, etc.
Although Libreboot is not affiliated with SFC in any official capacity, it is
otherwise an excellent organisation, it is listed here in honour of the
excellent work it does, including its support of the coreboot project.
Non-coreboot firmware projects
--------------------------
Several other projects besides coreboot provide free hardware initialisation,
@ -216,5 +281,74 @@ such as [U-Boot](https://www.u-boot.org/) (as own firmware, distinct from U-Boot
as a coreboot payload), [Trusted Firmware](https://www.trustedfirmware.org/) and
so on.
Here are a few such projects:
### fwupd
fwupd is essentially a centralised repository of firmware images, that
can be used to provide updates for your mainboard. Although not officially
supported nor endorsed by the Libreboot project, many Linux distros make
use of this to provide UEFI firmware updates for example.
Libreboot doesn't use this, due to the many idiosyncrasies of Libreboot on
various motherboards; however, we may use it in a limited capacity, in the
future.
### LinuxBoot
Website: <https://www.linuxboot.org/>
LinuxBoot can be provided as a UEFI DXE, or as a U-Boot SPL, coreboot payload
or Slim Bootloader Stage 1B, to provide a Linux kernel at boot time, which
kexecs into another Linux kernel.
The benefit of using *Linux* to *boot Linux* is that then the bootloader part
of your firmware doesn't need to rewrite every driver, because Linux already
provides excellent drivers, and it also affords you many advanced
configuration possibility such as hardened encryption setups with things
like Measured Boot, and it could also be used to boot over a network.
### OpenBMC
Website: <https://github.com/openbmc/docs>
Linux distro for management controllers (BMCs) used on servers,
rack switches and RAID appliances. This provides a remote management
feature, most useful (for example) on colocated server hosting.
### Oreboot
Website: <https://github.com/oreboot/oreboot>
Oreboot is a special fork of coreboot, re-written in the Rust programming
language, focusing specifically on the *LinuxBoot* payload configuration.
### Trusted Firmware
Website: <https://opensourcefirmware.foundation/projects/>
Trusted Firmware provides boot firmware for ARMv8-A, ARMv9-A
and ARMv8-M. Specifically tailored for use on embedded systems, and parts of
it are also used by the coreboot project on some boards.
### U-Boot
Website: <https://www.u-boot.org/>
U-Boot runs on a large number of embedded systems, with support for a variety
of architectures such as ARM, x86, RISC-V and others. U-Boot provides its own
small kernel and operating system, with drivers and applications designed to
boot your operating system using various methods. It has an advanced *shell*,
with excellent networking and file system support - most notably, we use it
in Libreboot as a UEFI payload for *coreboot*, but U-Boot can also provide its
own boot initialisation independently of coreboot.
One of the nice features of U-Boot is its *licensing* (GPLv2 for the most part)
and similar coding style to Linux; the licensing and technical design means
that it's much easier to port existing Linux drivers, when something needs to
be done in the U-boot project.
-----------------------------------------
We would like to list various distros of these too. If you know of a cool
project, please get in touch with the Libreboot project!