✧✦Catherine✦✧5d ago

i think if your network card has "UEFI secure boot" you have done something wrong. probably a lot of things

i counted at least 6 different pieces of firmware when looking at it component by component (if you can call a 128 GB eMMC with Ubuntu on it "firmware")

Show threadShawn Webb5d ago
@whitequark How fun: that's my next engagement at ${DAYJOB}. Gonna do a code review of the UEFI module for a NIC with an eye towards Secure Boot.
Show thread✧✦Catherine✦✧

@lattera no no, i'm not talking about an UEFI module that the NIC injects into the host for PXE reasons. that would be too reasonable.

the NIC itself has UEFI. and a copy of Ubuntu.

Apr 8 at 1:13amWeb
Show thread✧✦Catherine✦✧5d ago
@lattera or did you get hired by Mellanox because then i'm sorry :D
Show threadMichael Kohne5d ago
@whitequark @lattera I doubt they are the only ones. I've been using cell modems of late and got to wondering why the damn ota update was 20mb, then someone told me that these things often run Linux. Absurd.
Show thread✧✦Catherine✦✧5d ago

@mhkohne @lattera oh yeah cell modems are basically just cellphones without UI

this is... well, it's cheaper to just remove a display from a cellphone and let an existing RIL implementation handle it than to make a completely new device from scratch

Show threadMichael Kohne5d ago
@whitequark @lattera It's funny because the chipsets are so complicated to interact with that there are companies that package them up with another microcontroller, giving you a nicer serial interface. Strangeness abounds.
Show thread✧✦Catherine✦✧5d ago
@mhkohne @lattera pretty sure modern LTE (and 5G) chipsets are all PCIe
Show thread✧✦Catherine✦✧5d ago
@mhkohne @lattera or at least PCIe-capable, some still have USB and serial for lower bandwidth applications
Show threadShawn Webb5d ago
@whitequark oOoOo, I didn't catch that nuance. Thanks for the clarification. :-)