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Re: NAND technical review


Rutger Hofman wrote:
Jonathan Larmour wrote:
Rutger Hofman wrote:
Jonathan Larmour wrote:

Does your implementation _require_ a BBT in its current implementation? For simpler NAND usage, it may be overkill e.g. an application where the number of rewrites is very small, so the factory bad markers may be considered sufficient.


I had forgotten: there is a configuration option to bypass BBT and only use factory-bad markers (and caveat emptor).

Ah. Your documentation includes:
"Before the second initialization stage, some properties of the NAND system can be configured. These are en/disabling of ECC generation and en/disabling of a Bad Block Table (BBT). By default, ECC and BBT are enabled."


I hadn't noticed that these are not in fact CDL configuration options. They ought to be really.

This is a bit hairy in my opinion, and one reason is that there is no Standard Layout for the spare areas. One case where a BBT is forced: my BlackFin NFC can be used to boot from NAND, but it enforces a spare layout that is incompatible with MTD or anybody. It is even incompatible with most chips' specification that the first byte of spare in the first page of the block is the Bad Block Marker. BlackFin's boot layout uses this first byte in a way that suits it, and it may be 0 -- which would otherwise mean Bad Block.


I infer that your layer can cope with that? I didn't see the handling for that in io_nand_chip_bad_block.c.

No (not yet).

If it doesn't sound too silly, how were you able to test your layer on the bfin then?


To use the NAND controller in this way, a different spare layout must be used for the chip. Although there are no obstacles to selecting different spare layouts, there is no support for that yet. It would require one extra parameter in the chip device struct 'constructor' (e.g. with NULL for 'choose default = MTD compatible').

You mean CYG_NAND_DRIVER_CHIP()? Presumably some way to pass a different layout?


I was wondering about the extensibility of the spare layouts given how much stuff is sort of hard coded - sure it may fit plenty of existing chips but more can come along. In the chip ID table in io_nand_chip.c I haven't worked out what the layout field is for - I can't find where it is used. I also can't see how a driver in a new port can add a new chip with a new layout. There's talk in read_id() of being able to do a custom chip device (does that mean also you can do a custom spare layout?), but it's not clear to me how a new port can add that to the table since read_id() only searches the table. Obviously it's not sensible to have to keep changing io/nand, and may be inappropriate for custom spare layouts.

NB the chip ID table can be const can't it?

For the record: MDT/Blackfin/u-boot has support for this different layout, but it is build-static. MDT cannot hot-swap layouts (at the moment).

That's reasonable given it's associated with the controller.


Is your BBT compatible with Linux MTD? Including your use of a mirror?


Yes, I read MTD, and tried to copy their BBT handling as faithfully as possible without actually copying code. It is on my stack to check if the BBTs are indeed identical; as you may have noticed elsethread, my eCos application wants to share a YAFFS 'disk' with u-boot which has MTD.

Okay. Obviously compatibility is very important, especially for those using eCos/RedBoot just to load Linux.


But also, since R does not have partitioning, won't that potentially interfere with compatibility with MTD? A Linux booted image may not be using the whole chip as a single FS.

[memory use]
If you know what it's going to be (at most), it could just be allocated statically and just used directly surely? That's got the lowest overheads.

E's implementation had a good idea of a CDL variable for the maximum supported block size. Then individual HALs or driver packages can use a CDL 'requires' to ensure it's >= the block size of the chips really in use.

I can follow Ross's example here. Together with a switch to constructor and a cleanup of printfs, that will take some days. If it matters in the decision, I will schedule this to be finished within one month.

I'll make a note about it - again I don't want you to be adjusting things before the decision has been made - I for one certainly haven't made up my mind either way. But thanks very much for your willingness to do so! I doubt either implementation will be checked in with zero further changes anyway.


[OneNAND (and things like it) fitting into R's model]
I will take a better look at the OneNAND datasheet. You are right, it is software-wise as different from NOR as from 'raw' NAND. My guarded guess now is that integration into R would imply a replacement of the Common Controller code (by configuration or by 'object-oriented' indirect calls over a device struct). I will report on this later.

Thanks. Although of course adding more indirection may have its own disadvantages.


Ross, if you're reading, I would be interested to know whether something with a different access model, like OneNAND, would work with E's layer, in your opinion. While I think the answer is yes, I had better check.

Jifl
--
--["No sense being pessimistic, it wouldn't work anyway"]-- Opinions==mine


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