Towards a Unified Firmware for Enzian

Abstract

Firmware, the code running before the operating system starts, is a vast and interesting subject. Unfortunately, most knowledge in the field is owned by silicon vendors and not openly available, hindering research projects like Enzian. A large amount of hard-to-maintain, proprietary legacy code makes it difficult to extend it for research purposes, and poses a risk in technical debt and security. The Systems Group at ETH Zürich is developing the open Enzian research computer. The vendor-provided firmware is proprietary, thus in conflict with the openness principle, as well as difficult to adjust for research purposes. Thus, the project of creating a new firmware was initiated. Continuing the work started by the two prior theses, the original goal of this thesis was to integrate the two previously developed components and create a working firmware stack. In the process of writing this thesis it became evident that this endeavor would be much more involved than initially anticipated. The numerous problems that arise from a project of this nature will be explored. This thesis makes progress towards a production ready firmware stack and aims to be a guide for how to efficiently proceed with this project.