Dear Jean-Christophe PLAGNIOL-VILLARD,
In message 20090820132229.GT8470@game.jcrosoft.org you wrote:
ok, I think this will break nfsroot. I don't think it's possible to init ethernet with a initramfs before mounting the rootfs.
pivot root is your friend and generate the mac address at the openof the device in the kernel
...
but the best will be to handle this in a initramfs
Well, anybody with a minimum of experience in embedded systems and a halfway sane state of mind will agree that having to boot Linux into user space just to set the MAC address of the network interface is a real waste of time and resources, and not an acceptable solution.
The fact that the ARM Linux kernel until today has not found any standard way to allow passing of vital hardware information (including MAC addresses) from the boot loader to the Linux kenrel is extremely pitiable, and we all can but hope that we will see device tree support for ARM rather sooner than later.
In the mean time, Linux kernal modifications like accepting an "ethaddr=" boot argument are a viable workaround.
Best regards,
Wolfgang Denk