[U-Boot-Users] telnet server on u-boot

Hello all,
For some remote instruments, I need to be able to have a telnet access to the boot in case of my Linux kernel and file system are down (after an upgrade for example). I don't think that u-boot provide telnet support and I had a look at another boot project called redboot that provide such a functionality. I have a couple of questions : Does anybody see another solution than telnet to control a remote instrument? Has anybody already tried to add telnet server to u-boot? It seems to be a challenging task because we need to add TCP support. Has anybody used both u-boot and redboot and can point me the main advantages and drawbacks of both?
Thanks for replying,
Laurent MOHIN ACTERNA

Hello Laurent,
For some remote instruments, I need to be able to have a telnet access to the boot in case of my Linux kernel and file system are down (after an upgrade for example). I don't think that u-boot provide telnet support and I had a look at another boot project called redboot that provide such a functionality. I have a couple of questions : Does anybody see another solution than telnet to control a remote instrument? Has anybody already tried to add telnet server to u-boot? It seems to be a challenging task because we need to add TCP support.
U-Boot does not contain any TCP implementation. I doubt that this will be doable with reasonable effort. Writing a standard conform TCP implementation is a daunting task that even many proprietary systems could not solve, i.e. there are many TCP implementations working well in "the lab" _only_.
What I had in mind is a "UDP console" as it was implemented some time ago for the Linux kernel also (there was a patch floating around). Googling for it I found at least this link [1]. This would of course need a "special" program to access the console but it is a much more realistic target to aim at.
Has anybody used both u-boot and redboot and can point me the main advantages and drawbacks of both?
Sorry, I can't help you there.
Cheers Detlev
[1] http://www.linux.it/kerneldocs/sercons/sercons.html

In message 87fzd04g4z.fsf@deepthought.outer.space.org Detlev Zundel wrote:
For some remote instruments, I need to be able to have a telnet access to the boot in case of my Linux kernel and file system are down (after an upgrade for example). I don't think that u-boot provide telnet support and I had a look at another boot project called redboot that provide such a functionality. I have a couple of questions : Does anybody see another solution than telnet to control a remote instrument?
There are many solutions. You don't provide much informatiuon about your workign environment so it is difficult to make a good recommen- dation. Standard solutions include: use a modem to attach to the serial console; use a terminal server to attach to the serial console; etc.
What I had in mind is a "UDP console" as it was implemented some time ago for the Linux kernel also (there was a patch floating around). Googling for it I found at least this link [1]. This would of course need a "special" program to access the console but it is a much more realistic target to aim at.
This has been discussed before indeed for U-Boot, too. Interest for such a feature seems to pretty limited, though.
Best regards,
Wolfgang Denk
participants (3)
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Detlev Zundel
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Laurent Mohin
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Wolfgang Denk