[LinuxBIOS] Winflashrom -- Current Status

[Roman Kononov]

On 08/14/2007 02:47 PM, Peter Stuge wrote:
>> The CF8/CFC sequence can preserve CF8 port value. What other
>> hardware state would be changed?
> 
> The bits that are changed in the device config space.

I cannot imagine why the OS would care about a couple of configuration bits 
in the SB.

> Yup. Are you saying it is simply not possible to access PCI config
> space of a device from a device driver unless the driver is in fact
> part of the driver stack associated with that device?

Yes.

> I suppose Microsoft considers that a feature?

Yes. They don't want one driver to mess with other devices.

> But, on the other hand, there are a few applications that _do_.
> So how do they do it?

Using undocumented features is not uncommon in Windows.

> we can make
> ourselves be part of the driver stack for the southbridge?

It sounds too painful.

> Or maybe there is in fact a userspace API for PCI config access?

I doubt. It would be a huge security hole.

> I am by no means a Windows API or WDM expert, then I'd already
> written the code. :p That world is a pretty strange place.

Lucky you... It is not a pleasure to write Windows code.

Regards,

Roman