[Automated-testing] Looking for a Debian kernel provisioning solution

[Manuel Traut]

Hi Tim,

> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Thomas Gleixner 
> > On Wed, 24 Jan 2018, Bird, Timothy wrote:
> > 
> > > So, I want to test LTS kernels on a MinnowBoard Turbot....
> > >
> > > I'm looking for a board farm solution that can handle
> > > building a mainline (or LTS) kernel, and deploy it to the MinnowBoard,
> > > and reboot the board to a Linux shell prompt.
> > 
> > You might look into the CI-RT infrastructure which does exactly that with
> > debian packaged kernels.
> > 
> >        https://ci-rt.linutronix.de/RT-Test/about.jsp
> > 
> > All it requires is power switch and serial ... No fancy extra magic
> > hardware.
> 
> I'll definitely take a look at this.  Avoiding extra hardware is
> a big plus.
> 
> I seem to recall some mention of using kexec to boot into the kernel under test,
> from the presentation at ELCE.  Is that correct?

yes

> If so, this will work for some tests,
> but not, obviously, for production boot-time tests.

It works well for rt qa tests. If you want to 'flash' the test-kernel to your
device, the kexec part needs to be replaced and a 'rescue' system needs to
restore your device if a non-working kernel was flashed.

> Also, is kexec supported on
> all Linux platforms?  What platforms are supported in the lab now?

https://ci-rt.linutronix.de/RT-Test/targets.jsp

BTW. the am572x board doesn't use kexec. It is 'emulated' by a boot_once
command in uboot. Anna-Maria can give you more details about that.

> I guess I have lots of questions - should I direct them to ci at linutronix.de?

Yes, i also added this address to 'cc' of this thread.

Regards,

  Manuel