Re: [PATCH 4/5] commands: create createnv command

[Sascha Hauer <s.hauer@pengutronix.de>]

On Mon, Jun 02, 2025 at 03:48:26PM +0200, Ahmad Fatoum wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> On 02.06.25 15:28, Sascha Hauer wrote:
> > We want to move away from describing the barebox environment explicitly
> > in the device tree and instead motivate usage of GPT partitions for the
> > envrionment. This patch creates a createnv command to facilitate this.
> > It creates an environment partition on the specified device and if
> > necessary also a GPT partition table. In the simplest case a "createnv"
> > without arguments will create a partition on the device barebox itself
> > booted from. Both the device and the size of the partition can be
> > specified on the command line.
> > 
> > We can't create environment partitions on a device containing a MBR
> > partition table, so a MBR partitioned device won't be touched.
> > 
> > As an additional safety net the command will ask the user if altering
> > the partition table is really desired. This behaviour can be overwritten
> > by specifying -f on the command line.
> 
> Could we have saveenv/loadenv nudge the user towards createnv if CMD_CREATENV
> is enabled?
> 
> Something along the lines of:
> 
>   saveenv: no environment was registered
>   saveenv: run createnv to create an ad-hoc environment

I was more thinking towards issuing a message like that during startup,
because by then we know already that we don't have an environment
partition. The corresponding patch is not yet ready though, so I sent
without it.

Do you see any advantages putting the message into the saveenv command?

Sascha


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