UEFI 2.3.1 Specification

The UEFI 2.3.1 specification is now available at www.uefi.org.

Notable additions to this version of the specification include-

* Time-based authenticated variable and richer signing
* Key Management Services (KMS) protocol (loosely based on KMIP)
* Storage Security Command Protocol for hardware full-disk encryption (FDE) devices
* DUID-UUID usage in netboot6 to report platform identification
* Non-Blocking interfaces for Block I/O protocol
* Enhancements to the USB protocol for USB 3.0

Take a look

IPV6 Phase-2 ready logo achieved

Check out https://www.ipv6ready.org/db/index.php/public/logo/02-C-000590/ to see that the IPV6 network stack at Tianocore.org has achieved the phase-2 testing logo.

As noted on the page,
Open source preboot (firmware) network stack for UEFI EDKII UDK2010 UP3 P1 firmware. To be used with UEFI spec 2.3 or later netboot6

The details on netboot6 can be found in the UEFI 2.3 Specification, Errata D, and future iterations of the specification, along with RFC 5970.

IPv6 Ready Logo

The UEFI network stack implementation at http://www.tianocore.org, which implements the API's in the UEFI2.3 specification at http://www.uefi.org, including http://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc5970.txt IPv6 netboot, has achieved IPv6 Ready logo -


https://www.ipv6ready.org/db/index.php/public/logo/01-000557/


This is an important milestone in the journey toward pre-OS network boot, provisioning, recovery, and other OS-absent networking applications.

2nd edition of Beyond BIOS is now available

An updated version of the 'Beyond BIOS' book is available. It can be found at Intel Press or from Amazon.

This new edition will describe the latest updates to the UEFI 2.3 and Platform Initialization (PI) 1.2 specifications, in addition to details on embedded, system-on-a-chip (SOC), fast-boot, security, and manageability.

IPv6 netboot

Check-out the newly-published http://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc5970.txt. This describes how to perform a network boot on IPv6.

Good reading on firmware & UEFI

I just wanted to provide some background material on the work I do in firmware, namely UEFI-based technology.

A good place to start is a chapter I co-authored w/ colleagues at Intel in the Springer book Hardware-Dependent Software at http://www.springerlink.com/content/p814344458841w72/; this provides a basic overview of the machine boot flow, UEFI, PI. In addition, the same set of authors published a book with Intel Press "Beyond BIOS" which has a more detail at http://www.intel.com/intelpress/sum_efi.htm. Part of the work at UEFI of late has included bringing in the UEFI Shell, and we have a soon-to-be-released book at http://www.intel.com/intelpress/sum_eshl.htm with the same authorsplus Tim Lewis from Phoenix.

These readings, along with the specifications at http://www.uefi.org/home/ and reference implementation at https://www.tianocore.org/, should provide a good starting point on the UEFI adventure.

Other recent material that treats on more specific topics, like UEFI and trusted computing technology, can be found at http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~kubitron/courses/cs194-24-S14/hand-outs/SF09_EFIS001_UEFI_PI_TCG_White_Paper.pdf. This is material I provided with IBM co-authors to complement our Spring Intel Developer Forum (IDF) presentation. And a similar whitepaper-style reading authored by by Intel and HP engineers that treats the evolution of UEFI and networking technology can be found at http://www.uefi.org/sites/default/files/resources/A_Tale_of_Two_Standards_0.pdf.