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Blurring The Line Between BIOS And OS
Jon Kincade writes "The Register has an article about Phoenix Technologies cME software that allows users on anything from servers to embedded systems to run diagnostics, browse the web and other things without having to boot into a full fledged OS. The primary use seems to be recovery from system crashes. Also, this may explain why the Phoenix browser was asked to change its name a few months ago."
Phoenix Technologies is hoping PC manufacturers will latch on to its newest software to help solve PC problems and improve data security.
Phoenix, which creates BIOS software for many of the largest PC manufacturers, branched out this week with the new CME, or Core Managed Environment, software suite.
Where the BIOS (basic input/output system) provides a bridge between a PC's operating system and its hardware, CME will create protected areas on a PC's hard drive that can host sensitive data or applications that alleviate common problems, allowing the computers to run even if the operating system is damaged, the company said.
Phoenix, which will sell the software directly to PC makers for an undisclosed price, becomes the latest in a series of hardware and software makers trying to make PCs easier to use and more secure.
Intel, Transmeta, Via Technologies and Microsoft have recently launched new security initiatives. IBM has also been offering special data recovery software and a security chip in its new PCs. Collectively, the companies are seeking to better protect sensitive data, owned by companies or individuals, against thieves.
Although the security offers--including Intel's "LaGrande" technology, Transmeta's newest Crusoe processor and Via's Padlock--are built into chips or, in the case of Microsoft's Palladium project, into the operating system, Phoenix's CME will reside in a protected area on a PC's hard drive.
CME applications are intended to protect and recover PC users' data and to help the PC itself repair damaged software or connect to the Internet to download updates, the company said in a statement.
Phoenix will also offer versions of CME for embedded devices, such as industrial equipment, consumer electronics and servers.
A bit like the offerngs here?
[This Sig contains on viruses]
HP/Compaq Servers and SUN have some similar things on their servers now. Although no web browser, and not technically BIOS. The Remote Insight Lights-out (RILo)boards provide great disaster recovery tools. Compaq An oldie but goodie is SUN Solaris PROM. Much more useful than BIOS.
I know people clammor for the good ole days of BIOS and CMOS, but now we just need to accept that these new products are going to be better.
what? what I thought we were in the trust tree in the nest, were we not?
Actually, newer Macs use OpenFirmware. I have it on both of my Macs, and they're both over two years old.
For a little bit of fun, hold down CMD+OPT+O+F at the boot chime. This will put you into the PROM, which is scriptable in Forth.
Given that board test and driver suites are written in OF, I don't see any reason at all why a web browser would be difficult. Text-only, perhaps -- but not terribly difficult.
There is also a project I noticed one day on Freshmeat that I think was called Retro Native Forth, for the IA32 arch. I wonder if that could be molded into an OF-like role on that platform?
unixkb.com -- articles on practical Unix issues.
I am sorry, but this is absolutely true. The BIOS only exists as a concept on the PC. I like to give the Amiga OS as an example in this case.
(It was a single-user Multitasking, 32-bit OS, in late 80s to mid-90s. Last significant version was 3.1 in 1992 iirc, though 3.9 was released in 2001).
Let's take my A1200. What did it consist of? Well, it had the CPU, a custom chipset on the mainboard with DMA-accessible 2MB of RAM and an expansion slot. As you will see, there was hardware support for some things and then everything else was part of the OS:
Hardware-wise a number of protocols were supported, most importantly the mouse and AutoConfig. The mouse was simple. But AutoConfig was the plug'n'play of the 80s. (Introduced with Amiga3000 I think). It scanned the expansion bus (Think PCI bus). No, I should not say scan. It makes everything seem like windows scanning for hardware. It just sent a couple of signals on the bus and any devices that were there responded to acknowledge their presence, then the AutoConfig would ask them some stuff, like, if they had any ROM.
Now, what was interesting was that the A1200 itself had a (512k?) ROM, which contained basically the Kickstart and a large part of the OS (the kernel, disk operations and basic windowing system). The main part of the kickstart was the bootloader. Now, I don't see anything related to BIOS here. The sequence was basically
autoconfig->kickstart->kernel->?
Another interesting thing that hapenned around the same time that the kernel was loaded was what happenned to the ROMs that other devices that were connected on the bus declared. For example, my A1200 had a SCSI card addeed. The drivers for the OS were actually on a ROM on the SCSI card. When AutoConfig asked the card, it said it had a ROM. The same type of rom filesystem was used for the SCSI ROM and the Motherboard ROM. So, basically the ROM was looked at via the ROM filesystem and any libraries in there (the driver was just a shared library and shared device) were added to the system. Very simple.
So, I dunno if you would call AutoConfig a BIOS in itself. Or if you would call the ROM FileSystem part of a BIOS. In any case, the FileSystem concept was part of the OS, which used it to access all kinds of devices. The AutoConfig was an extremely simple protocol that could be done with a minimal amount of hardware. I think the specs are less than 20 pages in the Amiga Hardware Manual.
Anyway, all I see here is the hardware, some *standard protocols* that were implemented on the hardware itself, the bootloader and then the operating system itself.
BTW, Linux systems just ignore the BIOS completely, don't they?
I miss my rubber keyboard.(Homepage)