2214276 – efibootmgr creates a bad snippet for PXE boot

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Bug 2214276 - efibootmgr creates a bad snippet for PXE boot

Summary: efibootmgr creates a bad snippet for PXE boot

Keywords:
Status:	CLOSED MIGRATED
Alias:	None
Product:	Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9
Classification:	Red Hat
Component:	efibootmgr
Sub Component:
Version:	9.2
Hardware:	x86_64
OS:	Linux
Priority:	medium
Severity:	medium
Target Milestone:	rc
Target Release:	---
Assignee:	Bootloader engineering team
QA Contact:	Release Test Team
Docs Contact:
URL:
Whiteboard:
Depends On:
Blocks:
TreeView+	depends on / blocked

Reported:	2023-06-12 13:00 UTC by Renaud Métrich
Modified:	2023-09-16 19:44 UTC (History)
CC List:	2 users (show)
Fixed In Version:
Doc Type:	If docs needed, set a value
Doc Text:
Clone Of:
Environment:
Last Closed:	2023-09-16 19:44:24 UTC
Type:	Bug
Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:
Dependent Products:
Flags:	pm-rhel: mirror+

Attachments	(Terms of Use)

Links
System	ID	Private	Priority	Status	Summary	Last Updated
Red Hat Issue Tracker	RHEL-4398	0	None	Migrated	None	2023-09-16 19:44:16 UTC
Red Hat Issue Tracker	RHELPLAN-159515	0	None	None	None	2023-06-12 13:50:27 UTC

Description Renaud Métrich 2023-06-12 13:00:12 UTC

Description of problem:

We have customers wanting to create Network boot entry. In theory using "efibootmgr -c -i <itf> -L PXE" should work, but it appears that nowhere in the snippet the MAC address is written, which causes the entry to not be bootable at all.
This is seen at least on QEMU and VMWare so we can rule out any firmware issue.

Example of snippet created by the firmware itself:
-------- 8< ---------------- 8< ---------------- 8< ---------------- 8< --------
# hexdump -C /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/Boot0004-8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c 
00000000  07 00 00 00 01 00 00 00  5c 00 55 00 45 00 46 00  |........\.U.E.F.|
00000010  49 00 20 00 50 00 58 00  45 00 76 00 34 00 20 00  |I. .P.X.E.v.4. .|
00000020  28 00 4d 00 41 00 43 00  3a 00 35 00 32 00 35 00  |(.M.A.C.:.5.2.5.|
00000030  34 00 30 00 30 00 45 00  39 00 35 00 33 00 36 00  |4.0.0.E.9.5.3.6.|
00000040  34 00 29 00 00 00 02 01  0c 00 d0 41 03 0a 00 00  |4.)........A....|
00000050  00 00 01 01 06 00 00 02  01 01 06 00 00 00 03 0b  |................|
00000060  25 00 52 54 00 e9 53 64  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |%.RT..Sd........|
00000070  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000080  00 00 01 03 0c 1b 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000090  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 7f ff  |................|
000000a0  04 00 4e ac 08 81 11 9f  59 4d 85 0e e2 1a 52 2c  |..N.....YM....R,|
000000b0  59 b2                                             |Y.|
000000b2
-------- 8< ---------------- 8< ---------------- 8< ---------------- 8< --------

Here above we can see the MAC address at offset 62-67.

Example of snippet created by efibootmgr -i <itf>:
-------- 8< ---------------- 8< ---------------- 8< ---------------- 8< --------
# hexdump -C /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/Boot0008-8be4df61-93ca-11d2-aa0d-00e098032b8c 
00000000  07 00 00 00 01 00 00 00  44 00 50 00 58 00 45 00  |........D.P.X.E.|
00000010  00 00 03 0b 25 00 52 54  00 e9 53 64 00 00 00 00  |....%.RT..Sd....|
00000020  00 00 00 00 65 66 69 76  61 72 73 2f 42 6f 6f 74  |....efivars/Boot|
00000030  30 30 30 36 2d 38 01 03  0c 1b 00 00 00 00 00 00  |0006-8..........|
00000040  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
00000050  00 00 7f ff 04 00                                 |......|
00000056
-------- 8< ---------------- 8< ---------------- 8< ---------------- 8< --------

Here above none of the information related to the MAC address is there (MAC address being 52:54:00:e9:53:64).

Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable):

efivar-libs-38-3.el9.x86_64

How reproducible:

Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Create a snippet using "efibootmgr -c -i <itf> -L PXE" command
2. Try booting

Actual results:

Doesn't boot

Expected results:

Boots.

Comment 3 RHEL Program Management 2023-09-16 19:43:36 UTC

Issue migration from Bugzilla to Jira is in process at this time. This will be the last message in Jira copied from the Bugzilla bug.

Comment 4 RHEL Program Management 2023-09-16 19:44:24 UTC

This BZ has been automatically migrated to the issues.redhat.com Red Hat Issue Tracker. All future work related to this report will be managed there.

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