[Bug 2110301] Re: [SRU] Backport u-boot 2025.01-3 to Noble

[Dave Jones]

Targetting to oracular as we want to backport this prior to oracular's
EOL; updated regression section with some more information.

** Description changed:

  [ Impact ]
  
  With the release of Ubuntu 25.04 (Plucky) we support new RISC-V
  hardware:
  
  * Pine64 Star64
  * DeepComputing FML13V01
  
  In the 25.10 cycle we will upgraded the ISA from RVA20 to presumably
  RVA23. This implies that hardware that is not RVA23 compliant will only
  be supported on 24.04 in the long term.
  
  We therefore need to backport the hardware support to 24.04. This
  includes:
  
  * U-Boot
  * Kernel 6.14
  
  With this SRU we will backport U-Boot 2025.01-3 to Noble.
  
  [ Test Plan ]
  
  Install the updated U-Boot and check booting on the following boards:
  
  DeepComputing FML13V01
  Microchip Icicle Kit
  Milk-V Mars
  Pine64 Star64
  StarFive VisionFive 2
  SiFive Unmatched
  
  Check that U-Boot's variable $fdtfile shows the value matching the board.
  (With the current U-Boot on Noble this will not work for the FML13V01 and Pine64 Star64.)
  
  Check that booting via GRUB into Ubuntu works.
  
  See the descriptions in the Ubuntu manual tests for the respective
  boards.
  
  For testing best use preinstalled Plucky images which will have the
  matching kernel.
  
  [ Where problems could occur ]
  
- The wrong device-tree might be loaded.
+ Updating the bootloader always carries the risk of breaking boot on
+ user's machines. To guard against that, the test plan covers all
+ potentially affected boards (for which we produce official images), not
+ just those on which we hope to enable boot.
  
- Booting might fail.
+ That said, there are other mitigating factors: a bootloader is
+ necessarily a standalone binary (when running at boot time). The
+ particular version we are backporting is already in successful use in
+ plucky, giving us a reasonable degree of confidence that this version is
+ fundamentally sound.
+ 
+ The backport to oracular is relatively trivial (it's the same upstream,
+ the only changes are in the debian directory). The backport to noble is
+ an actual upstream version bump; the risk here is that the build under
+ noble acts differently (e.g. due to differences in the build
+ dependencies). Still, the test plan serves to cover those concerns.
  
  [ Other Info ]
  
  N/A

** Also affects: u-boot (Ubuntu Oracular)
   Importance: Undecided
       Status: New

** Changed in: u-boot (Ubuntu Oracular)
       Status: New => Confirmed

** Changed in: u-boot (Ubuntu Oracular)
     Assignee: (unassigned) => Dave Jones (waveform)

** Description changed:

  [ Impact ]
  
  With the release of Ubuntu 25.04 (Plucky) we support new RISC-V
  hardware:
  
  * Pine64 Star64
  * DeepComputing FML13V01
  
  In the 25.10 cycle we will upgraded the ISA from RVA20 to presumably
  RVA23. This implies that hardware that is not RVA23 compliant will only
  be supported on 24.04 in the long term.
  
  We therefore need to backport the hardware support to 24.04. This
  includes:
  
  * U-Boot
  * Kernel 6.14
  
  With this SRU we will backport U-Boot 2025.01-3 to Noble.
  
  [ Test Plan ]
  
  Install the updated U-Boot and check booting on the following boards:
  
  DeepComputing FML13V01
  Microchip Icicle Kit
  Milk-V Mars
  Pine64 Star64
  StarFive VisionFive 2
  SiFive Unmatched
  
  Check that U-Boot's variable $fdtfile shows the value matching the board.
  (With the current U-Boot on Noble this will not work for the FML13V01 and Pine64 Star64.)
  
  Check that booting via GRUB into Ubuntu works.
  
  See the descriptions in the Ubuntu manual tests for the respective
  boards.
  
  For testing best use preinstalled Plucky images which will have the
  matching kernel.
  
  [ Where problems could occur ]
  
  Updating the bootloader always carries the risk of breaking boot on
- user's machines. To guard against that, the test plan covers all
+ user's machines. That said, a bootloader is necessarily a standalone
+ binary (when running at boot time). The particular upstream version we
+ are backporting is already in successful use in plucky, giving us a
+ reasonable degree of confidence that this version is fundamentally
+ sound.
+ 
+ Still, the backport is an actual upstream version bump; the risk here is
+ that the build acts differently (e.g. due to differences in the build
+ dependencies). To guard against that, the test plan covers all
  potentially affected boards (for which we produce official images), not
  just those on which we hope to enable boot.
- 
- That said, there are other mitigating factors: a bootloader is
- necessarily a standalone binary (when running at boot time). The
- particular version we are backporting is already in successful use in
- plucky, giving us a reasonable degree of confidence that this version is
- fundamentally sound.
- 
- The backport to oracular is relatively trivial (it's the same upstream,
- the only changes are in the debian directory). The backport to noble is
- an actual upstream version bump; the risk here is that the build under
- noble acts differently (e.g. due to differences in the build
- dependencies). Still, the test plan serves to cover those concerns.
  
  [ Other Info ]
  
  N/A

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/2110301

Title:
  [SRU] Backport u-boot 2025.01-3 to Noble

Status in u-boot package in Ubuntu:
  Invalid
Status in u-boot source package in Noble:
  Confirmed
Status in u-boot source package in Oracular:
  Confirmed
Status in u-boot source package in Plucky:
  Confirmed

Bug description:
  [ Impact ]

  With the release of Ubuntu 25.04 (Plucky) we support new RISC-V
  hardware:

  * Pine64 Star64
  * DeepComputing FML13V01

  In the 25.10 cycle we will upgraded the ISA from RVA20 to presumably
  RVA23. This implies that hardware that is not RVA23 compliant will
  only be supported on 24.04 in the long term.

  We therefore need to backport the hardware support to 24.04. This
  includes:

  * U-Boot
  * Kernel 6.14

  With this SRU we will backport U-Boot 2025.01-3 to Noble.

  [ Test Plan ]

  Install the updated U-Boot and check booting on the following boards:

  DeepComputing FML13V01
  Microchip Icicle Kit
  Milk-V Mars
  Pine64 Star64
  StarFive VisionFive 2
  SiFive Unmatched

  Check that U-Boot's variable $fdtfile shows the value matching the board.
  (With the current U-Boot on Noble this will not work for the FML13V01 and Pine64 Star64.)

  Check that booting via GRUB into Ubuntu works.

  See the descriptions in the Ubuntu manual tests for the respective
  boards.

  For testing best use preinstalled Plucky images which will have the
  matching kernel.

  [ Where problems could occur ]

  Updating the bootloader always carries the risk of breaking boot on
  user's machines. That said, a bootloader is necessarily a standalone
  binary (when running at boot time). The particular upstream version we
  are backporting is already in successful use in plucky, giving us a
  reasonable degree of confidence that this version is fundamentally
  sound.

  The backport in plucky's case simply incorporates changes to the
  debian/ directory which occurred after plucky's release (we sync'd
  from Debian's experimental branch during plucky).

  The backport for oracular and noble is an actual upstream version
  bump; the risk here is that the build acts differently (e.g. due to
  differences in the build dependencies). To guard against that, the
  test plan covers all potentially affected boards (for which we produce
  official images), not just those on which we hope to enable boot.

  [ Other Info ]

  N/A

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