This repository contains a prototype for a new UEFI variable design for modern PCs.
It is extensible, secure, with built-in testing up and down the entire stack. The design and implementation are all taking place here in this repo.
This repository is part of Project Mu. Please see Project Mu for details: https://microsoft.github.io/mu.
We welcome everyone to file feature requests, bugs, participate in code reviews, submit code, update documentation, and help us build the best variable driver possible.
At this time, we are very early in the work so we're particularly interested in ideas around the future of UEFI variables (including breaking UEFI specification compatibility) and suggestions to help shape the overall design.
Please open GitHub issues directly in this repo.
The UEFI Specification describes an interface between the operating system (OS) and platform firmware. A UEFI
Specification compliant system must implement two high-level sets of services - Boot Services which consist of
functions available prior to a successful call to EFI_BOOT_SERVICES.ExitBootServices() and Runtime Services which
consist of functions that are available before and after any call to EFI_BOOT_SERVICES.ExitBootServices().
A fundamental Runtime Service is called the UEFI variable services. These services are comprised of an API that the platform firmware must implement to satisfy the relevant API requirements defined in the UEFI Specification. While the underlying implementation is platform-specific, the callers will include both the operating system and firmware components.
The de facto open-source implementation of UEFI, TianoCore, provides a commonly used set of UEFI variable drivers in the edk2 project that has served as the industry standard implementation for UEFI variable services for over a decade. Over time, the UEFI variable driver has substantially grown in complexity to support an increasing number of features.
The TianoCore driver is now over 15 years old. It's design is rigid and not accommodating to change. Over the span of its lifetime, many advancements have occurred in the PC industry that require better scale to support:
- New storage technologies have come to market
- Device trends have shifted to low-power ultra mobile devices and cloud server systems
- New offload engines like BMC and special security processors have become more common to process non-volatile data
- New expectations around device security have come into focus
- For example, resistance against physical attack has led to variable data confidentiality via encryption, data integrity checks for tamper-proof storage guarantees, data replay protection, etc.
- Additional computer architectures have gained popularity such as AArch64 and RISC-V
- Operating systems have evolved and so have their security expectations
The TianoCore driver was written for a PI-centric boot flow assuming it was writing to SPI flash with no structured design to support extending the driver to support these advancements. In addition, while some industry standard tests such as the UEFI Self-Certification Tests exist, much of the stack is error prone to modify and difficult to assess because of its accumulated technical debt.
Due to the importance of the driver, we concluded that a new design that takes into account these requirements with testing built in could better support today's needs.
This project has adopted the Microsoft Open Source Code of Conduct https://opensource.microsoft.com/codeofconduct/
For more information see the Code of Conduct FAQ https://opensource.microsoft.com/codeofconduct/faq/ or contact opencode@microsoft.com. with any additional questions or comments.
Please follow the steps in the Project Mu docs to build for CI and local testing. More Details
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