Nicholas Chin 35599f9a66 Docs: Replace Recommonmark with MyST Parser
Recommonmark has been deprecated since 2021 [1] and the last release was
over 3 years ago [2]. As per their announcement, Markedly Structured
Text (MyST) Parser [3] is the recommended replacement.

For the most part, the existing documentation is compatible with MyST,
as both parsers are built around the CommonMark flavor of Markdown. The
main difference that affects coreboot is how the Sphinx toctree is
generated. Recommonmark has a feature called auto_toc_tree, which
converts single level lists of references into a toctree:

* [Part 1: Starting from scratch](part1.md)
* [Part 2: Submitting a patch to coreboot.org](part2.md)
* [Part 3: Writing unit tests](part3.md)
* [Managing local additions](managing_local_additions.md)
* [Flashing firmware](flashing_firmware/index.md)

MyST Parser does not provide a replacement for this feature, meaning the
toctree must be defined manually. This is done using MyST's syntax for
Sphinx directives:

```{toctree}
:maxdepth: 1

Part 1: Starting from scratch <part1.md>
Part 2: Submitting a patch to coreboot.org <part2.md>
Part 3: Writing unit tests <part3.md>
Managing local additions <managing_local_additions.md>
Flashing firmware <flashing_firmware/index.md>
```

Internally, auto_toc_tree essentially converts lists of references into
the Sphinx toctree structure that the MyST syntax above more directly
represents.

The toctrees were converted to the MyST syntax using the following
command and Python script:

`find ./ -iname "*.md" | xargs -n 1 python conv_toctree.py`

```
import re
import sys

in_list = False
f = open(sys.argv[1])
lines = f.readlines()
f.close()

with open(sys.argv[1], "w") as f:
    for line in lines:
        match = re.match(r"^[-*+] \[(.*)\]\((.*)\)$", line)
        if match is not None:
            if not in_list:
                in_list = True
                f.write("```{toctree}\n")
                f.write(":maxdepth: 1\n\n")
            f.write(match.group(1) + " <" + match.group(2) + ">\n")
        else:
            if in_list:
                f.write("```\n")
            f.write(line)
            in_list = False

    if in_list:
        f.write("```\n")
```

While this does add a little more work for creating the toctree, this
does give more control over exactly what goes into the toctree. For
instance, lists of links to external resources currently end up in the
toctree, but we may want to limit it to pages within coreboot.

This change does break rendering and navigation of the documentation in
applications that can render Markdown, such as Okular, Gitiles, or the
GitHub mirror. Assuming the docs are mainly intended to be viewed after
being rendered to doc.coreboot.org, this is probably not an issue in
practice.

Another difference is that MyST natively supports Markdown tables,
whereas with Recommonmark, tables had to be written in embedded rST [4].
However, MyST also supports embedded rST, so the existing tables can be
easily converted as the syntax is nearly identical.

These were converted using
`find ./ -iname "*.md" | xargs -n 1 sed -i "s/eval_rst/{eval-rst}/"`

Makefile.sphinx and conf.py were regenerated from scratch by running
`sphinx-quickstart` using the updated version of Sphinx, which removes a
lot of old commented out boilerplate. Any relevant changes coreboot had
made on top of the previous autogenerated versions of these files were
ported over to the newly generated file.

From some initial testing the generated webpages appear and function
identically to the existing documentation built with Recommonmark.

TEST: `make -C util/docker docker-build-docs` builds the documentation
successfully and the generated output renders properly when viewed in
a web browser.

[1] https://github.com/readthedocs/recommonmark/issues/221
[2] https://pypi.org/project/recommonmark/
[3] https://myst-parser.readthedocs.io/en/latest/
[4] https://doc.coreboot.org/getting_started/writing_documentation.html

Change-Id: I0837c1722fa56d25c9441ea218e943d8f3d9b804
Signed-off-by: Nicholas Chin <nic.c3.14@gmail.com>
Reviewed-on: https://review.coreboot.org/c/coreboot/+/73158
Reviewed-by: Matt DeVillier <matt.devillier@gmail.com>
Tested-by: build bot (Jenkins) <no-reply@coreboot.org>
2024-03-21 16:11:56 +00:00

7.3 KiB

External Resources

This is a list of resources that could be useful to coreboot developers. These are not endorsed or officially recommended by the coreboot project, but simply listed here in the hopes that someone will find something useful.

Please add any helpful or informational links and sections as you see fit.

Articles

:maxdepth: 1

Boot Guard and PSB have user-hostile defaults <https://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/58424.html>

General Information

:maxdepth: 1

OS Dev <https://wiki.osdev.org/Categorized_Main_Page>
Interface BUS <http://www.interfacebus.com/>

OpenSecurityTraining2

OpenSecurityTraining2 is dedicated to sharing training material for any topic related to computer security, including coreboot.

There are various ways to learn firmware, some are more efficient than others, depending on the people. Before going straight to practice and experimenting with hardware, it can be beneficial to learn the basics of computing. OST2 focuses on conveying computer architecture and security information in the form of structured instructor-led classes, available to everyone for free.

All material is licensed CC BY-SA 4.0, allowing anyone to use the material however they see fit, so long as they share modified works back to the community.

Below is a list of currently available courses that can help understand the inner workings of coreboot and other firmware-related topics:

:maxdepth: 1

coreboot design principles and boot process <https://ost2.fyi/Arch4031>
x86-64 Assembly <https://ost2.fyi/Arch1001>
x86-64 OS Internals <https://ost2.fyi/Arch2001>
x86-64 Intel Firmware Attack & Defense <https://ost2.fyi/Arch4001>

There are additional security courses at the site as well (such as how to avoid writing exploitable code in C/C++.)

Firmware Specifications & Information

:maxdepth: 1

System Management BIOS - SMBIOS <https://www.dmtf.org/standards/smbios>
Desktop and Mobile Architecture for System Hardware - DASH <https://www.dmtf.org/standards/dash>
PNP BIOS <https://www.intel.com/content/dam/support/us/en/documents/motherboards/desktop/sb/pnpbiosspecificationv10a.pdf>

ACPI

:maxdepth: 1

ACPI Specs <https://uefi.org/acpi/specs>
ACPI in Linux <https://www.kernel.org/doc/ols/2005/ols2005v1-pages-59-76.pdf>
ACPI 5 Linux <https://blog.linuxplumbersconf.org/2012/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/LPC2012-ACPI5.pdf>
ACPI 6 Linux <https://events.static.linuxfound.org/sites/events/files/slides/ACPI_6_and_Linux_0.pdf>

Security

:maxdepth: 1

Intel Boot Guard <https://edk2-docs.gitbook.io/understanding-the-uefi-secure-boot-chain/secure_boot_chain_in_uefi/intel_boot_guard>

Hardware information

:maxdepth: 1

WikiChip <https://en.wikichip.org/wiki/WikiChip>
Sandpile <https://www.sandpile.org/>
CPU-World <https://www.cpu-world.com/index.html>
CPU-Upgrade <https://www.cpu-upgrade.com/index.html>

Hardware Specifications & Standards

:maxdepth: 1

eMMC <https://www.jedec.org/)  - JEDEC - (LOGIN REQUIRED>
:maxdepth: 1

I3C <https://www.mipi.org/specifications/i3c-sensor-specification) - MIPI Alliance (LOGIN REQUIRED>
Memory <https://www.jedec.org/)  - JEDEC - (LOGIN REQUIRED>
  • NVMe - NVMe Specifications
  • LPC - Intel
:maxdepth: 1

PCI / PCIe / M.2 <https://pcisig.com/specifications) -  PCI-SIG - (LOGIN REQUIRED>
:maxdepth: 1

SATA <https://sata-io.org/developers/purchase-specification) - SATA-IO (LOGIN REQUIRED>
  • SMBus - System Management Interface Forum
  • Smart Battery - Smart Battery System Implementers Forum
  • USB - USB Implementers Forum
  • WI-FI - Wi-Fi Alliance

Chip Vendor Documentation

Software

  • Fiedka - A graphical Firmware Editor
  • IOTools - Command line tools to access hardware registers
  • UEFITool - Editor for UEFI PI compliant firmware images
  • CHIPSEC - Framework for analyzing platform level security & configuration
  • SPDEditor - GUI to edit DDR3 SPD files
  • DDR4XMPEditor - Editor for DDR4 SPD and XMP
  • overclockSPD - Fast and easy way to read and write data to RAM SPDs.
  • VBiosFinder - This tool attempts to extract a VBIOS from a BIOS update.

Infrastructure software

:maxdepth: 1

Kconfig <https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/kbuild/kconfig-language.html>
GNU Make <https://www.gnu.org/software/make/manual/>