OFW_CONSOLE(4)

📦 version 15.1, in freebsd 14.5, freebsd 15.1

💖 OFW_CONSOLE(4) — Open Firmware console 💖

okay bestie, welcome to OFW_CONSOLE(4), straight out of the powerpc Kernel Interfaces Manual ✨ This one is all about the Open Firmware console, and yes, it’s giving “vintage fallback energy” but make it useful 💅

✨ NAME ✨

ofw_console — Open Firmware console 🖥️🌸

🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

cpu AIM
options OFWCONS_POLL_HZ=N

options KDB
options DDB
options ALT_BREAK_TO_DEBUGGER

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

So the ofw_console driver gives you a simple text console using the Open Firmware services for input and output 💖 It will use the Open Firmware console devices set via the input-device and output-device variables. iykyk.

Real talk though: this driver is deprecated and only provided as a fallback console mechanism if the real console hardware can not be driven by FreeBSD 😭 It’s the backup bestie, not the main character.

If the ofw_console console appears to work too slowly, its responsiveness probably can be improved by including options OFWCONS_POLL_HZ=N 🔥 When omitted, OFWCONS_POLL_HZ defaults to 4. For example, on Sun Ultra 2 a value of 20 or higher works best. Too high values, on the other hand, can cause ofw_console to unnecessarily consume CPU 💀 so don’t go wild with it, bestie.

🎀 FILES 🎀

  • /dev/console
  • /dev/keyboard — terminal input device in case the console input device is the keyboard ⌨️
  • /dev/screen — terminal output device in case the console output device is the screen 🖥️
  • /dev/tty[a-z] — terminal device in case both the console input and output device is tty[a-z] 🌈

🌸 SEE ALSO 🌸

akbd(4), powermac_nvram(4), vt(4) 🫶

⭐ HISTORY ⭐

The ofw_console driver first appeared in FreeBSD 5.0 👑

💜 AUTHORS 💜

The ofw_console driver was written by Benno Rice <benno@FreeBSD.org> 🎀

🙈 CAVEATS 🙈

Since the Open Firmware will handle BREAK (or Stop-A) sequences before ofw_console, the preferred way to enter ddb(4) when using ofw_console is to include options ALT_BREAK_TO_DEBUGGER in a ddb-enabled kernel, and enter the alternate BREAK sequence (RETURN TILDE CTRL-b) 💅

no cap, that’s the move if you want ddb to actually catch the vibe 😭

💀 BUGS 💀

The ofw_console driver also doesn’t attach to the hardware resources it actually talks to 🫠

mwah 💋 — that’s the whole page, signed off with source/version Debian, dated January 16, 2021 ✨🎀

📦 where this page comes from