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Crate intel_fw

Crate intel_fw 

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§Modern Intel Firmware Tool ✨

This is a new utility to analyze and edit firmware images for Intel platforms.

Based on knowledge from other projects, such as me_cleaner, coreboot’s ifdtool, ME Analyzer and related research, intel_fw is written from scratch in Rust, allowing for integration with other projects, including a flexible API.

The architecture and design is based on experience.

To test this tool, you will need sample firmware images. For convenience, take a look at the scripts used for development.

§Commands

§me

The me command lets you print, edit and check the (CS)ME firmware. The me clean command is compatible with me_cleaner, with minor differences:

  • The --whitelist and --blacklist flags do not cause deletion of partitions when multiple partitions refer to the same range, but at least one of them is to be retained. This is considered a bug fix.
  • The --check flag checks all directory partitions as well as the presence of the FTPR. Analysis details are printed unconditionally.
  • The --truncuate option may result in smaller ME images than me_cleaner.

§Development

To run the CLI via cargo directly, remember to add arguments after an extra --; i.e., to print the general help, invoke cargo run --relase -- -h, or, for a subcommand, e.g. cargo run --relase -- me clean -h.

§Milestones

  • bootstrap a new, general CLI, intel_fw, with an me subcommand
    • mimic the me_cleaner CLI, using similar+same arguments and switches for compatibility
  • port the logic to Rust, using me_cleaner-edited images as test fixtures
    • NOTE: committing the test fixtures would be big and a potential license issue; instead, add notes on how to reproduce them, via public vendor images and extraction utilities (e.g. from Lenovo)
    • step 1: port core logic to produce the same output as me_cleaner for Lenovo ThinkPad X230 + X270
    • step 2: full feature parity with me_cleaner
  • expand the documentation
    • higher-level view on Intel platform boot flows
    • how the Intel data structures work, in prose
    • adding support for more platforms and variants
  • work out a reusable library, i.e., a Rust crate for https://crates.io/
    • turn all unwrap()s into Option/Result; add lint rule
    • add bounds checks
    • publish the crate
  • sync up; https://github.com/corna/me_cleaner has another patch that coreboot is missing, doing rework and adding ME Gen 1 support

Modules§

dir
Directories for ME generation 2 and 3
fit
Firmware Interface Table (FIT)
ifd
Intel Flash Descriptor (IFD)
me
Intel Management Engine Firmware Parser
meta
Map of key hashes => metadata (variant + version)
part
Partitioning for ME generation 2 and 3
ver
Common struct for version information

Structs§

Firmware

Constants§

EMPTY

Traits§

Removables
Common method for anything that has removable parts, such as directories.