Networking NVIDIA BlueField BSP
Networking NVIDIA BlueField BSP
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Intelligent Platform Management Interface


IPMB requests can be initiated in 2 directions:

  • BlueField BMC-to-BlueField

  • BlueField-to-BlueField BMC

The NVIDIA® BlueField® networking platform's (DPU or SuperNIC) ipmb_dev_int driver is registered at the 7-bit I2C address 0x30 by default. The I2C address of the BlueField can be changed in the file /usr/bin/set_emu_param.sh.

  • BlueField Controller cards provide connection from the host server BMC to BlueField Arm I2C bus

  • BlueField devices provide connection from the host server BMC to the BlueField NC-SI port

  • BlueField Reference Platforms provide connection from its on-board BMC to BlueField Arm I2C bus

BlueField BMC IPMI Commands

The BlueField BMC is able to retrieve data from BlueField software over its Intelligent Platform Management Bus (IPMB).

The BlueField BMC may request information about itself using the following command format:

$ ipmitool <ipmitool command>

Issue a command with the following format from the BlueField BMC to retrieve information from the BlueField:

ipmitool -I ipmb <ipmitool command>

The following table provides a list of supported ipmitool command arguments:

Command Description

Ipmitool Command

Relevant IPMI 2.0
Rev 1.1 Spec Section

Get device ID

mc info

20.1

Broadcast “Get Device ID”

Part of "mc info"

20.9

Get BMC global enables

mc getenables

22.2

Get device SDR info

sdr info

35.2

Get device SDR

"sdr get", "sdr list" or
"sdr elist"

35.3

Get sensor hysteresis

sdr get <sensor-id>

35.7

Set sensor threshold

sensor thresh <sensor-id> <threshold> <setting>

  • sensor-id – name of the sensor for which a threshold is to be set

  • threshold – which threshold to set

    • ucr – upper critical

    • unc – upper non-critical

    • lnc – lower non-critical

    • lcr – lower critical

  • setting – the value to set the threshold to

To configure all lower thresholds, use: sensor thresh <sensor-id> lower <lnr> <lcr> <lnc>

The lower non-recoverable <lnr> option is not supported

To configure all upper thresholds, use: sensor thresh <sensor-id> upper <unc> <ucr> <unr>

The upper non-recoverable <unr> option is not supported

35.8

Get sensor threshold

sdr get <sensor-id>

35.9

Get sensor event enable

sdr get <sensor-id>

35.11

Get sensor reading

sensor reading <sensor-id>

35.14

Get sensor type

sdr type <type>

35.16

Read FRU data

fru read <fru-number> <file-to-write-to>

34.2

Get SDR repository info

sdr info

33.9

Get SEL info

"sel" or "sel info"

40.2

Get SEL allocation info

"sel" or "sel info"

40.3

Get SEL entry

"sel list" or "sel elist"

40.5

Add SEL entry

sel add <filename>

40.6

Delete SEL entry

sel delete <id>

40.8

Clear SEL

sel clear

40.9

Get SEL time

sel time get

40.1

Set SEL time

sel time set "MM/DD/YYYY HH:M:SS"

40.11

List of IPMI Supported Sensors

Sensor

ID

Description

bluefield_temp

0

Support NIC monitoring of BlueField's temperature

ddr0_0_temp

1

Support monitoring of DDR0 temp (on memory controller 0)

ddr0_1_temp

2

Support monitoring of DDR1 temp (on memory controller 0)

ddr1_0_temp

3

Support monitoring of DDR0 temp (on memory controller 1)

ddr1_1_temp

4

Support monitoring of DDR1 temp (on memory controller 1)

p0_temp

5

Port 0 temperature

p1_temp

6

Port 1 temperature

p0_link

7

Port0 link status

p1_link

8

Port1 link status

We don't have a way to export this macro.

List of IPMI Supported FRUs

FRU

ID

Description

update_timer

0

set_emu_param.service is responsible for collecting data on sensors and FRUs every 3 seconds. This regular update is required for sensors but not for FRUs whose content is less susceptible to change. update_timer is used to sample the FRUs every hour instead. Users may need this timer in the case where they are issuing several raw IPMItool FRU read commands. This helps in assessing how much time users have to retrieve large FRU data before the next FRU update.

update_timer is a hexadecimal number.

fw_info

1

NVIDIA® ConnectX® firmware information, Arm firmware version, and MLNX_OFED version.

The fw_info is in ASCII format.

nic_pci_dev_info

2

NIC vendor ID, device ID, subsystem vendor ID, and subsystem device ID.

The nic_pci_dev_info is in ASCII format.

cpuinfo

3

CPU information reported in lscpu and /proc/cpuinfo.

The cpuinfo is in ASCII format.

ddr0_0_spd

4

FRU for SPD MC0 DIMM 0 (MC = memory controller).

The ddr0_0_spd is in binary format.

ddr0_1_spd

5

FRU for SPD MC0 DIMM1.

The ddr0_1_spd is in binary format.

ddr1_0_spd

6

FRU for SPD MC1 DIMM0.

The ddr1_0_spd is in binary format.

ddr1_1_spd

7

FRU for SPD MC1 DIMM1.

The ddr1_1_spd is in binary format.

emmc_info

8

eMMC size, list of its partitions, and partitions usage (in ASCII format).

eMMC CID, CSD, and extended CSD registers (in binary format).

The ASCII data is separated from the binary data with "StartBinary" marker.

qsfp0_eeprom

9

FRU for QSFP 0 EEPROM page 0 content (256 bytes in binary format)

qsfp1_eeprom

10

FRU for QSFP 1 EEPROM page 0 content (256 bytes in binary format)

ip_addresses

11

This FRU file can be used to write the BMC port 0 and port 1 IP addresses to the BlueField. It is empty to begin with.

The file passed through the ipmitool fru write 11 <file> command must have the following format:

BMC: XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX
P0: XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX
P1: XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX

The size of the written file should be exactly 61 bytes.

dimms_ce_ue

12

FRU reporting the number of correctable and uncorrectable errors in the DIMMs.

This FRU is updated once every 3 seconds.

eth0

13

Network interface 0 information. Updated once every minute.

eth1

14

Network interface 1 information. Updated once every minute.

bf_uid

15

BlueField UID

eth_hw_counters

16

List of ConnectX interface hardware counters

We don't have a way to export this macro.

BlueField IPMI Commands

The BlueField is able to retrieve data from the BlueField BMC over IPMB. 

Issue a command with the following format from the BlueField to retrieve information from the BMC:

$ ipmitool <ipmitool command>

The BlueField may request information about itself using the following command format:

$ ipmitool -U ADMIN -P ADMIN -p 9001 -H localhost <ipmitool command>


The ipmb_host driver allows the BlueField to send requests to the BMC. Once set_emu_param.service is started, it will try to load the ipmb_host drivers. If the BMC is down or not responsive when BlueField tries to load the ipmb_host driver, the latter will not load successfully. In that case, make sure the BMC is up and operational, and run the following from BlueField's console: 

echo 0x1011 > /sys/bus/i2c/devices/i2c-2/delete_device
rmmod ipmb_host

The set_emu_param.service script will try to load the driver again.

I2C Addresses for BMC-initiated Requests

Device

I2C Address

BlueField ipmb_dev_int

0x30

BMC ipmb_host

0x20

I2C Addresses for BlueField-initiated Requests

Device

I2C Address

BlueField ipmb_host

0x11

BMC ipmb_dev_int

0x10

Changing I2C Addresses

To use a different BlueField or BMC I2C address, you must make changes to the following files' variables.

Filename Path

Parameter Change

/usr/bin/set_emu_param.sh

The ipmb_dev_int and ipmb_host drivers are registered at the following I2C addresses:

  • IPMB_DEV_INT_ADD=<BlueField I2C Address 1>

  • IPMB_HOST_ADD=<BlueField I2C Address 2>

These addresses must be different from one another. Otherwise, one of the drives will fail to register.

To change the BMC I2C address:

IPMB_HOST_CLIENTADDR=<BMC I2C Address>
<I2C Address> must be equal to: 0x1000+<7-bit I2C address>


External Host IPMI Commands

It is possible for the external host to retrieve data from the BlueField via the IPMI LAN interface (either OOB or ConnectX).

To do that:

  1. Set the network interface address properly in progconf. For example, if the OOB IP address is 192.168.101.2, edit the OOB_IP variable in the /etc/ipmi/progconf file as follows:

    root@localhost:~# cat /etc/ipmi/progconf
SUPPORT_IPMB="NONE"
LOOP_PERIOD=3
BF_FAMILY=$(/usr/bin/bffamily | tr -d '[:space:]')
OOB_IP="192.168.101.2"


  2. Then reboot or restart the IPMI service as follows: 

    systemctl restart mlx_ipmid


  3. To get information from the BlueField, issue commands from the external host in the following format:

    ipmitool -I lanplus -H 192.168.101.2 -U ADMIN -P ADMIN <ipmitool command>


Loading and Using IPMI on BlueField Running CentOS

  1. Load the BlueField CentOS image:

    The following steps are performed from the BlueField CentOS prompt. The BlueField is running CentOS 7.6 with kernel 5.4. The CentOS installation was done using the CentOS everything ISO image.

    The following drivers need to be loaded on the BlueField running CentOS:

    • jc42.ko

    • ee1004.ko

    • at24.ko

    • eeprom.ko

    • i2c-dev.ko

    Example of loading ee1004.ko, at24.ko, and eeprom.ko: 

    modprobe ee1004
modprobe at24
modprobe eeprom


    The i2c-dev module is built into the kernel 5.4.60 on CentOS 7.6.


  2. (Optional) Update the i2c-mlx driver if the installed version is older than i2c-mlx-1.0-0.gab579c6.src.rpm.

    1. Re-compile i2c-mlx. Run:

      $ yum remove -y kmod-i2c-mlx
$ modprobe -rv i2c-mlx


    2. Transfer the i2c-mlx RPM from the BlueField software tarball under distro/SRPM onto the Arm. Run:

      $ rpmbuild --rebuild /root/i2c-mlx-1.0-0.g422740c.src.rpm
$ yum install -y /root/rpmbuild/RPMS/aarch64/i2c-mlx-1.0-0.g422740c_5.4.17_mlnx.9.ga0bea68.aarch64.rpm
$ ls -l /lib/modules/$(uname -r)/extra/i2c-mlx/i2c-mlx.ko


    3. Load i2c-mlx. Run: 

      $ modprobe i2c-mlx


  3. Install the following packages:

    $ yum install ipmitool lm_sensors

    If the above operation fails for ipmitool, run the following to install it: 

    wget http://sourceforge.net/projects/ipmitool/files/ipmitool/1.8.18/ipmitool-1.8.18.tar.gz 
tar -xvzf ipmitool-1.8.18.tar.gz 
cd ipmitool-1.8.18
./bootstrap
./configure
make
make install DESTDIR=/tmp/package-ipmitool


  4. The i2c-tools package is also required, but the version contained in the CentOS Yum repository is old and does not work with BlueField. Therefore, please download i2c-tools version 4.1, and then build and install it. 

    # Build i2c-tools from a newer source
wget http://mirrors.edge.kernel.org/pub/software/utils/i2c-tools/i2c-tools-4.1.tar.gz
tar -xvzf i2c-tools-4.1.tar.gz
cd i2c-tools-4.1
make
make install PREFIX=/usr

# create a link to the libraries
ln -sfn /usr/lib/libi2c.so.0.1.1 /lib64/libi2c.so
ln -sfn /usr/lib/libi2c.so.0.1.1 /lib64/libi2c.so.0


  5. Generate an RPM binary from the BlueField's mlx-OpenIPMI-2.0.25 source RPM.

    The following packages might be needed to build the binary RPM depending on which version of CentOS you are using.

    $ yum install libtool rpm-devel rpmdevtools rpmlint wget ncurses-devel automake
$ rpmbuild --rebuild mlx-OpenIPMI-2.0.25-0.g581ebbb.src.rpm


    You may obtain this rpm file by means of scp from the server host's Bluefield Distribution folder. For example:

    $ scp <BF_INST_DIR>/distro/SRPMS/mlx-OpenIPMI-2.0.25-0.g4fdc53d.src.rpm <ip-address>:/<target_directory>/


    If there are issues with building the OpenIPMI RPM, verify that the swig package is not installed. 

    $ yum remove -y swig


  6. Generate a binary RPM from the ipmb-dev-int source RPM and install it. Run: 

    $ rpmbuild --rebuild ipmb-dev-int-1.0-0.g304ea0c.src.rpm


  7. Generate a binary RPM from the ipmb-host source RPM and install it. Run: 

    $ rpmbuild --rebuild ipmb-host-1.0-0.g304ea0c.src.rpm


  8. Load OpenIPMI, ipmb-host, and ipmb-dev-int RPM packages. Run: 

    $ yum install -y /root/rpmbuild/RPMS/aarch64/mlx-OpenIPMI-2.0.25-0.g581ebbb_5.4.0_49.el7a.aarch64.aarch64.rpm
$ yum install -y /root/rpmbuild/RPMS/aarch64/ipmb-dev-int-1.0-0.g304ea0c_5.4.0_49.el7a.aarch64.aarch64.rpm
$ yum install -y /root/rpmbuild/RPMS/aarch64/ipmb-host-1.0-0.g304ea0c_5.4.0_49.el7a.aarch64.aarch64.rpm


  9. Load the IPMB driver. Run:

    $ modprobe ipmb-dev-int


  10. Install and start rasdaemon package. Run: 

    yum install rasdaemon
systemctl enable rasdaemon
systemctl start rasdaemon


  11. Start the IPMI daemon. Run:

    $ systemctl enable mlx_ipmid
$ systemctl start mlx_ipmid
$ systemctl enable set_emu_param
$ systemctl start set_emu_param


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