IPMB requests can be initiated in 2 directions:
DPU BMC-to-BlueField
BlueField-to-DPU BMC
The BlueField 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 DPUs 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
The DPU BMC is able to retrieve data from NVIDIA® BlueField® DPU software over its Intelligent Platform Management Bus (IPMB).
The DPU BMC may request information about itself using the following command format:
$ ipmitool <ipmitool command>
Issue a command with the following format from the DPU 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>
To configure all lower thresholds, use : sensor thresh <sensor-id> lower <lnr> <lcr> <lnc> Note
The lower non-recoverable <lnr> option is not supported
To configure all upper thresholds, use: sensor thresh <sensor-id> upper <unc> <ucr> <unr> Note
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 | 1 | Support monitoring of DDR0 temp (on memory controller 0) |
| ddr0_1_temp 1 | 2 | Support monitoring of DDR1 temp (on memory controller 0) |
| ddr1_0_temp 1 | 3 | Support monitoring of DDR0 temp (on memory controller 1) |
| ddr1_1_temp 1 | 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 |
On BlueField-2 and BlueField-3 based boards, DDR sensors and FRUs are not supported. They will appear as no reading.
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 2 | 4 | FRU for SPD MC0 DIMM 0 (MC = memory controller). The ddr0_0_spd is in binary format. |
| ddr0_1_spd 2 | 5 | FRU for SPD MC0 DIMM1. The ddr0_1_spd is in binary format. |
| ddr1_0_spd 2 | 6 | FRU for SPD MC1 DIMM0. The ddr1_0_spd is in binary format. |
| ddr1_1_spd 2 | 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:
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 |
On BlueField-2 and BlueField-3 based boards, DDR sensors and FRUs are not supported. They will appear as no reading.
The BlueField is able to retrieve data from the DPU 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:
These addresses must be different from one another. Otherwise, one of the drives will fail to register. To change the BMC I2C address:
|
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:
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"
Then reboot or restart the IPMI service as follows:
systemctl restart mlx_ipmid
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>
Load the BlueField CentOS image:
NoteThe 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
InfoThe i2c-dev module is built into the kernel 5.4.60 on CentOS 7.6.
(Optional) Update the i2c-mlx driver if the installed version is older than i2c-mlx-1.0-0.gab579c6.src.rpm.
Re-compile i2c-mlx. Run:
$ yum remove -y kmod-i2c-mlx $ modprobe -rv i2c-mlx
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
Load i2c-mlx. Run:
$ modprobe i2c-mlx
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
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
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
NoteYou 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
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
Generate a binary RPM from the ipmb-host source RPM and install it. Run:
$ rpmbuild --rebuild ipmb-host-1.0-0.g304ea0c.src.rpm
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
Load the IPMB driver. Run:
$ modprobe ipmb-dev-
intInstall and start rasdaemon package. Run:
yum install rasdaemon systemctl enable rasdaemon systemctl start rasdaemon
Start the IPMI daemon. Run:
$ systemctl enable mlx_ipmid $ systemctl start mlx_ipmid $ systemctl enable set_emu_param $ systemctl start set_emu_param