[Gllug] Bios

[Richard Cohen]

On Tue, 1 Feb 2000, Stuart Fox wrote:

> Martin Ling wrote:
> > 
> > >> There are a couple of libraries and APIs for getting to specific bits of
> > >> BIOS information (read and write).  I know, for example, that SVGAlib
> > uses
> > >> one for some video programming stuff, and I think Alan Cox made some
> > >> reference to one recently in his diary (Jan 2nd).
> > 
> > >I was just curious really.  Im sure that sometimes it might be useful to
> > >make bios changes on the fly.  I did have reason to want it the other
> > >day but for the life of me I can't remember what the reason was!
> > 
> > If you mean the BIOS configuration information (that's not the BIOS itself)
> > stored in CMOS memory (aka NVRAM), then there's an option in the kernel
> > since <someversion> to have a read/write /dev/nvram - I'm not what's been
> > written to make use of that.
> > 
> > It's useful for a couple of other reasons - in some machines, there's a few
> > bytes free there, and you can write little bits of data into there to be
> > stored independently of the disks. Uses that come to mind include codes to
> > assist post-mortem on crashed servers, last section of IP addresses for
> > cluster machines, and stored password for encrypted-filesystem removable
> > hard drive (doesn't prompt user for filesystem password on boot, checks bios
> > instead - ensures hd cannot be taken elsewhere and accessed, but will start
> > unattended).
> > 
> > Martin
> 
> I remember what prompted this question now! (brain returns)
> My bios config util has cpu fan speed and temp monitors etc
> I wondered if there was an X or console util where you could 
> monitor the said items

http://www.lm-sensors.nu is the home of the Linux hardware sensors
page.  They have what you're looking for - no need to read it directly
from the BIOS :-)

I've played with it at home, and it does work.

Cheers
Richard