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Toshiki Yagi - AIST

HTTP-FUSE PS3 Linux: internet boot framework using HTTP

HTTP-FUSE PS3-Linux is an Internet boot framework for PlayStation3 Linux Distributions. We use kboot and HTTP-FUSE LOOP to boot PS3 Linux distributions via HTTP from the internet. Kboot is an initial bootloader for PS3 Linux, and it is able to download the linux kernel and miniroot from an HTTP server. And we use HTTP-FUSE LOOP as the root filesystem.

HTTP-FUSE LOOP is a stackable virtual block device. It re-constructs a block device from the block files on HTTP servers. The block files are made from a normal disk image by splitting it into constant size pieces. The piece is named by the SHA1 hash of its data and saved as a file. The file name acts the address of the block.

HTTP-FUSE LOOP is applied to PS3-Linux distributions (Fedora Core, Debian, etc) which are installed on a built-in hard disk. We only have to customize the kernel and miniroot for HTTP-FUSE PS3-Linux. It makes security updates easy for anonymous users because it is only necessary to add new block files on the servers. This framework isn't limited to PS3 and can be applied to any embedded Linux which can use kboot. Current HTTP-FUSE LOOP is read-only. We use device-mapper for read-write access. The HTTP-FUSE LOOP driver uses PPE(PowerPC Processor Element) of CELL and performs at 8MB/s.

For the next step we will customize the driver for SPE (Synergistic Processor Element) because the PS3 CELL has 7 SPEs for parallel processing. The HTTP-FUSE LOOPs are bundled by software RAID (md driver). It will achieve wide bandwidth and fault-tolerance. We'll also customize the driver to deal with writing blocks.

Submitted paper

Paper (PDF) .