[PATCH v7 0/9] Support for block device NVMEM providers

[Loic Poulain]

On embedded devices, it is common for factory provisioning to store
device-specific information, such as Ethernet or WiFi MAC addresses,
in a dedicated area of an eMMC partition. This avoids the need for
and additional EEPROM/OTP and leverages the persistence of eMMC.

One example is the Arduino UNO-Q, where the WiFi MAC address and the
Bluetooth Device address are stored in the eMMC Boot1 partition.

Until now, accessing this information required a custom bootloader
to read the data and inject it into the Device Tree before handing
control over to the kernel. This approach is fragile and leads to
device-specific workarounds.

Rather than adding a new NVMEM provider specifically to the eMMC
subsystem, the new support operates at the block layer, allowing any
block device to behave like other non-volatile memories such as EEPROM
or OTP.

This series builds on earlier work by Daniel Golle that enables block
devices to act as NVMEM providers:
https://lore.kernel.org/all/6061aa4201030b9bb2f8d03ef32a564fdb786ed1.1709667858.git.daniel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx/

It also introduces an NVMEM layout description for the Arduino UNO-Q,
allowing device-specific data stored in the eMMC Boot1 partition to
be accessed in a standard way.

WiFi and Ethernet already support retrieving MAC addresses from NVMEM.
Bluetooth requires similar support, which is also addressed.

Note that this is currently limited to MMC-backed block devices, as
only the MMC core associates a firmware node with the block device
(add_disk_fwnode). This can be easily extended in the future to
support additional block drivers.

Signed-off-by: Loic Poulain <loic.poulain@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
---
Changes in v7:
- Rework bindings/dts so that the eMMC boot partition can be a nvmem fixed-layout
  and not a child of fixed-partition. (Rob)
- Add Support for fixed-layout as the nvmem device node itself
- Remove "block: partitions: of: Skip child nodes without reg property"
  This is no more required in this series and will be submitted separately (Rob)
- Add missing linux/cleanup.h and linux/device.h includes (Bartosz)
- simplify nvmem_register() error path using dev_err_probe() (Bartosz)
- nvmem_device forward declaration to blk_types.h (Bartosz)
- Add hci_dev_get_bd_addr_from_nvmem() kernel-doc for return value (Piotr)
- Link to v6: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20260629-block-as-nvmem-v6-0-f02513dcd46d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Changes in v6:
- blk_nvmem_add() returns int, error properly propagated (Bartosz)
- Redundant if (bdev->bd_nvmem) guard removed in blk_nvmem_del() (Bartosz)
- Size guard changed from UINT_MAX → INT_MAX to avoid signed overflow in config.size (sashiko)
- BLK_OPEN_RESTRICT_WRITES removed from blk_nvmem_reg_read() (sashiko)
- Link to v5: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20260612-block-as-nvmem-v5-0-95e0b30fff90@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Changes in v5:
- Fixed ath10k binding issue + extended commit message (Krzysztof)
- Moved blk-nvmem handling to block core instead of a class_interface
  This allows correct/robust integration with block device life cycle (Bartosz).
- block: partitions: of: Skip child nodes without reg property (sashiko)
- Link to v4: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20260609-block-as-nvmem-v4-0-45712e6b22c6@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Changes in v4:
- Fix squash issue (dts commit incorrectly squashed) (Konrad)
- Use devres for nvmem resources (Bartosz)
- use __free() destructor helper when possible (Bartosz)
- Fix value return checking for bdev_file_open_by_dev
- Link to v3: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20260608-block-as-nvmem-v3-0-82681f50aa35@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Changes in v3:
- Fixed missing 'fixed-partitions' compatible in partition (Rob)
- Fixed clashing nvmem cells, document calibration along mac (Sashiko)
- Remove workaround to handle dangling nvmem references after
  unregistering, this is a generic nvmem framework issue handled
  in Bartosz's series:
   https://lore.kernel.org/all/20260429-nvmem-unbind-v3-0-2a694f95395b@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx/
- Validate mac (is_valid_ether_addr) before copying to output buffer
- Link to v2: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20260507-block-as-nvmem-v2-0-bf17edd5134e@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Changes in v2:
- Fix example nvmem-layout cells to use compatible = "mac-base"
- Squash WiFi MAC and Bluetooth BD address consumer patches into the nvmem layout patch
- Fix possible use-after-free in blk-nvmem: bnv (nvmem priv) linked to nvmem lifetime
- Simplify nvmem-cell-names from items: - const: to plain const:
- Factor out common NVMEM EUI-48 retrieval logic
- Reorder changes
- Link to v1: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20260428-block-as-nvmem-v1-0-6ad23e75190a@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

---
Daniel Golle (1):
      block: implement NVMEM provider

Loic Poulain (8):
      dt-bindings: mmc: Document fixed-layout NVMEM provider support
      dt-bindings: net: wireless: qcom,ath10k: Document NVMEM cells
      dt-bindings: bluetooth: qcom: Add NVMEM BD address cell
      nvmem: layouts: Support fixed-layout as the nvmem device node itself
      net: of_net: Add of_get_nvmem_eui48() helper for EUI-48 lookup
      Bluetooth: hci_sync: Add NVMEM-backed BD address retrieval
      Bluetooth: qca: Set NVMEM BD address quirks when address is invalid
      arm64: dts: qcom: arduino-imola: Describe NVMEM layout for WiFi/BT addresses

 .../devicetree/bindings/mmc/mmc-card.yaml          |  23 ++++-
 .../net/bluetooth/qcom,bluetooth-common.yaml       |   9 ++
 .../bindings/net/wireless/qcom,ath10k.yaml         |  16 +++
 arch/arm64/boot/dts/qcom/qrb2210-arduino-imola.dts |  32 ++++++
 block/Kconfig                                      |   9 ++
 block/Makefile                                     |   1 +
 block/blk-nvmem.c                                  | 109 +++++++++++++++++++++
 block/blk.h                                        |   8 ++
 block/genhd.c                                      |   4 +
 drivers/bluetooth/btqca.c                          |   5 +-
 drivers/nvmem/layouts.c                            |  13 ++-
 include/linux/blk_types.h                          |   4 +
 include/linux/of_net.h                             |   7 ++
 include/net/bluetooth/hci.h                        |  18 ++++
 net/bluetooth/hci_sync.c                           |  41 +++++++-
 net/core/of_net.c                                  |  49 ++++++---
 16 files changed, 332 insertions(+), 16 deletions(-)
---
base-commit: c58ba8c7e9ab26b5e8d91f8ca0e0a16c2ae318e9
change-id: 20260428-block-as-nvmem-4b308e8bda9a

Best regards,
-- 
Loic Poulain <loic.poulain@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>