Microsoft Corporation
SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR DISAGGREGATING SYSTEM FIRMWARE CONFIGURATION DATA INTO A MANAGEMENT SUBSYSTEM FOR SEAMLESS UPDATES

Abstract:

While booting a host computing device on a cloud computing system, system firmware (such as Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) or Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI)) sends a query to a management subsystem (such as a baseboard management controller (BMC)) for updated configuration data used during a boot of the host computing device. The management subsystem sends the updated configuration data to the system firmware, and boot instructions in the system firmware compare the updated configuration data with configuration data stored on the host computing device. If the respective configuration data match, the boot instructions continue with booting the host computing device. If the configuration data do not match, then the boot instructions update the stored configuration data with the updated configuration data and then proceed to boot the host computing device.