Systems and methods for allowing flexible chip configuration by external entity while maintaining secured boot environment

Abstract

A new approach is proposed that contemplates systems and methods to support flexible reconfiguration of a network chip by an external entity, such as a baseboard management controller (BMC), while maintaining a secured environment for the chip so that it can booted securely. Specifically, the network chip is configured to designate one or more of its networking ports to the BMC and allow the BMC to configure the designated networking ports without violating the secure areas of the network chip. To this end, the network chip is configured to allow the BMC to access a plurality of registers of the network chip via an Network Controller Sideband Interface (NC-SI) block of the network chip by issuing a plurality NC-SI compliant commands. By configuring the designated networking ports, the BMC is configured to establish a data path to a management software of a platform that includes the network chip though the designated networking ports.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.