Compiling and running 3rd party software on pfSense
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@admin: I could not find a proper place to start this thread, so please feel free to move it to a better place.
Some (or all?) Intel X710-based NICs refuse to cooperate with non-qualified SFP+ modules. I may have such a module in my Intel-branded X710-DA NIC. The Status->Interfaces page reports that the Ethernet Link-state is up, and it shows the brand and type of the module, so that's looking good. But this specific module is an XGS-PON ONT, so I cannot simply hook up it's other side to another NIC to diagnose why it doesn't work.
Taking this NIC out of my pfSense box and installing it into my Linux workstation to run xl710-unlocker is a bit of an undertaking, so I would like to try unlocking it on my pfSense box first.
Fortunately, somebody already made a BSD tool for it: ixl_unlock. I'm no stranger to building software, but BSD is still a black box to me, and I imagine the pfSense environment is probably limited when it comes to this.
Can anybody give me some hints, please?
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Is it actually showing an unsupported module error?
That BSD code looks pretty basic I would compile it with FreeBSD 14 and move it across. Since it's not a kernel module I'd expect there's a good chance it will run fine.
However that looks like a risk. Unclear if it would actually help either. -
@stephenw10 said in Compiling and running 3rd party software on pfSense:
Is it actually showing an unsupported module error?
No; It does not. Is that good news?
The Linux Kernel reports unsupported modules in the Kernel log, here. I was unable to find a similar message in the BSD Kernel.
However, when looking at the Linux code, it seems that the Ethernet link-state is always down for unsupported modules, so now I'm in doubt...That BSD code looks pretty basic I would compile it with FreeBSD 14 and move it across. Since it's not a kernel module I'd expect there's a good chance it will run fine.
However that looks like a risk. Unclear if it would actually help either.If it's not necessary, preventing is always better.
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I would expect to see at least some sort of error in the boot log when the driver attaches if the module is rejected as unsupported.
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@stephenw10 said in Compiling and running 3rd party software on pfSense:
I would expect to see at least some sort of error in the boot log when the driver attaches if the module is rejected as unsupported.
Apparently you're, right: No messages were logged and - against expectations - the Zaram XGS-PON ONT SPF+ module works beautifully in my X710-DA NIC. Perhaps because it's the Intel branded version, perhaps not. But at this moment, there's no problem to solve, but that you very much for your input!
