Explanation of an error message while activating BMC firmware after hpm upgrade

Pre-requirement & reference:

How to approach BMC on Advantech CIoT platforms

How to set BMC IP address

How to upgrade FW via IPMITool

* Advantech’s IANA Enterprise Number used for OEM commands is 002839h

* IANA = Internet Assigned Number Authority 

Purpose:

Explanation for a pop-up error message during firmware activation.

Target Audience:

All users who are using Advantech ICVG (CIoT) platforms, including FWA, SKY-7K, SKY-8K, SKY-9K Series. 

Here's Cases:

Users may encounter the error message 'Error: Unable to establish IPMI v2 / RMCP+ session' or 'No data available' while activating BMC firmware, which is unexpected. Should this error message be a cause for concern?

IPMItool over LAN :

$ sudo ipmitool -I lanplus -H <bmc ip> -U <user> -P <password> hpm upgrade bmc_0.13.img activate

PICMG HPM.1 Upgrade Agent 1.0.9:

Validating firmware image integrity...OK
Performing preparation stage...
Services may be affected during upgrade. Do you wish to continue? (y/n): y
OK

Performing upgrade stage:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|ID  | Name        |                     Versions                        | %  |
|    |             |      Active     |      Backup     |      File       |    |
|----|-------------|-----------------|-----------------|-----------------|----|
|   1|8320 BMC     |   1.02 00000000 |   1.02 00000000 |   0.13 00000000 |100%|
|    |Upload Time: 04:39             | Image Size: 13990122 bytes              |
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(*) Component requires Payload Cold Reset
Performing activation stage:
    Waiting firmware activation...Error: Unable to establish IPMI v2 / RMCP+ session
Error: Unable to establish IPMI v2 / RMCP+ session
Error: Unable to establish IPMI v2 / RMCP+ session
OK

Firmware upgrade procedure successful

Or KCS way: 

$ sudo ipmitool hpm activate

PICMG HPM.1 Upgrade Agent 1.0.9:

Waiting firmware activation...No data available
No data available
No data available
OK

Explanation:

This behavior should be observed on platforms with Advantech BMC , as the error is reported by the IPMItool. Let's break down the messages description into 3 portions

1st ,

BMC prepares to reset itself for the FW activation

Performing activation stage:
Waiting firmware activation...

2nd,

while BMC is resetting, No IPMI communication is available at the moment, IPMItool awares about this could be a long-duration-process responsible so it starts to ping the BMC then you would see such error message due to the IPMItool timeout mechanism for each ping message

Error: Unable to establish IPMI v2 / RMCP+ session
Error: Unable to establish IPMI v2 / RMCP+ session
Error: Unable to establish IPMI v2 / RMCP+ session

3rd,

BMC has done the activation and boot successful, e.g. be available to deal with IPMI communication, as IPMItool is still in the process of long-duration-process it returns the message of the FW update is done & successful accordingly.

OK

Firmware upgrade procedure successful

In addition for reference, "Self test failed" KCS message seem only to happen if "upgrade" and "activate" HPM.1 commands are used together in one IPMItool call  and this was found on IPMItool v1.8.18 but v1.8.15 is having no such message. 

e.g. 
# ipmitool hpm upgrade bmc.img activate
...
...
Performing activation stage:
    Waiting firmware activation...No data available
No data available
OK
    Self test failed:
    Result1 = 0
    Result2 = 0
    Getting rollback status...
No Firmware rollback occurred

Firmware upgrade procedure successful

The error message occurs when ipmitool sending message to the BMC during its resetting, which could be not fixable from BMC FW.  For the activation case which is not a real error due to the returned status code is 0, checking by 'echo $?'

e.g. 
# ipmitool hpm upgrade bmc.img activate;echo $?
...
...
Performing activation stage: 
   Waiting firmware activation...
No data available 
No data available 
OK  
Self test failed: 
  Result1 = 0 
  Result2 = 0 
  Getting rollback status... 
No Firmware rollback occurred Firmware upgrade procedure successful

0

Internal ref ticket: #45250