This is an unnamed and undocumented partition table format implemented by the bootloader and kernel that Amlogic provides for their Linux SoCs (Meson series at least, and probably others). They appear to use this rather than GPT, the industry standard, because their BootROM loads and executes the next stage loader from offset 512 (0x200) on the eMMC, which is exactly where the GPT header would have to start. So instead of changing their BootROM, Amlogic devised this partition table, which lives at an offset of 36MiB (0x240_0000) on the eMMC and so doesn't conflict. This parser expects as input just the partition table from that offset. The maximum number of partitions in a table is 32, which corresponds to a maximum table size of 1304 bytes (0x518).
This page hosts a formal specification of Amlogic proprietary eMMC partition table using Kaitai Struct. This specification can be automatically translated into a variety of programming languages to get a parsing library.
All parsing code for Ruby generated by Kaitai Struct depends on the Ruby runtime library. You have to install it before you can parse data.
The Ruby runtime library can be installed from RubyGems:
gem install kaitai-struct
Parse a local file and get structure in memory:
data = AmlogicEmmcPartitions.from_file("path/to/local/file.bin")
Or parse structure from a string of bytes:
bytes = "\x00\x01\x02..."
data = AmlogicEmmcPartitions.new(Kaitai::Struct::Stream.new(bytes))
After that, one can get various attributes from the structure by invoking getter methods like:
data.checksum # => To calculate this, treat the first (and only the first) partition
descriptor in the table below as an array of unsigned little-endian
32-bit integers. Sum all those integers mod 2^32, then multiply the
result by the total number of partitions, also mod 2^32. Amlogic
likely meant to include all the partition descriptors in the sum,
but their code as written instead repeatedly loops over the first
one, once for each partition in the table.
# This is a generated file! Please edit source .ksy file and use kaitai-struct-compiler to rebuild
require 'kaitai/struct/struct'
unless Gem::Version.new(Kaitai::Struct::VERSION) >= Gem::Version.new('0.9')
raise "Incompatible Kaitai Struct Ruby API: 0.9 or later is required, but you have #{Kaitai::Struct::VERSION}"
end
##
# This is an unnamed and undocumented partition table format implemented by
# the bootloader and kernel that Amlogic provides for their Linux SoCs (Meson
# series at least, and probably others). They appear to use this rather than GPT,
# the industry standard, because their BootROM loads and executes the next stage
# loader from offset 512 (0x200) on the eMMC, which is exactly where the GPT
# header would have to start. So instead of changing their BootROM, Amlogic
# devised this partition table, which lives at an offset of 36MiB (0x240_0000)
# on the eMMC and so doesn't conflict. This parser expects as input just the
# partition table from that offset. The maximum number of partitions in a table
# is 32, which corresponds to a maximum table size of 1304 bytes (0x518).
# @see http://aml-code.amlogic.com/kernel/common.git/tree/include/linux/mmc/emmc_partitions.h?id=18a4a87072ababf76ea08c8539e939b5b8a440ef Source
# @see http://aml-code.amlogic.com/kernel/common.git/tree/drivers/amlogic/mmc/emmc_partitions.c?id=18a4a87072ababf76ea08c8539e939b5b8a440ef Source
class AmlogicEmmcPartitions < Kaitai::Struct::Struct
def initialize(_io, _parent = nil, _root = self)
super(_io, _parent, _root)
_read
end
def _read
@magic = @_io.read_bytes(4)
raise Kaitai::Struct::ValidationNotEqualError.new([77, 80, 84, 0].pack('C*'), magic, _io, "/seq/0") if not magic == [77, 80, 84, 0].pack('C*')
@version = (Kaitai::Struct::Stream::bytes_terminate(@_io.read_bytes(12), 0, false)).force_encoding("UTF-8")
@num_partitions = @_io.read_s4le
raise Kaitai::Struct::ValidationLessThanError.new(1, num_partitions, _io, "/seq/2") if not num_partitions >= 1
raise Kaitai::Struct::ValidationGreaterThanError.new(32, num_partitions, _io, "/seq/2") if not num_partitions <= 32
@checksum = @_io.read_u4le
@partitions = []
(num_partitions).times { |i|
@partitions << Partition.new(@_io, self, @_root)
}
self
end
class Partition < Kaitai::Struct::Struct
def initialize(_io, _parent = nil, _root = self)
super(_io, _parent, _root)
_read
end
def _read
@name = (Kaitai::Struct::Stream::bytes_terminate(@_io.read_bytes(16), 0, false)).force_encoding("UTF-8")
@size = @_io.read_u8le
@offset = @_io.read_u8le
@_raw_flags = @_io.read_bytes(4)
_io__raw_flags = Kaitai::Struct::Stream.new(@_raw_flags)
@flags = PartFlags.new(_io__raw_flags, self, @_root)
@padding = @_io.read_bytes(4)
self
end
class PartFlags < Kaitai::Struct::Struct
def initialize(_io, _parent = nil, _root = self)
super(_io, _parent, _root)
_read
end
def _read
@is_code = @_io.read_bits_int_le(1) != 0
@is_cache = @_io.read_bits_int_le(1) != 0
@is_data = @_io.read_bits_int_le(1) != 0
self
end
attr_reader :is_code
attr_reader :is_cache
attr_reader :is_data
end
attr_reader :name
attr_reader :size
##
# The start of the partition relative to the start of the eMMC, in bytes
attr_reader :offset
attr_reader :flags
attr_reader :padding
attr_reader :_raw_flags
end
attr_reader :magic
attr_reader :version
attr_reader :num_partitions
##
# To calculate this, treat the first (and only the first) partition
# descriptor in the table below as an array of unsigned little-endian
# 32-bit integers. Sum all those integers mod 2^32, then multiply the
# result by the total number of partitions, also mod 2^32. Amlogic
# likely meant to include all the partition descriptors in the sum,
# but their code as written instead repeatedly loops over the first
# one, once for each partition in the table.
attr_reader :checksum
attr_reader :partitions
end