]> code.delx.au - refind/blob - NEWS.txt
Fixed bugs related to loading of customized disk-type badges.
[refind] / NEWS.txt
1 0.7.2 (?/??/2013):
2 ------------------
3
4 - Fixed reading of volume icons from user-specified icons directory, which
5 was broken.
6
7 - Fixed handling of /.VolumeBadge.icns (or /.VolumeBadge.png) files, which
8 was broken.
9
10 0.7.1 (7/8/2013):
11 -----------------
12
13 - Fixed build problem with recent development versions of EDK2.
14
15 - Added scan for Boot Repair's backup of the Windows boot loader
16 (bkpbootmgfw.efi). If found, give separate entries for it and for
17 bootmgfw.efi, each with its own descriptive text label.
18
19 - Fixed also_scan_dirs; used to have bug that caused it to ignore
20 volume specification, if present.
21
22 - Fixed bug in driver cache that caused Btrfs driver to hang sometimes.
23
24 0.7.0 (6/27/2013):
25 ------------------
26
27 - Added Btrfs signature to rEFInd, so that it can identify the filesystem
28 type for volumes that lack labels.
29
30 - Changed some critical filesystem driver pointers from 32-bit to 64-bit.
31 This *SHOULD* enable use of over-2TiB filesystems (for those filesystems
32 that support such large volumes). This capability is largely untested,
33 though.
34
35 - Added a cache to the filesystem driver core, and therefore to all the
36 filesystem drivers. This cache greatly improves performance in
37 VirtualBox, and offers modest performance improvements on a few "real"
38 computers. The most dramatic improvement is on ext2/3fs under VirtualBox:
39 Loading a kernel and initrd used to take ~200 seconds on my system, but
40 now takes ~3 seconds! On most "real" hardware, the improvement is much
41 less dramatic -- an improvement of a second or less, presumably because
42 of cacheing within the EFI or on the hard disk itself.
43
44 - Filter boot loaders based on a test of their validity; keeps out Linux
45 kernels without EFI stub loader code, loaders for the wrong architecture,
46 non-EFI loaders, etc.
47
48 - New Btrfs driver, contributed by Samuel Liao based on GRUB 2.00 Btrfs
49 code.
50
51 0.6.12 (6/18/2013):
52 -------------------
53
54 - Changed the 64-bit EFI shell included in the CD-R and USB flash drive
55 images to a version 2 shell that should support the "bcfg" command.
56
57 - Added support for PreBootloader to refind.spec's built-in installation
58 script.
59
60 - Added support for the Linux Foundation's PreLoader to install.sh. It's
61 treated just like shim, including using the --shim option (or, now,
62 --preloader); but it searches for and copies HashTool.efi rather than
63 MokManager.efi, and filenames are adjusted appropriately.
64
65 - Added code to determine Linux root filesystem from /etc/fstab file, if
66 it's on the same partition as the kernel and if the refind_linux.conf
67 file is not available. This enables rEFInd to boot Linux without any
68 rEFInd-specific configuration files on some (but not all) systems.
69
70 0.6.11 (5/13/2013):
71 -------------------
72
73 - New feature: rEFInd now ignores symbolic links to files on filesystems
74 that support them. This prevents the "vmlinuz" symbolic link that some
75 distributions create in the root directory from appearing in the loader
76 list. Note that this does NOT affect symbolic links to directories.
77
78 - Added icons for Lubuntu and Kubuntu.
79
80 - Improved the install.sh script so that it does a better job dealing with
81 directory names that contain spaces.
82
83 - rEFInd now tries to guess the Linux distribution type based on the kernel
84 filename (Fedora and RHEL only) or the "ID" or "NAME" variables in
85 /etc/os-release on the kernel's partition. None of these is guaranteed to
86 work. A fallback of the Tux penguin icon remains in place in case rEFInd
87 can't find anything substantive enough for a guess.
88
89 - Added "EFI\opensuse" to the locations searched for MOK utilities, since
90 OpenSUSE now uses that name.
91
92 - Renamed "Reboot to Firmware User Interface" to "Reboot to Computer Setup
93 Utility" in menu.
94
95 - Fixed bug in gptsync that caused it to hang if the disk had too few GPT
96 partitions to fill the MBR.
97
98 0.6.10 (5/5/2013):
99 ------------------
100
101 - Added support for "screensaver" token. If set to a positive integer, this
102 causes the screen to blank after the specified number of seconds of
103 inactivity. Pressing most keys (unfortunately NOT including Shift, Alt,
104 or Ctrl) will restore the display and restart the screen saver timeout.
105
106 - Added icon for ChromeOS (os_chrome.icns in the icons subdirectory).
107 ChromeBooks reportedly boots using the fallback filename, but if a user
108 wants to install rEFInd on a ChromeBook, renaming the original EFI/BOOT
109 directory to EFI/chrome and then installing rEFInd in the fallback
110 filename will bring up this new icon for ChromeOS.
111
112 - Added new option to reboot the computer into the firmware's user
113 interface. This option is active by default, or can be set via the
114 "firmware" option to the "showtools" token in refind.conf. It works
115 on only some computers, though; older computers lack this feature, and
116 when rEFInd is told to use this feature on such computers, the directive
117 is quietly ignored.
118
119 - Upgraded LodePNG library from version 20121216 to 20130415 and
120 restructured rEFInd-specific modifications to simplify future upgrades.
121
122 - Replaced hexadecimal error code with description if an error is
123 encountered when saving a screen shot.
124
125 - Enable multiple screen shots: Rather than naming all screen shots
126 "screenshot.bmp", the name is now "screenshot_###.bmp", where "###" is a
127 sequence number, starting with "001".
128
129 0.6.9 (4/25/2013):
130 ------------------
131
132 - Modified default banner to include the new rEFInd icon, provided by Erik
133 Kemperman.
134
135 - Worked around a suspected firmware bug that caused rEFInd 0.6.6 to 0.6.8
136 to hang at startup on some systems (DUET and some Macs).
137
138 - Modified rEFInd to search for gptsync under the names gptsync.efi and
139 gptsync_{arch}.efi, where {arch} is ia32 or x64. (Previous versions
140 searched only for gptsync.efi.)
141
142 - Added gptsync program from rEFIt project, but with some changes to
143 improve flexibility and make it less likely that UEFI users will
144 accidentally trash their systems.
145
146 - Changed timeout code so that the timeout continues if the keyboard is
147 disconnected. This can help in booting a headless server or a system with
148 a bluetooth or other keyboard that's not recognized by the EFI.
149
150 0.6.8 (3/18/2013):
151 ------------------
152
153 - Added workaround for presumed EFI bug that was causing "Invalid
154 Parameter" errors when scanning for boot loaders on some computers.
155
156 - Added search for an EFI shell called shell.efi in the root directory
157 (previously this name was only accepted in EFI\tools).
158
159 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail on some systems (Fedora
160 18, for instance) because of a problem identifying the ESP.
161
162 - Fixed bug that caused icons named after boot loaders to not be used.
163
164 0.6.7 (2/3/2013):
165 -----------------
166
167 - Added a more explicit error message summarizing options when a launch of
168 a program results in a Secure Boot failure.
169
170 - Changed MOK tool detection to scan all volumes, not just the rEFInd
171 home volume. This is desirable because the Linux Foundation's HashTool
172 can only scan its own volume, making it desirable to place copies of this
173 program on every volume that holds EFI boot loader binaries.
174
175 - Added support for launching the Linux Foundation HashTool as a means of
176 managing MOKs (or MOK hashes, at any rate).
177
178 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to present an entry for itself as a
179 Microsoft OS if it was launched as EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi.
180
181 - Fixed bug that caused dont_scan_volumes option to be added to
182 also_scan_dirs list.
183
184 - Fixed dont_scan_volumes so that it works with OS X boot loaders.
185
186 - Fixed broken mixing of PNG and ICNS icons when using a user-specified
187 icons directory -- previously, an ICNS file in the default directory
188 would override a PNG file in the user-specified directory.
189
190 0.6.6 (1/26/2013):
191 ------------------
192
193 - rEFInd now ignores the fallback boot loader (EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
194 EFI/BOOT/bootia32.efi) if it's identical to another boot loader on
195 the same volume. This is intended to help unclutter the display on
196 systems that run Windows, since Windows tends to duplicate its own boot
197 loader under the fallback name.
198
199 - Added new "font" token to refind.conf, which enables specifying a font in
200 the form of a PNG file. This file must contain monospace glyphs for the
201 95 characters from ASCII 32 to 126 (space through tilde), inclusive, plus
202 a glyph to be displayed for characters outside of this range, for a total
203 of 96 glyphs.
204
205 - Replaced the old font (inherited from rEFInd) with an anti-aliased
206 version of Luxi Mono Regular 14 point.
207
208 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore manual boot stanzas in files
209 included via the "include" token in refind.conf.
210
211 - Fixed bug that caused ASSERT error on some systems (and conceivably a
212 crash on startup on some) when default_selection line in refind.conf was
213 commented out or empty.
214
215 - Fixed bug that caused "Binary is whitelisted" message to persist on
216 screen after loading MOK-signed drivers in Secure Boot mode.
217
218 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore the "icon" token in refind.conf
219 manual boot stanzas.
220
221 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused the script to fail to update
222 drivers when rEFInd was installed in EFI/BOOT/.
223
224 0.6.5 (1/16/2013):
225 ------------------
226
227 - Improved text color support: rEFInd now uses black text against light
228 backgrounds and white text against dark backgrounds.
229
230 - Added support for PNGs as banners, icons, and selectors.
231
232 - Added icon for ALT Linux.
233
234 - Added "safemode" option to "hideui" token, to hide option to boot into
235 safe mode for OS X ("-v -x" option to boot.efi).
236
237 - Added icon for Haiku (os_haiku.icns).
238
239 - Enable transparency of icons & main-menu text when the banner icon is
240 sized to cover these areas.
241
242 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to crash if fed a banner image that's
243 too big. Note that "too big" can be substantially smaller than the screen
244 resolution!
245
246 0.6.4 (1/8/2013):
247 -----------------
248
249 - Revised install.sh to copy ext2fs driver, rather than ext4fs driver, for
250 ext2/3 filesystems. This can help keep non-functional entries from links
251 from /vmlinuz to /boot/vmlinuz out of the menu if the system uses ext4fs
252 on root and ext2fs or ext3fs on /boot.
253
254 - Fixed a couple of memory management bugs that cause rEFInd to hang at
255 startup on some systems.
256
257 0.6.3 (1/6/2013):
258 -----------------
259
260 - Added the ability to specify a volume name or number in the
261 "dont_scan_dirs" and "also_scan_dirs" tokens.
262
263 - Fixed a bug that caused removable EFI media to not appear in scan lists
264 if rEFInd was installed as EFI/BOOT/boot{arch}.efi on a hard disk.
265
266 - Modified ISO-9660 driver so that it can handle discs with other than
267 2048-byte sectors. This makes it useful for reading "hybrid ISO" images
268 burned to USB flash disks.
269
270 - New mvrefind.sh script to move a rEFInd installation between a standard
271 location (typically EFI/refind) and one of the fallback locations
272 (EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot). It can also do more exotic locations.
273
274 - The install.sh script now installs to EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
275 EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi if it's run in BIOS mode. This is
276 intended to give some chance of producing a bootable installation should
277 a user accidentally install Linux in EFI mode and then install rEFInd
278 from that installation.
279
280 - The install.sh script now tries to find an existing rEFInd installation
281 and upgrade it, even if it's in EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot rather
282 than in EFI/refind.
283
284 - New "--yes" option to install.sh to help with unattended or automated
285 installations (as from an RPM or Debian package).
286
287 0.6.2 (12/30/2012):
288 -------------------
289
290 - Inclusion of a sample refind.spec file for the benefit of RPM
291 distribution maintainers who might want to include rEFInd. It's a bit
292 rough, but it gets you a good chunk of the way there....
293
294 - The EFI filesystem drivers can now be built with the GNU-EFI toolkit as
295 well as with the TianoCore EDK2. See the BUILDING.txt file for details on
296 how to build them with either toolkit. This improvement doesn't affect
297 users of my binary packages, but it should make it easier for Linux
298 distributions to adopt rEFInd into their package systems.
299
300 - Tweaked refind.inf file for better build results using "native" TianoCore
301 EDK2 build process (vs. the Makefile-based build process that I use under
302 Linux). This won't affect those who use my binary builds or build under
303 Linux with the "make" command.
304
305 - Fixed bug that prevented Secure Boot launches from working when rEFInd
306 was built with GNU-EFI rather than the TianoCore EDK2.
307
308 - Substantial reworking of Secure Boot code, based on James Bottomley's
309 PreLoader program. This new code eliminates the limitation of launching
310 just one driver in Secure Boot mode and is likely to be more reliable
311 with future or obscure boot loaders. It should also work with non-x86-64
312 systems, although this relies on a platform-specific shim program, which
313 to date exists only for x86-64. The basic features are the same as before
314 -- rEFInd relies on shim for authentication functions and will launch
315 programs that are signed by Secure Boot keys, shim keys, or MOKs.
316
317 - Altered default for "textmode" option (when it's commented out) to not
318 adjust the text mode at all. (Prior versions set it to mode 0 by
319 default.)
320
321 0.6.1 (12/21/2012):
322 -------------------
323
324 - Added "--root" option to install.sh, to enable installation of rEFInd
325 to something other than the currently-running OS. This is intended for
326 use on emergency discs.
327
328 - Thanks to Stefan Agner, the ext4fs driver now supports the "meta_bg"
329 filesystem feature, which distributes metadata throughout the disk. This
330 feature isn't used by default, but can be set at filesystem creation time
331 by passing the "-O meta_bg,^resize_inode" option to mke2fs. (Using
332 "^resize_inode" is necessary because meta_bg is incompatible with
333 resize_inode, which IS used by default.) This feature can be used on
334 ext3fs and ext2fs as well as on ext4fs, so the ext4fs driver can now
335 handle some ext3fs and ext2fs partitions that the ext2fs driver can't
336 handle.
337
338 - Fixed some screen resolution-setting bugs.
339
340 - Added the "words" that make up a filesystem's label (delimited by spaces,
341 dashes, or underscores) to the list of bases used to search for OS icons.
342 For instance, if the filesystem's label is "Arch", rEFInd searches for
343 os_Arch.icns; if it's "Fedora 17", it searches for os_Fedora.icns and
344 os_17.icns; and if it's "NEW_GENTOO", it searches for os_NEW.icns and
345 os_GENTOO.icns.
346
347 - Refined hints displays to be more context-sensitive, particularly in text
348 mode.
349
350 - Instead of displaying a blank filesystem label when a filesystem has
351 none, rEFInd now displays the size and/or type of the filesystem, as in
352 "boot EFI\foo\bar.efi from 200 MiB ext3 volume" rather than "boot
353 EFI\foo\bar.efi from".
354
355 - Fixed a bug that caused the screen to clear after displaying an error
356 message but before displaying the "Hit any key to continue" message when
357 a boot loader launch failed.
358
359 0.6.0 (12/16/2012):
360 -------------------
361
362 - Fixed a memory allocation bug that could cause a program crash when
363 specifying certain values with the "also_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_volumes",
364 "dont_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_files", and "scan_driver_dirs" refind.conf
365 options.
366
367 - Modified Linux kernel initrd-finding code so that if an initrd is
368 specified in refind_linux.conf, rEFInd will not add any initrd it finds.
369 This enables an override of the default initrd, and is likely to be
370 particularly helpful to Arch Linux users.
371
372 - Added ext4fs driver!
373
374 - Made "boot" the default value for "also_scan_dirs".
375
376 - Added identifying screen header to line editor.
377
378 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd's display to be mis-sized upon return
379 from a program that set the resolution itself.
380
381 - Adjusted "resolution" refind.conf parameter so that it can accept EITHER
382 a resolution as width and height OR a single digit as a UEFI mode number
383 (which is system-specific). This is done because some systems present the
384 same mode twice in their mode lists, perhaps varying in refresh rate,
385 monitor output, or some other salient characteristics; specifying the
386 mode number enables selecting the higher-numbered mode, whereas using
387 horizontal and vertical resolution values selects the lowest-numbered
388 mode.
389
390 - Added "textmode" refind.conf parameter to set the text mode used in
391 text-only displays, and for the line editor and boot-time handoff
392 display even in graphics mode.
393
394 - Fixed bug that caused tools (shell, etc.) to launch when they were
395 highlighted and F2 or Insert was pressed.
396
397 - Added "editor" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf, which
398 disables the boot options editor.
399
400 - Added hints text to rEFInd main menu and sub-menus. This can be disabled
401 by setting the new "hints" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf.
402
403 - Added "boot with minimal options" entry to refind_linux.conf file
404 generated by install.sh. This entry boots without the options extracted
405 from the /etc/default/grub file.
406
407 - Added keys subdirectory to main distribution, to hold public Secure
408 Boot/shim keys from known sources.
409
410 - Changed install.sh --drivers option to --alldrivers, added new
411 --nodrivers option, and made the default on Linux to install the one
412 driver that's used on /boot (or the root filesystem if /boot isn't a
413 separate partition). Of course, this won't install a non-existent driver,
414 and it also won't work properly if run from an emergency disk unless you
415 mount a separate /boot partition at that location.
416
417 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented creation of refind_linux.conf file
418 on Linux systems.
419
420 0.5.1.1 (12/12/2012):
421 ---------------------
422
423 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented it from working on OS X.
424
425 0.5.1 (12/11/2012):
426 -------------------
427
428 - Added support for "0" options to "textonly" and "scan_all_linux_kernels"
429 to reverse the usual meaning of these tokens. This is useful for
430 including these options in a secondary configuration file called with the
431 new "include" token to override a setting set in the main file.
432
433 - Added "include" token for refind.conf, to enable including a secondary
434 configuration file from a primary one.
435
436 - Modified install.sh so that it creates a simple refind_linux.conf file in
437 /boot, if that file doesn't already exist and if install.sh is run from
438 Linux. If that directory happens to be on a FAT, HFS+, ext2fs, ext3fs, or
439 ReiserFS volume, and if the necessary drivers are installed, the result
440 is that rEFInd will detect the Linux installation with no further
441 configuration on many systems. (Some may still require tweaking of kernel
442 options, though; for instance, adding "dolvm" on Gentoo systems that use
443 LVM.)
444
445 - Added --shim and --localkeys options to install.sh to help simplify setup
446 on systems with Secure Boot active.
447
448 - Fixed (maybe) bug that caused resolution options to not be displayed on
449 recent Macs with GOP graphics when specifying an invalid resolution in
450 refind.conf.
451
452 - Fixed bug that caused some programs (EFI shells, in particular) to hang
453 when launching on some systems (DUET, in particular).
454
455 - Implemented a fix to enable ELILO to launch with Secure Boot active.
456 This fix might help with some other boot loaders in Secure Boot mode,
457 too, but I don't know of any specifics.
458
459 0.5.0 (12/6/2012):
460 ------------------
461
462 - Added the ability to include quote marks ('"') in refind.conf and
463 refind_linux.conf tokens by doubling them up, as in:
464 "ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value=""this is it"""
465 This example results in the following string being passed as an
466 option:
467 ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value="this is it"
468
469 - Changed refind.conf-sample to uncomment the scan_all_linux_kernels
470 option by default. If this option is deleted or commented out, the
471 program default remains to not scan all Linux kernels; but with
472 increasing numbers of distributions shipping with kernels that include
473 EFI stub loader support, setting the configuration file default to scan
474 for them makes sense.
475
476 - Modified the "resolution" token so that it affects text mode as well
477 as graphics mode. On my systems, though, the actual text area is still
478 restricted to an 80x25 area. (This seems to be a firmware limitation; my
479 EFI shells are also so limited.)
480
481 - Fixed a bug that caused the options line editor to blank out lines that
482 were not actually edited.
483
484 - Added support for using Matthew Garrett's Shim program and its Machine
485 Owner Keys (MOKs) to extend Secure Boot capabilities. If rEFInd is
486 launched from Shim on a computer with Secure Boot active, rEFInd will
487 launch programs signed with either a standard UEFI Secure Boot key or a
488 MOK. For the moment, this feature works only on x86-64 systems.
489
490 - Added new "dont_scan_files" (aka "don't_scan_files") token for
491 refind.conf. The effect is similar to dont_scan_dirs, but it creates a
492 blacklist of filenames within directories rather than directory names.
493 I'm initially using it to place shim.efi and MokManager.efi in the
494 blacklist to keep these programs out of the OS list. (MokManager.efi is
495 scanned separately as a tool; see below.) I've moved checks for
496 ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi, and TextMode.efi to this list. (These
497 three had previously been blacklisted by hard-coding in ScanLoaderDir().)
498
499 - Added the directory from which rEFInd launched to dont_scan_dirs. This
500 works around a bug in which rEFInd would show itself as a bogus Windows
501 entry if it's installed as EFI/Microsoft/boot/bootmgfw.efi.
502
503 - Added support for launching MokManager.efi for managing the Machine Owner
504 Keys (MOKs) maintained by the shim boot loader developed by Fedora and
505 SUSE. This program is scanned and presented as a second-row tool.
506
507 - Added support for Apple's Recovery HD partition: If it's detected, a new
508 icon appears on the second row. This icon can be removed by explicitly
509 setting the "showtools" option in refind.conf and excluding the
510 "apple_recovery" option from that line.
511
512 - Fixed bug that caused text-mode ("textonly" refind.conf option enabled)
513 menu entries to be right-aligned rather than left-aligned when rEFInd was
514 compiled with the TianoCore EDK2.
515
516 - Added "--usedefault {devicename}" and "--drivers" options to the
517 install.sh script and changed the "esp" option to "--esp".
518
519 0.4.7 (11/6/2012):
520 ------------------
521
522 - Added an icon for gummiboot.
523
524 - Added a boot option editor: Pressing the Insert or F2 key from a boot
525 tag's options menu opens a simple text-mode line editor on which the boot
526 options may be edited for a one-time boot with altered options.
527
528 - Modified the "scan_delay" feature to delay and then perform a re-scan,
529 which may work better than the first attempt at this feature (which I'm
530 told isn't working as planned).
531
532 - Modified rEFInd to add a space after the command-line options only when
533 launching Mac OS X. On some early Macs, the extra space (which had been
534 present by default, as a carryover from rEFIt) causes problems when
535 booting Linux kernels from FAT partitions.
536
537 0.4.6 (10/6/2012):
538 ------------------
539
540 - Fixed some minor memory management issues.
541
542 - Added new "scan_delay" feature to impose a delay before scanning
543 for disks.
544
545 - Changed default "scanfor" option from internal-external-optical to either
546 internal-external-optical-manual (for non-Macs) or
547 internal-hdbios-external-biosexternal-optical-cd-manual (for Macs). I've
548 done this for two reasons:
549 - Many Mac users have been confused by the fact that rEFInd needs
550 reconfiguration to detect Windows (or Linux installed in BIOS mode),
551 since rEFIt scans BIOS devices by default. Adding the BIOS options as
552 default for them should help them.
553 - Adding the "manual" option enables users to simply add manual boot
554 stanzas and have them work, which is more intuitive. Adding the
555 "manual" option will have no effect unless manual stanzas are created
556 or uncommented, so this part of the change won't affect users' working
557 default configurations.
558
559 - Added new legacy (BIOS) boot support for UEFI-based PCs.
560
561 0.4.5 (8/12/2012):
562 ------------------
563
564 - Fixed bug that caused a failure to boot BIOS-based OSes on Macs.
565
566 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail to detect rEFItBlesser.
567
568 0.4.4 (6/23/2012):
569 ------------------
570
571 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be corrupted by rEFInd on
572 32-bit systems.
573
574 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be truncated in the drivers
575 on 32-bit systems.
576
577 - Fixed bug in use_graphics_for option parsing that caused most options
578 to set graphics mode for OS X and/or Linux but not other boot
579 loaders/OSes.
580
581 - Tweaked install script to better isolate the ESP under OS X.
582
583 0.4.3 (6/21/2012):
584 ------------------
585
586 - rEFInd now supports compilation using the TianoCore UDK2010/EDK2
587 development kit in addition to GNU-EFI.
588
589 - Added new "use_graphics_for" option to control which OSes to boot in
590 graphics mode. (This effect lasts for a fraction of a second on most
591 systems, since the boot loader that rEFInd launches is likely to set
592 graphics or text mode itself.)
593
594 - Graphics-mode booting now clears the screen to the current rEFInd
595 background color (rather than black) and does NOT display boot messages.
596 The intent is for a smoother transition when booting OS X, or perhaps
597 other OSes that don't display boot loader messages. In practice, this
598 effect will be tiny for many OSes, since the boot loader generally clears
599 the screen within a fraction of a second of being launched; but the
600 "flicker" of a rEFInd message in that time can sometimes be distracting.
601
602 - Filesystem drivers now work on EFI 1.x systems, such as Macs.
603
604 - Removed "linux.conf" as a valid alternative name for "refind_linux.conf"
605 for holding Linux kernel options. The kernel developers plan to use
606 "linux.conf" themselves.
607
608 0.4.2 (6/3/2012):
609 -----------------
610
611 - Added a message to install.sh when run on Macs to remind users to update
612 the "scanfor" line in refind.conf if they need to boot BIOS-based OSes
613 via rEFInd.
614
615 - Modified install.sh script to be smarter about running efibootmgr on
616 Linux. It now uses the whole path to the rEFInd binary as a key to
617 determine whether an existing entry exists, rather than just the filename
618 portion. If an entry exists and is the first entry in the boot order, the
619 script does nothing to the NVRAM entries. If such an entry exists but is
620 not the default, the script deletes that entry and creates a new one
621 (implicitly making it the first in the boot order). If such an entry does
622 not exist, the script creates a new one (again, making it the first in
623 the boot order).
624
625 - Added "dont_scan_dirs" configuration file option, which adds directories
626 to a "blacklist" of directories that are NOT scanned for boot loaders.
627
628 0.4.1 (5/25/2012):
629 ------------------
630
631 - Added "scanning for new boot loaders" message to the re-scan function
632 (hitting Esc at the main menu). It usually flashes up too quickly to
633 be of importance, but if the scan function takes a while because of
634 access to a CD that must be spun up, it should make it clear that the
635 system hasn't hung.
636
637 - Modified install.sh script to detect rEFItBlesser on Macs, and if
638 present, to ask the user if it should be removed.
639
640 - Cleaned up the Make.common file for the filesystem drivers.
641
642 - Changed HFS+ driver to return volume label of "HFS+ volume" rather than
643 an empty label. (The driver doesn't currently read the real volume
644 label.)
645
646 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to appear in its own menu after
647 running a shell and then re-scanning for boot loaders.
648
649 0.4.0 (5/20/2012):
650 ------------------
651
652 - Inclusion of drivers for ISO-9660, HFS+, ReiserFS, and ext2fs. Most of
653 these drivers originated with rEFIt, although the HFS+ driver seems to
654 have come from Oracle's VirtualBox, with some files from Apple. I hadn't
655 included these drivers previously because the build process proved
656 challenging. As it is, they don't work on my Mac Mini, I suspect because
657 the build process with the UDK2010 development kit may not work with the
658 EFI 1.x that Apple uses.
659
660 - Addition of support for drivers in the "drivers_{arch}" subdirectory of
661 the main rEFInd binary directory (e.g., "drivers_x64" or "drivers_ia32").
662 Drivers may continue to be placed in the "drivers" subdirectory.
663
664 - Added new feature to eject CDs (and other removable media): Press F12 to
665 eject all such media. This function works only on some Macs, though (it
666 relies on an Apple-specific EFI extension, and this extension isn't even
667 implemented on all Macs, much less on UEFI-based PCs).
668
669 - Fixed a problem that could cause GRUB 2 to fail to read its configuration
670 file when launched from rEFInd.
671
672 0.3.5 (5/15/2012):
673 ------------------
674
675 - Removed the GRUB 2 detection "reciped" added with 0.3.2, since I've
676 received reports that it's not working as intended.
677
678 - Added re-scan feature: Press the Esc key to have rEFInd re-read its
679 configuration file, tell the EFI to scan for new filesystems, and re-scan
680 those filesystems for boot loaders. The main purpose is to enable
681 scanning a new removable medium that you insert after launching rEFInd;
682 however, it can also be used to immediately implement changes to the
683 configuration file or new drivers you load from an EFI shell.
684
685 - Fixed a bug that could cause the scroll-right arrow to be replaced by the
686 scroll-left arrow under some circumstances.
687
688 0.3.4 (5/9/2012):
689 -----------------
690
691 - Added new configuration file option: "icons_dir", which sets the name
692 of the subdirectory in which icons are found. See the documentation or
693 sample configuration file for a full description.
694
695 - Modified Makefile to generate rEFInd binary that includes architecture
696 code -- refind_ia32.efi or refind_x64.efi, rather than the generic
697 refind.efi. This is done mainly to help the install.sh script. The
698 program can be named anything you like on the disk. (The generic name
699 refind.efi is used on unknown architectures.)
700
701 - Improved install.sh script: Fixed bug on OS X 10.7 and enable it to be
702 used after building from source code (or via new "make install" Makefile
703 target).
704
705 - Improved screen redraws to produce less flicker when moving among the
706 second-row tags or to the last tag on the first row.
707
708 0.3.3 (5/6/2012):
709 -----------------
710
711 - Improved menu navigation:
712 - In graphics mode, left & right arrow keys move left & right, while up &
713 down arrows move between rows.
714 - Page Up and Page Down now move through chunks of visible tags (in both
715 text & graphics modes), jumping from one row to another only when at
716 the edge of the row. In text mode, the "rows" are broken down as in
717 graphics mode, but they aren't visibly distinguished on the screen.
718
719 - Improved text-mode use: rEFInd now displays the proper number of entries
720 when first started in text mode and scrolling is done sensibly when too
721 many entries exist to fit on the screen.
722
723 0.3.2 (5/4/2012):
724 -----------------
725
726 - Added the install.sh script to install rEFInd on Linux and Mac OS X
727 systems. This script must be run as root (or via sudo). It requires
728 no options, but on Mac OS X, passing it the "esp" option causes it
729 to install rEFInd on the computer's ESP rather than the default of the
730 currently OS X boot partition. (Under Linux, the default is to install to
731 the ESP.) Note that there may be some unusual cases in which this script
732 will fail to work.
733
734 - Does a better job of clearing the screen when launching OSes in text
735 mode.
736
737 - Added detection "recipe" for GRUB 2's BIOS Boot Partition.
738
739 - Fixed bogus detection of ESPs created by Linux's mkdosfs utility or
740 Windows as bootable partitions when "scanfor" includes BIOS scanning
741 options.
742
743
744 0.3.1 (4/27/2012):
745 ------------------
746
747 - Fixed bug that caused spurious "Unsupported while scanning the root
748 directory" messages under some conitions on Macs.
749
750 - Modified loader scanning code to sort boot loader entries within a
751 directory by modification time, so that the most recently-modified loader
752 is first among those in a given directory. Thus, if you specify a
753 directory name (or volume name, for loaders stored in the root directory
754 of a volume) as the default_selection, the most recent of those loaders
755 will be the default. This is intended to help with Linux kernel
756 maintenance when using the EFI stub loader; set up this way, the most
757 recent kernel copied to your kernel directory will be the default,
758 obviating the need to adjust the refind.conf file when adding a new
759 kernel. If you want to change the default among those in the default
760 directory, you can use "touch" to adjust the modification timestamp.
761
762 - Tweaked code to find loader-specific .icns file so that it finds files
763 for Linux kernels without .efi extensions. In this case, files should be
764 named the same as the kernels they match, but with .icns extensions. For
765 instance, bzImage-3.3.2 should have an icon called bzImage-3.3.2.icns.
766 (The old code would have looked for an icon called bzImage-3.3.icns.)
767
768 - Eliminated bogus OS loader tags for filenames that end in ".icns" when
769 the scan_all_linux_kernels option is set.
770
771 0.3.0 (4/22/2012):
772 ------------------
773
774 - I'm officially upgrading this project's status from "alpha" to "beta" and
775 giving it a bump from 0.2.x to 0.3.0. This doesn't reflect any major
776 milestone with this version; rather, it reflects my sense that rEFInd has
777 been "out there" for a while, and although I've gotten bug reports,
778 they've been minor and/or have been fixed. The program still has known
779 bugs, but my impression is that it is, overall, usable by ordinary users.
780
781 - Added "resolution" option to refind.conf, which enables setting the video
782 resolution. To use it, pass two numeric values, as in "resolution 1024
783 768" to use a 1024x768 video mode. Note that not all modes are supported.
784 If you specify a non-supported video mode on a UEFI system, a message
785 appears listing the supported video modes and you must then press a key
786 to continue, using the default video mode (usually 800x600).
787 Unfortunately, I don't know the calls to get a list of supported video
788 modes on older EFI 1.x systems (including Macs), so on Macs setting an
789 incorrect video mode silently fails (you keep using the default mode).
790 This makes changing your video mode a hit-or-miss proposition on Macs.
791 CAUTION: It's possible to set a legal video mode that your monitor can't
792 handle, in which case you'll get a blank display until you boot an OS
793 that resets the video mode.
794
795 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused rEFInd to crash when returning from an
796 EFI shell or other programs on Macs, particularly when rEFInd used
797 graphical mode. I'm not 100% sure this bug is squashed because I still
798 don't understand the cause and I only have one Mac for testing. See
799 comments in the ReinitRefitLib() function in refit/lib.c for more
800 details.
801
802 - Added new refind.conf option: scan_all_linux_kernels, which causes Linux
803 kernels that lack ".efi" extensions to be included in scans for EFI boot
804 loaders. This may help integration with Linux distributions that don't
805 give their kernels such names by default. Beware, though: It can detect
806 unwanted files, such as older non-stub-loader kernels or .icns files used
807 to give kernels with .efi extensions custom icons.
808
809 - Improved EFI boot loader detection on boards with Gigabyte's Hybrid EFI,
810 and perhaps other EFIs with a buggy StriCmp() function. Files with both
811 ".efi" and ".EFI" extensions should now be detected as boot loaders.
812
813 - Fixed a bug that caused rEFInd to fail to scan for drivers if the
814 filesystem driver didn't set a volume name (that is, if the relevant
815 field was set to NULL rather than even an empty string). In such
816 situations, rEFInd now reports the volume name as "Unknown".
817
818 0.2.7 (4/19/2012):
819 ------------------
820
821 - After much trial and tribulation, I've overcome a GNU-EFI limitation and
822 enabled rEFInd to load EFI drivers. This feature was present in the
823 original build of rEFIt but was removed in the versions that could
824 compile under Linux, but now it's back -- and still being compiled under
825 Linux! To use it, you should place your drivers in a convenient directory
826 on the ESP (or whatever partition you use to launch rEFInd) and add a
827 "scan_driver_dirs" entry to refind.conf to tell rEFInd where to look. (As
828 always, you should specify the driver directory relative to the root of
829 the filesystem.) Note that you can't launch drivers from another
830 filesystem; they must be on the same volume that holds rEFInd. Those who
831 compile from source code should note that implementing this feature
832 necessitated using a more recent version of the GNU-EFI library. I'm
833 currently using version 3.0p, and version 3.0i does NOT work. I don't
834 know where the change occurred, but you may need to upgrade your GNU-EFI
835 installation.
836
837 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to show up in its own menu sometimes.
838
839 - Added new refind.conf token: also_scan_dirs. When scanning volumes for
840 EFI boot loaders, rEFInd always scans the root directory and every
841 subdirectory of the /EFI directory, but it doesn't recurse into these
842 directories. The also_scan_dirs token adds more directories to the scan
843 list. It defaults to "elilo,boot", but you can set it to any directory or
844 directories you like.
845
846 0.2.6 (4/14/2012):
847 ------------------
848
849 - Added "volume" keyword to configuration file's stanza options. This
850 option changes the volume from which subsequent files (specified by
851 "loader" and "icon") are loaded. You pass "volume" the name/label of the
852 FILESYSTEM you want to use (not the GPT partition name), or a number
853 followed by a colon (e.g., "1:"). The former should reliably identify a
854 filesystem, assuming the name is unique. The latter assigns numbers based
855 on the order in which they're scanned, which may not be as reliable but
856 should work when a volume is unnamed.
857
858 - Fixed bug in 0.2.5 that caused failure of Linux initial RAM disk
859 mapping on some (but not all) systems. Affected computers include at
860 least some Intel motherboards, maybe others.
861
862 0.2.5 (4/9/2012):
863 -----------------
864
865 - Fixed bug that caused an inability to associate initial RAM disks with
866 Linux kernels stored in a volume's root directory.
867
868 - Volume badges (that override default badges) are now stored in
869 .VolumeBadge.icns. Although undocumented, rEFInd formerly loaded custom
870 volume badges from .VolumeIcon.icns. This carryover from rEFIt was a
871 confusing name, given the next (new) feature, so I've changed and
872 documented the name....
873
874 - Added ability to set a default icon for a loader stored in the root
875 directory of a volume: The icon is stored in .VolumeIcon.icns. This icon
876 is also used for Mac OS X volumes booted from the standard location.
877
878 - Fixed bug that caused icons to drop back to generic icons when rEFInd
879 was launched in certain ways (such as from an EFI shell in rEFInd's
880 directory) on certain systems.
881
882 - Fixed bug that caused "unknown disable flag" to be shown (very briefly)
883 instead of "unknown hideui flag" when an improper hideui flag was set.
884
885 0.2.4 (4/5/2012):
886 -----------------
887
888 - Created new refind.conf entry: "showtools". This entry takes options of
889 "shell", "gptsync", "about", "exit", "reboot", and "shutdown". This
890 option is in some respects an affirmative version of portions of the old
891 "disable" and "hideui" options; however, it enables users to specify the
892 order in which these options appear on the screen. Also, the "exit"
893 option is new; it terminates the program. The effect is usually to return
894 to whatever tool launched it or to launch a default OS; however, this is
895 somewhat unpredictable. The default therefore omits the "exit" option, as
896 well as "gptsync", which has always been dangerous (but necessary on most
897 MacOS/Windows dual-boot setups on Macs). As part of this reconfiguration,
898 I've eliminated the "rescue Linux" option, which always seemed pointless
899 to me.
900
901 - Folded "disable" and "hideui" refind.conf entries into one ("disable"),
902 and reduced the number of options to six: "banner", "label",
903 "singleuser", "hwtest", "arrows", and "all". ("arrows" is new and
904 disables the scroll arrows when a system has too many tags to display
905 simultaneously.)
906
907 - Added max_tags option to the refind.conf file, enabling users to reduce
908 the maximum number of OS loader tags that can be displayed at once.
909
910 - Updated rEFIt icon, based on the 128x128 volume label from the rEFIt CD
911 image.
912
913 - Added x86 and x86-64 EFI shells to the CD image version of the binary,
914 but NOT to the binary zip file. The logic is that the CD image is more
915 likely to be used directly as an emergency disc and so may need this
916 feature, even though the source isn't part of the rEFInd project. (The
917 source is readily available from the TianoCore project.)
918
919 - EFI shells may now be stored at /shellx64.efi for x86-64 systems or at
920 /shellia32.efi for x86 systems. The /EFI/tools/shell.efi name is also
921 recognized; however, if both files are present, two EFI shell icons will
922 appear on the main menu. The /efi/{refind-path/apps/shell.efi filename,
923 which was never officially documented but worked as a carryover from
924 rEFIt, is no longer valid.
925
926 0.2.3 (3/26/2012):
927 ------------------
928
929 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused hangs when launching a second program
930 after returning from a first. There are some weird system-to-system
931 differences, though, and this fix causes (apparently harmless) error
932 messages about "(re)opening our installation volume" on at least one
933 system (a 32-bit Mac Mini). I'm committing this change because, imperfect
934 though it is, it's preferable to the earlier version, at least on my
935 small sample of computers.
936
937 - Because of news that the Linux kernel developers are planning to use the
938 filename linux.conf to hold Linux kernel configuration data for EFI
939 booting, I'm transitioning rEFInd away from that name and to
940 refind_linux.conf to avoid a conflict. This version can use either name,
941 with refind_linux.conf taking precedence if both are present.
942
943 - Added logo for Arch Linux.
944
945 0.2.2 (3/23/2012):
946 ------------------
947
948 - Fixed bug that caused program failure when Linux kernels with EFI stub
949 support were detected with no associated version numbers. rEFInd now
950 permits automatic linking of *ONE* versionless kernel to *ONE*
951 versionless initrd file.
952
953 - Fixed bug that caused program hangs when a boot loader filename or label
954 was too long. Such names are now properly truncated and program execution
955 continues.
956
957 - Fixed bug that caused no text to appear in submenus on UEFI systems with
958 small screens (800x600). NOTE: Problem still occurs on screens smaller
959 than this, but such systems are very rare.
960
961 0.2.1 (3/19/2012):
962 ------------------
963
964 - Added ability to set a "default_selection" that's a title or a substring
965 of one -- the name given to a stanza in a "menuentry" or the boot
966 loader's filename, in most cases, although "Mac OS X", "Windows XP
967 (XoM)", and "Microsoft EFI boot" are also titles.
968
969 - Added support for semi-automatic scans of Linux kernels with EFI stub
970 loader support. The program auto-detects matching initial RAM disk files
971 and loads additional options from the "linux.conf" file in the same
972 directory as the kernel.
973
974 - Added support for "submenuentry" keyword and associated sub-stanza
975 entries in refind.conf file.
976
977 - Renamed icons/os_mint.icns to icons/os_linuxmint.icns to match the
978 filename Linux Mint ACTUALLY uses for its ESP boot loader directory.
979
980
981 0.2.0 (3/14/2012):
982 ------------------
983
984 - Initial public release