]> code.delx.au - refind/blob - NEWS.txt
Fix legacy booting on Macs.
[refind] / NEWS.txt
1 0.7.4.1 (8/25/2013):
2 --------------------
3
4 - My initial 0.7.4 release broke legacy-boot ability on Macs, so I quickly
5 released this version using the original 0.7.4 filenames to fix the
6 problem.
7
8 0.7.4 (8/25/2013):
9 ------------------
10
11 - Fixed options passing to loader to include loader's filename as the first
12 option. This omission had no effect on most boot loaders, but caused
13 VMware's mboot64.efi to fail.
14
15 - Added support for memtest86 as second-row option. Program must be
16 stored in EFI/tools, EFI/tools/memtest, EFI/tools/memtest86, EFI/memtest,
17 or EFI/memtest86; and must use the name memtest86.efi, memtest86_x64.efi,
18 memtest86x64.efi, or bootx64.efi (changing "x64" to "ia32" on IA-32
19 systems). The memtest86 program is scanned for when the "showtools"
20 option includes the "memtest" or "memtest86" token, which it does by
21 default.
22
23 - Added space to end of "Boot %s from %s" string; enables adding a space
24 to the end of the "default_selection" item (in quotes) to set a default
25 that matches a volume name that's identical to another one except for
26 extra characters at the end of the non-wanted volume's name.
27
28 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to hang when launching boot loaders
29 under some conditions. (Launching from Firewire drives on Macs is the
30 known case, but there may be others.)
31
32 0.7.3 (8/7/2013):
33 -----------------
34
35 - Fixed bug that caused missing media-type badges on BIOS-mode boot
36 loaders on Macs.
37
38 - Fixed bug that caused failure when launching BIOS-mode OSes on Macs.
39
40 0.7.2 (8/6/2013):
41 -----------------
42
43 - Fixed bug that caused display glitches in the final entry on the first
44 row of icons if the second row of icons was empty.
45
46 - Fixed bug that could cause incorrect scanning or even a rEFInd crash when
47 using volume specification in also_scan_dirs token.
48
49 - Added protection against loading invalid drivers and other EFI programs.
50 (Some EFIs crash when attempting to load such drivers and programs.)
51
52 - Added PreLoader.efi and shim-fedora.efi to default dont_scan_files list;
53 it's now "shim.efi, shim-fedora.efi, PreLoader.efi, TextMode.efi,
54 ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi, MokManager.efi, HashTool.efi,
55 HashTool-signed.efi".
56
57 - Added icon for Funtoo Linux.
58
59 - Fixed reading of volume badges from user-specified icons directory, which
60 was broken.
61
62 - Fixed handling of /.VolumeBadge.icns (or /.VolumeBadge.png) files, which
63 was broken.
64
65 0.7.1 (7/8/2013):
66 -----------------
67
68 - Fixed build problem with recent development versions of EDK2.
69
70 - Added scan for Boot Repair's backup of the Windows boot loader
71 (bkpbootmgfw.efi). If found, give separate entries for it and for
72 bootmgfw.efi, each with its own descriptive text label.
73
74 - Fixed also_scan_dirs; used to have bug that caused it to ignore
75 volume specification, if present.
76
77 - Fixed bug in driver cache that caused Btrfs driver to hang sometimes.
78
79 0.7.0 (6/27/2013):
80 ------------------
81
82 - Added Btrfs signature to rEFInd, so that it can identify the filesystem
83 type for volumes that lack labels.
84
85 - Changed some critical filesystem driver pointers from 32-bit to 64-bit.
86 This *SHOULD* enable use of over-2TiB filesystems (for those filesystems
87 that support such large volumes). This capability is largely untested,
88 though.
89
90 - Added a cache to the filesystem driver core, and therefore to all the
91 filesystem drivers. This cache greatly improves performance in
92 VirtualBox, and offers modest performance improvements on a few "real"
93 computers. The most dramatic improvement is on ext2/3fs under VirtualBox:
94 Loading a kernel and initrd used to take ~200 seconds on my system, but
95 now takes ~3 seconds! On most "real" hardware, the improvement is much
96 less dramatic -- an improvement of a second or less, presumably because
97 of cacheing within the EFI or on the hard disk itself.
98
99 - Filter boot loaders based on a test of their validity; keeps out Linux
100 kernels without EFI stub loader code, loaders for the wrong architecture,
101 non-EFI loaders, etc.
102
103 - New Btrfs driver, contributed by Samuel Liao based on GRUB 2.00 Btrfs
104 code.
105
106 0.6.12 (6/18/2013):
107 -------------------
108
109 - Changed the 64-bit EFI shell included in the CD-R and USB flash drive
110 images to a version 2 shell that should support the "bcfg" command.
111
112 - Added support for PreBootloader to refind.spec's built-in installation
113 script.
114
115 - Added support for the Linux Foundation's PreLoader to install.sh. It's
116 treated just like shim, including using the --shim option (or, now,
117 --preloader); but it searches for and copies HashTool.efi rather than
118 MokManager.efi, and filenames are adjusted appropriately.
119
120 - Added code to determine Linux root filesystem from /etc/fstab file, if
121 it's on the same partition as the kernel and if the refind_linux.conf
122 file is not available. This enables rEFInd to boot Linux without any
123 rEFInd-specific configuration files on some (but not all) systems.
124
125 0.6.11 (5/13/2013):
126 -------------------
127
128 - New feature: rEFInd now ignores symbolic links to files on filesystems
129 that support them. This prevents the "vmlinuz" symbolic link that some
130 distributions create in the root directory from appearing in the loader
131 list. Note that this does NOT affect symbolic links to directories.
132
133 - Added icons for Lubuntu and Kubuntu.
134
135 - Improved the install.sh script so that it does a better job dealing with
136 directory names that contain spaces.
137
138 - rEFInd now tries to guess the Linux distribution type based on the kernel
139 filename (Fedora and RHEL only) or the "ID" or "NAME" variables in
140 /etc/os-release on the kernel's partition. None of these is guaranteed to
141 work. A fallback of the Tux penguin icon remains in place in case rEFInd
142 can't find anything substantive enough for a guess.
143
144 - Added "EFI\opensuse" to the locations searched for MOK utilities, since
145 OpenSUSE now uses that name.
146
147 - Renamed "Reboot to Firmware User Interface" to "Reboot to Computer Setup
148 Utility" in menu.
149
150 - Fixed bug in gptsync that caused it to hang if the disk had too few GPT
151 partitions to fill the MBR.
152
153 0.6.10 (5/5/2013):
154 ------------------
155
156 - Added support for "screensaver" token. If set to a positive integer, this
157 causes the screen to blank after the specified number of seconds of
158 inactivity. Pressing most keys (unfortunately NOT including Shift, Alt,
159 or Ctrl) will restore the display and restart the screen saver timeout.
160
161 - Added icon for ChromeOS (os_chrome.icns in the icons subdirectory).
162 ChromeBooks reportedly boots using the fallback filename, but if a user
163 wants to install rEFInd on a ChromeBook, renaming the original EFI/BOOT
164 directory to EFI/chrome and then installing rEFInd in the fallback
165 filename will bring up this new icon for ChromeOS.
166
167 - Added new option to reboot the computer into the firmware's user
168 interface. This option is active by default, or can be set via the
169 "firmware" option to the "showtools" token in refind.conf. It works
170 on only some computers, though; older computers lack this feature, and
171 when rEFInd is told to use this feature on such computers, the directive
172 is quietly ignored.
173
174 - Upgraded LodePNG library from version 20121216 to 20130415 and
175 restructured rEFInd-specific modifications to simplify future upgrades.
176
177 - Replaced hexadecimal error code with description if an error is
178 encountered when saving a screen shot.
179
180 - Enable multiple screen shots: Rather than naming all screen shots
181 "screenshot.bmp", the name is now "screenshot_###.bmp", where "###" is a
182 sequence number, starting with "001".
183
184 0.6.9 (4/25/2013):
185 ------------------
186
187 - Modified default banner to include the new rEFInd icon, provided by Erik
188 Kemperman.
189
190 - Worked around a suspected firmware bug that caused rEFInd 0.6.6 to 0.6.8
191 to hang at startup on some systems (DUET and some Macs).
192
193 - Modified rEFInd to search for gptsync under the names gptsync.efi and
194 gptsync_{arch}.efi, where {arch} is ia32 or x64. (Previous versions
195 searched only for gptsync.efi.)
196
197 - Added gptsync program from rEFIt project, but with some changes to
198 improve flexibility and make it less likely that UEFI users will
199 accidentally trash their systems.
200
201 - Changed timeout code so that the timeout continues if the keyboard is
202 disconnected. This can help in booting a headless server or a system with
203 a bluetooth or other keyboard that's not recognized by the EFI.
204
205 0.6.8 (3/18/2013):
206 ------------------
207
208 - Added workaround for presumed EFI bug that was causing "Invalid
209 Parameter" errors when scanning for boot loaders on some computers.
210
211 - Added search for an EFI shell called shell.efi in the root directory
212 (previously this name was only accepted in EFI\tools).
213
214 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail on some systems (Fedora
215 18, for instance) because of a problem identifying the ESP.
216
217 - Fixed bug that caused icons named after boot loaders to not be used.
218
219 0.6.7 (2/3/2013):
220 -----------------
221
222 - Added a more explicit error message summarizing options when a launch of
223 a program results in a Secure Boot failure.
224
225 - Changed MOK tool detection to scan all volumes, not just the rEFInd
226 home volume. This is desirable because the Linux Foundation's HashTool
227 can only scan its own volume, making it desirable to place copies of this
228 program on every volume that holds EFI boot loader binaries.
229
230 - Added support for launching the Linux Foundation HashTool as a means of
231 managing MOKs (or MOK hashes, at any rate).
232
233 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to present an entry for itself as a
234 Microsoft OS if it was launched as EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi.
235
236 - Fixed bug that caused dont_scan_volumes option to be added to
237 also_scan_dirs list.
238
239 - Fixed dont_scan_volumes so that it works with OS X boot loaders.
240
241 - Fixed broken mixing of PNG and ICNS icons when using a user-specified
242 icons directory -- previously, an ICNS file in the default directory
243 would override a PNG file in the user-specified directory.
244
245 0.6.6 (1/26/2013):
246 ------------------
247
248 - rEFInd now ignores the fallback boot loader (EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
249 EFI/BOOT/bootia32.efi) if it's identical to another boot loader on
250 the same volume. This is intended to help unclutter the display on
251 systems that run Windows, since Windows tends to duplicate its own boot
252 loader under the fallback name.
253
254 - Added new "font" token to refind.conf, which enables specifying a font in
255 the form of a PNG file. This file must contain monospace glyphs for the
256 95 characters from ASCII 32 to 126 (space through tilde), inclusive, plus
257 a glyph to be displayed for characters outside of this range, for a total
258 of 96 glyphs.
259
260 - Replaced the old font (inherited from rEFInd) with an anti-aliased
261 version of Luxi Mono Regular 14 point.
262
263 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore manual boot stanzas in files
264 included via the "include" token in refind.conf.
265
266 - Fixed bug that caused ASSERT error on some systems (and conceivably a
267 crash on startup on some) when default_selection line in refind.conf was
268 commented out or empty.
269
270 - Fixed bug that caused "Binary is whitelisted" message to persist on
271 screen after loading MOK-signed drivers in Secure Boot mode.
272
273 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore the "icon" token in refind.conf
274 manual boot stanzas.
275
276 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused the script to fail to update
277 drivers when rEFInd was installed in EFI/BOOT/.
278
279 0.6.5 (1/16/2013):
280 ------------------
281
282 - Improved text color support: rEFInd now uses black text against light
283 backgrounds and white text against dark backgrounds.
284
285 - Added support for PNGs as banners, icons, and selectors.
286
287 - Added icon for ALT Linux.
288
289 - Added "safemode" option to "hideui" token, to hide option to boot into
290 safe mode for OS X ("-v -x" option to boot.efi).
291
292 - Added icon for Haiku (os_haiku.icns).
293
294 - Enable transparency of icons & main-menu text when the banner icon is
295 sized to cover these areas.
296
297 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to crash if fed a banner image that's
298 too big. Note that "too big" can be substantially smaller than the screen
299 resolution!
300
301 0.6.4 (1/8/2013):
302 -----------------
303
304 - Revised install.sh to copy ext2fs driver, rather than ext4fs driver, for
305 ext2/3 filesystems. This can help keep non-functional entries from links
306 from /vmlinuz to /boot/vmlinuz out of the menu if the system uses ext4fs
307 on root and ext2fs or ext3fs on /boot.
308
309 - Fixed a couple of memory management bugs that cause rEFInd to hang at
310 startup on some systems.
311
312 0.6.3 (1/6/2013):
313 -----------------
314
315 - Added the ability to specify a volume name or number in the
316 "dont_scan_dirs" and "also_scan_dirs" tokens.
317
318 - Fixed a bug that caused removable EFI media to not appear in scan lists
319 if rEFInd was installed as EFI/BOOT/boot{arch}.efi on a hard disk.
320
321 - Modified ISO-9660 driver so that it can handle discs with other than
322 2048-byte sectors. This makes it useful for reading "hybrid ISO" images
323 burned to USB flash disks.
324
325 - New mvrefind.sh script to move a rEFInd installation between a standard
326 location (typically EFI/refind) and one of the fallback locations
327 (EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot). It can also do more exotic locations.
328
329 - The install.sh script now installs to EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
330 EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi if it's run in BIOS mode. This is
331 intended to give some chance of producing a bootable installation should
332 a user accidentally install Linux in EFI mode and then install rEFInd
333 from that installation.
334
335 - The install.sh script now tries to find an existing rEFInd installation
336 and upgrade it, even if it's in EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot rather
337 than in EFI/refind.
338
339 - New "--yes" option to install.sh to help with unattended or automated
340 installations (as from an RPM or Debian package).
341
342 0.6.2 (12/30/2012):
343 -------------------
344
345 - Inclusion of a sample refind.spec file for the benefit of RPM
346 distribution maintainers who might want to include rEFInd. It's a bit
347 rough, but it gets you a good chunk of the way there....
348
349 - The EFI filesystem drivers can now be built with the GNU-EFI toolkit as
350 well as with the TianoCore EDK2. See the BUILDING.txt file for details on
351 how to build them with either toolkit. This improvement doesn't affect
352 users of my binary packages, but it should make it easier for Linux
353 distributions to adopt rEFInd into their package systems.
354
355 - Tweaked refind.inf file for better build results using "native" TianoCore
356 EDK2 build process (vs. the Makefile-based build process that I use under
357 Linux). This won't affect those who use my binary builds or build under
358 Linux with the "make" command.
359
360 - Fixed bug that prevented Secure Boot launches from working when rEFInd
361 was built with GNU-EFI rather than the TianoCore EDK2.
362
363 - Substantial reworking of Secure Boot code, based on James Bottomley's
364 PreLoader program. This new code eliminates the limitation of launching
365 just one driver in Secure Boot mode and is likely to be more reliable
366 with future or obscure boot loaders. It should also work with non-x86-64
367 systems, although this relies on a platform-specific shim program, which
368 to date exists only for x86-64. The basic features are the same as before
369 -- rEFInd relies on shim for authentication functions and will launch
370 programs that are signed by Secure Boot keys, shim keys, or MOKs.
371
372 - Altered default for "textmode" option (when it's commented out) to not
373 adjust the text mode at all. (Prior versions set it to mode 0 by
374 default.)
375
376 0.6.1 (12/21/2012):
377 -------------------
378
379 - Added "--root" option to install.sh, to enable installation of rEFInd
380 to something other than the currently-running OS. This is intended for
381 use on emergency discs.
382
383 - Thanks to Stefan Agner, the ext4fs driver now supports the "meta_bg"
384 filesystem feature, which distributes metadata throughout the disk. This
385 feature isn't used by default, but can be set at filesystem creation time
386 by passing the "-O meta_bg,^resize_inode" option to mke2fs. (Using
387 "^resize_inode" is necessary because meta_bg is incompatible with
388 resize_inode, which IS used by default.) This feature can be used on
389 ext3fs and ext2fs as well as on ext4fs, so the ext4fs driver can now
390 handle some ext3fs and ext2fs partitions that the ext2fs driver can't
391 handle.
392
393 - Fixed some screen resolution-setting bugs.
394
395 - Added the "words" that make up a filesystem's label (delimited by spaces,
396 dashes, or underscores) to the list of bases used to search for OS icons.
397 For instance, if the filesystem's label is "Arch", rEFInd searches for
398 os_Arch.icns; if it's "Fedora 17", it searches for os_Fedora.icns and
399 os_17.icns; and if it's "NEW_GENTOO", it searches for os_NEW.icns and
400 os_GENTOO.icns.
401
402 - Refined hints displays to be more context-sensitive, particularly in text
403 mode.
404
405 - Instead of displaying a blank filesystem label when a filesystem has
406 none, rEFInd now displays the size and/or type of the filesystem, as in
407 "boot EFI\foo\bar.efi from 200 MiB ext3 volume" rather than "boot
408 EFI\foo\bar.efi from".
409
410 - Fixed a bug that caused the screen to clear after displaying an error
411 message but before displaying the "Hit any key to continue" message when
412 a boot loader launch failed.
413
414 0.6.0 (12/16/2012):
415 -------------------
416
417 - Fixed a memory allocation bug that could cause a program crash when
418 specifying certain values with the "also_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_volumes",
419 "dont_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_files", and "scan_driver_dirs" refind.conf
420 options.
421
422 - Modified Linux kernel initrd-finding code so that if an initrd is
423 specified in refind_linux.conf, rEFInd will not add any initrd it finds.
424 This enables an override of the default initrd, and is likely to be
425 particularly helpful to Arch Linux users.
426
427 - Added ext4fs driver!
428
429 - Made "boot" the default value for "also_scan_dirs".
430
431 - Added identifying screen header to line editor.
432
433 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd's display to be mis-sized upon return
434 from a program that set the resolution itself.
435
436 - Adjusted "resolution" refind.conf parameter so that it can accept EITHER
437 a resolution as width and height OR a single digit as a UEFI mode number
438 (which is system-specific). This is done because some systems present the
439 same mode twice in their mode lists, perhaps varying in refresh rate,
440 monitor output, or some other salient characteristics; specifying the
441 mode number enables selecting the higher-numbered mode, whereas using
442 horizontal and vertical resolution values selects the lowest-numbered
443 mode.
444
445 - Added "textmode" refind.conf parameter to set the text mode used in
446 text-only displays, and for the line editor and boot-time handoff
447 display even in graphics mode.
448
449 - Fixed bug that caused tools (shell, etc.) to launch when they were
450 highlighted and F2 or Insert was pressed.
451
452 - Added "editor" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf, which
453 disables the boot options editor.
454
455 - Added hints text to rEFInd main menu and sub-menus. This can be disabled
456 by setting the new "hints" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf.
457
458 - Added "boot with minimal options" entry to refind_linux.conf file
459 generated by install.sh. This entry boots without the options extracted
460 from the /etc/default/grub file.
461
462 - Added keys subdirectory to main distribution, to hold public Secure
463 Boot/shim keys from known sources.
464
465 - Changed install.sh --drivers option to --alldrivers, added new
466 --nodrivers option, and made the default on Linux to install the one
467 driver that's used on /boot (or the root filesystem if /boot isn't a
468 separate partition). Of course, this won't install a non-existent driver,
469 and it also won't work properly if run from an emergency disk unless you
470 mount a separate /boot partition at that location.
471
472 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented creation of refind_linux.conf file
473 on Linux systems.
474
475 0.5.1.1 (12/12/2012):
476 ---------------------
477
478 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented it from working on OS X.
479
480 0.5.1 (12/11/2012):
481 -------------------
482
483 - Added support for "0" options to "textonly" and "scan_all_linux_kernels"
484 to reverse the usual meaning of these tokens. This is useful for
485 including these options in a secondary configuration file called with the
486 new "include" token to override a setting set in the main file.
487
488 - Added "include" token for refind.conf, to enable including a secondary
489 configuration file from a primary one.
490
491 - Modified install.sh so that it creates a simple refind_linux.conf file in
492 /boot, if that file doesn't already exist and if install.sh is run from
493 Linux. If that directory happens to be on a FAT, HFS+, ext2fs, ext3fs, or
494 ReiserFS volume, and if the necessary drivers are installed, the result
495 is that rEFInd will detect the Linux installation with no further
496 configuration on many systems. (Some may still require tweaking of kernel
497 options, though; for instance, adding "dolvm" on Gentoo systems that use
498 LVM.)
499
500 - Added --shim and --localkeys options to install.sh to help simplify setup
501 on systems with Secure Boot active.
502
503 - Fixed (maybe) bug that caused resolution options to not be displayed on
504 recent Macs with GOP graphics when specifying an invalid resolution in
505 refind.conf.
506
507 - Fixed bug that caused some programs (EFI shells, in particular) to hang
508 when launching on some systems (DUET, in particular).
509
510 - Implemented a fix to enable ELILO to launch with Secure Boot active.
511 This fix might help with some other boot loaders in Secure Boot mode,
512 too, but I don't know of any specifics.
513
514 0.5.0 (12/6/2012):
515 ------------------
516
517 - Added the ability to include quote marks ('"') in refind.conf and
518 refind_linux.conf tokens by doubling them up, as in:
519 "ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value=""this is it"""
520 This example results in the following string being passed as an
521 option:
522 ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value="this is it"
523
524 - Changed refind.conf-sample to uncomment the scan_all_linux_kernels
525 option by default. If this option is deleted or commented out, the
526 program default remains to not scan all Linux kernels; but with
527 increasing numbers of distributions shipping with kernels that include
528 EFI stub loader support, setting the configuration file default to scan
529 for them makes sense.
530
531 - Modified the "resolution" token so that it affects text mode as well
532 as graphics mode. On my systems, though, the actual text area is still
533 restricted to an 80x25 area. (This seems to be a firmware limitation; my
534 EFI shells are also so limited.)
535
536 - Fixed a bug that caused the options line editor to blank out lines that
537 were not actually edited.
538
539 - Added support for using Matthew Garrett's Shim program and its Machine
540 Owner Keys (MOKs) to extend Secure Boot capabilities. If rEFInd is
541 launched from Shim on a computer with Secure Boot active, rEFInd will
542 launch programs signed with either a standard UEFI Secure Boot key or a
543 MOK. For the moment, this feature works only on x86-64 systems.
544
545 - Added new "dont_scan_files" (aka "don't_scan_files") token for
546 refind.conf. The effect is similar to dont_scan_dirs, but it creates a
547 blacklist of filenames within directories rather than directory names.
548 I'm initially using it to place shim.efi and MokManager.efi in the
549 blacklist to keep these programs out of the OS list. (MokManager.efi is
550 scanned separately as a tool; see below.) I've moved checks for
551 ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi, and TextMode.efi to this list. (These
552 three had previously been blacklisted by hard-coding in ScanLoaderDir().)
553
554 - Added the directory from which rEFInd launched to dont_scan_dirs. This
555 works around a bug in which rEFInd would show itself as a bogus Windows
556 entry if it's installed as EFI/Microsoft/boot/bootmgfw.efi.
557
558 - Added support for launching MokManager.efi for managing the Machine Owner
559 Keys (MOKs) maintained by the shim boot loader developed by Fedora and
560 SUSE. This program is scanned and presented as a second-row tool.
561
562 - Added support for Apple's Recovery HD partition: If it's detected, a new
563 icon appears on the second row. This icon can be removed by explicitly
564 setting the "showtools" option in refind.conf and excluding the
565 "apple_recovery" option from that line.
566
567 - Fixed bug that caused text-mode ("textonly" refind.conf option enabled)
568 menu entries to be right-aligned rather than left-aligned when rEFInd was
569 compiled with the TianoCore EDK2.
570
571 - Added "--usedefault {devicename}" and "--drivers" options to the
572 install.sh script and changed the "esp" option to "--esp".
573
574 0.4.7 (11/6/2012):
575 ------------------
576
577 - Added an icon for gummiboot.
578
579 - Added a boot option editor: Pressing the Insert or F2 key from a boot
580 tag's options menu opens a simple text-mode line editor on which the boot
581 options may be edited for a one-time boot with altered options.
582
583 - Modified the "scan_delay" feature to delay and then perform a re-scan,
584 which may work better than the first attempt at this feature (which I'm
585 told isn't working as planned).
586
587 - Modified rEFInd to add a space after the command-line options only when
588 launching Mac OS X. On some early Macs, the extra space (which had been
589 present by default, as a carryover from rEFIt) causes problems when
590 booting Linux kernels from FAT partitions.
591
592 0.4.6 (10/6/2012):
593 ------------------
594
595 - Fixed some minor memory management issues.
596
597 - Added new "scan_delay" feature to impose a delay before scanning
598 for disks.
599
600 - Changed default "scanfor" option from internal-external-optical to either
601 internal-external-optical-manual (for non-Macs) or
602 internal-hdbios-external-biosexternal-optical-cd-manual (for Macs). I've
603 done this for two reasons:
604 - Many Mac users have been confused by the fact that rEFInd needs
605 reconfiguration to detect Windows (or Linux installed in BIOS mode),
606 since rEFIt scans BIOS devices by default. Adding the BIOS options as
607 default for them should help them.
608 - Adding the "manual" option enables users to simply add manual boot
609 stanzas and have them work, which is more intuitive. Adding the
610 "manual" option will have no effect unless manual stanzas are created
611 or uncommented, so this part of the change won't affect users' working
612 default configurations.
613
614 - Added new legacy (BIOS) boot support for UEFI-based PCs.
615
616 0.4.5 (8/12/2012):
617 ------------------
618
619 - Fixed bug that caused a failure to boot BIOS-based OSes on Macs.
620
621 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail to detect rEFItBlesser.
622
623 0.4.4 (6/23/2012):
624 ------------------
625
626 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be corrupted by rEFInd on
627 32-bit systems.
628
629 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be truncated in the drivers
630 on 32-bit systems.
631
632 - Fixed bug in use_graphics_for option parsing that caused most options
633 to set graphics mode for OS X and/or Linux but not other boot
634 loaders/OSes.
635
636 - Tweaked install script to better isolate the ESP under OS X.
637
638 0.4.3 (6/21/2012):
639 ------------------
640
641 - rEFInd now supports compilation using the TianoCore UDK2010/EDK2
642 development kit in addition to GNU-EFI.
643
644 - Added new "use_graphics_for" option to control which OSes to boot in
645 graphics mode. (This effect lasts for a fraction of a second on most
646 systems, since the boot loader that rEFInd launches is likely to set
647 graphics or text mode itself.)
648
649 - Graphics-mode booting now clears the screen to the current rEFInd
650 background color (rather than black) and does NOT display boot messages.
651 The intent is for a smoother transition when booting OS X, or perhaps
652 other OSes that don't display boot loader messages. In practice, this
653 effect will be tiny for many OSes, since the boot loader generally clears
654 the screen within a fraction of a second of being launched; but the
655 "flicker" of a rEFInd message in that time can sometimes be distracting.
656
657 - Filesystem drivers now work on EFI 1.x systems, such as Macs.
658
659 - Removed "linux.conf" as a valid alternative name for "refind_linux.conf"
660 for holding Linux kernel options. The kernel developers plan to use
661 "linux.conf" themselves.
662
663 0.4.2 (6/3/2012):
664 -----------------
665
666 - Added a message to install.sh when run on Macs to remind users to update
667 the "scanfor" line in refind.conf if they need to boot BIOS-based OSes
668 via rEFInd.
669
670 - Modified install.sh script to be smarter about running efibootmgr on
671 Linux. It now uses the whole path to the rEFInd binary as a key to
672 determine whether an existing entry exists, rather than just the filename
673 portion. If an entry exists and is the first entry in the boot order, the
674 script does nothing to the NVRAM entries. If such an entry exists but is
675 not the default, the script deletes that entry and creates a new one
676 (implicitly making it the first in the boot order). If such an entry does
677 not exist, the script creates a new one (again, making it the first in
678 the boot order).
679
680 - Added "dont_scan_dirs" configuration file option, which adds directories
681 to a "blacklist" of directories that are NOT scanned for boot loaders.
682
683 0.4.1 (5/25/2012):
684 ------------------
685
686 - Added "scanning for new boot loaders" message to the re-scan function
687 (hitting Esc at the main menu). It usually flashes up too quickly to
688 be of importance, but if the scan function takes a while because of
689 access to a CD that must be spun up, it should make it clear that the
690 system hasn't hung.
691
692 - Modified install.sh script to detect rEFItBlesser on Macs, and if
693 present, to ask the user if it should be removed.
694
695 - Cleaned up the Make.common file for the filesystem drivers.
696
697 - Changed HFS+ driver to return volume label of "HFS+ volume" rather than
698 an empty label. (The driver doesn't currently read the real volume
699 label.)
700
701 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to appear in its own menu after
702 running a shell and then re-scanning for boot loaders.
703
704 0.4.0 (5/20/2012):
705 ------------------
706
707 - Inclusion of drivers for ISO-9660, HFS+, ReiserFS, and ext2fs. Most of
708 these drivers originated with rEFIt, although the HFS+ driver seems to
709 have come from Oracle's VirtualBox, with some files from Apple. I hadn't
710 included these drivers previously because the build process proved
711 challenging. As it is, they don't work on my Mac Mini, I suspect because
712 the build process with the UDK2010 development kit may not work with the
713 EFI 1.x that Apple uses.
714
715 - Addition of support for drivers in the "drivers_{arch}" subdirectory of
716 the main rEFInd binary directory (e.g., "drivers_x64" or "drivers_ia32").
717 Drivers may continue to be placed in the "drivers" subdirectory.
718
719 - Added new feature to eject CDs (and other removable media): Press F12 to
720 eject all such media. This function works only on some Macs, though (it
721 relies on an Apple-specific EFI extension, and this extension isn't even
722 implemented on all Macs, much less on UEFI-based PCs).
723
724 - Fixed a problem that could cause GRUB 2 to fail to read its configuration
725 file when launched from rEFInd.
726
727 0.3.5 (5/15/2012):
728 ------------------
729
730 - Removed the GRUB 2 detection "reciped" added with 0.3.2, since I've
731 received reports that it's not working as intended.
732
733 - Added re-scan feature: Press the Esc key to have rEFInd re-read its
734 configuration file, tell the EFI to scan for new filesystems, and re-scan
735 those filesystems for boot loaders. The main purpose is to enable
736 scanning a new removable medium that you insert after launching rEFInd;
737 however, it can also be used to immediately implement changes to the
738 configuration file or new drivers you load from an EFI shell.
739
740 - Fixed a bug that could cause the scroll-right arrow to be replaced by the
741 scroll-left arrow under some circumstances.
742
743 0.3.4 (5/9/2012):
744 -----------------
745
746 - Added new configuration file option: "icons_dir", which sets the name
747 of the subdirectory in which icons are found. See the documentation or
748 sample configuration file for a full description.
749
750 - Modified Makefile to generate rEFInd binary that includes architecture
751 code -- refind_ia32.efi or refind_x64.efi, rather than the generic
752 refind.efi. This is done mainly to help the install.sh script. The
753 program can be named anything you like on the disk. (The generic name
754 refind.efi is used on unknown architectures.)
755
756 - Improved install.sh script: Fixed bug on OS X 10.7 and enable it to be
757 used after building from source code (or via new "make install" Makefile
758 target).
759
760 - Improved screen redraws to produce less flicker when moving among the
761 second-row tags or to the last tag on the first row.
762
763 0.3.3 (5/6/2012):
764 -----------------
765
766 - Improved menu navigation:
767 - In graphics mode, left & right arrow keys move left & right, while up &
768 down arrows move between rows.
769 - Page Up and Page Down now move through chunks of visible tags (in both
770 text & graphics modes), jumping from one row to another only when at
771 the edge of the row. In text mode, the "rows" are broken down as in
772 graphics mode, but they aren't visibly distinguished on the screen.
773
774 - Improved text-mode use: rEFInd now displays the proper number of entries
775 when first started in text mode and scrolling is done sensibly when too
776 many entries exist to fit on the screen.
777
778 0.3.2 (5/4/2012):
779 -----------------
780
781 - Added the install.sh script to install rEFInd on Linux and Mac OS X
782 systems. This script must be run as root (or via sudo). It requires
783 no options, but on Mac OS X, passing it the "esp" option causes it
784 to install rEFInd on the computer's ESP rather than the default of the
785 currently OS X boot partition. (Under Linux, the default is to install to
786 the ESP.) Note that there may be some unusual cases in which this script
787 will fail to work.
788
789 - Does a better job of clearing the screen when launching OSes in text
790 mode.
791
792 - Added detection "recipe" for GRUB 2's BIOS Boot Partition.
793
794 - Fixed bogus detection of ESPs created by Linux's mkdosfs utility or
795 Windows as bootable partitions when "scanfor" includes BIOS scanning
796 options.
797
798
799 0.3.1 (4/27/2012):
800 ------------------
801
802 - Fixed bug that caused spurious "Unsupported while scanning the root
803 directory" messages under some conitions on Macs.
804
805 - Modified loader scanning code to sort boot loader entries within a
806 directory by modification time, so that the most recently-modified loader
807 is first among those in a given directory. Thus, if you specify a
808 directory name (or volume name, for loaders stored in the root directory
809 of a volume) as the default_selection, the most recent of those loaders
810 will be the default. This is intended to help with Linux kernel
811 maintenance when using the EFI stub loader; set up this way, the most
812 recent kernel copied to your kernel directory will be the default,
813 obviating the need to adjust the refind.conf file when adding a new
814 kernel. If you want to change the default among those in the default
815 directory, you can use "touch" to adjust the modification timestamp.
816
817 - Tweaked code to find loader-specific .icns file so that it finds files
818 for Linux kernels without .efi extensions. In this case, files should be
819 named the same as the kernels they match, but with .icns extensions. For
820 instance, bzImage-3.3.2 should have an icon called bzImage-3.3.2.icns.
821 (The old code would have looked for an icon called bzImage-3.3.icns.)
822
823 - Eliminated bogus OS loader tags for filenames that end in ".icns" when
824 the scan_all_linux_kernels option is set.
825
826 0.3.0 (4/22/2012):
827 ------------------
828
829 - I'm officially upgrading this project's status from "alpha" to "beta" and
830 giving it a bump from 0.2.x to 0.3.0. This doesn't reflect any major
831 milestone with this version; rather, it reflects my sense that rEFInd has
832 been "out there" for a while, and although I've gotten bug reports,
833 they've been minor and/or have been fixed. The program still has known
834 bugs, but my impression is that it is, overall, usable by ordinary users.
835
836 - Added "resolution" option to refind.conf, which enables setting the video
837 resolution. To use it, pass two numeric values, as in "resolution 1024
838 768" to use a 1024x768 video mode. Note that not all modes are supported.
839 If you specify a non-supported video mode on a UEFI system, a message
840 appears listing the supported video modes and you must then press a key
841 to continue, using the default video mode (usually 800x600).
842 Unfortunately, I don't know the calls to get a list of supported video
843 modes on older EFI 1.x systems (including Macs), so on Macs setting an
844 incorrect video mode silently fails (you keep using the default mode).
845 This makes changing your video mode a hit-or-miss proposition on Macs.
846 CAUTION: It's possible to set a legal video mode that your monitor can't
847 handle, in which case you'll get a blank display until you boot an OS
848 that resets the video mode.
849
850 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused rEFInd to crash when returning from an
851 EFI shell or other programs on Macs, particularly when rEFInd used
852 graphical mode. I'm not 100% sure this bug is squashed because I still
853 don't understand the cause and I only have one Mac for testing. See
854 comments in the ReinitRefitLib() function in refit/lib.c for more
855 details.
856
857 - Added new refind.conf option: scan_all_linux_kernels, which causes Linux
858 kernels that lack ".efi" extensions to be included in scans for EFI boot
859 loaders. This may help integration with Linux distributions that don't
860 give their kernels such names by default. Beware, though: It can detect
861 unwanted files, such as older non-stub-loader kernels or .icns files used
862 to give kernels with .efi extensions custom icons.
863
864 - Improved EFI boot loader detection on boards with Gigabyte's Hybrid EFI,
865 and perhaps other EFIs with a buggy StriCmp() function. Files with both
866 ".efi" and ".EFI" extensions should now be detected as boot loaders.
867
868 - Fixed a bug that caused rEFInd to fail to scan for drivers if the
869 filesystem driver didn't set a volume name (that is, if the relevant
870 field was set to NULL rather than even an empty string). In such
871 situations, rEFInd now reports the volume name as "Unknown".
872
873 0.2.7 (4/19/2012):
874 ------------------
875
876 - After much trial and tribulation, I've overcome a GNU-EFI limitation and
877 enabled rEFInd to load EFI drivers. This feature was present in the
878 original build of rEFIt but was removed in the versions that could
879 compile under Linux, but now it's back -- and still being compiled under
880 Linux! To use it, you should place your drivers in a convenient directory
881 on the ESP (or whatever partition you use to launch rEFInd) and add a
882 "scan_driver_dirs" entry to refind.conf to tell rEFInd where to look. (As
883 always, you should specify the driver directory relative to the root of
884 the filesystem.) Note that you can't launch drivers from another
885 filesystem; they must be on the same volume that holds rEFInd. Those who
886 compile from source code should note that implementing this feature
887 necessitated using a more recent version of the GNU-EFI library. I'm
888 currently using version 3.0p, and version 3.0i does NOT work. I don't
889 know where the change occurred, but you may need to upgrade your GNU-EFI
890 installation.
891
892 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to show up in its own menu sometimes.
893
894 - Added new refind.conf token: also_scan_dirs. When scanning volumes for
895 EFI boot loaders, rEFInd always scans the root directory and every
896 subdirectory of the /EFI directory, but it doesn't recurse into these
897 directories. The also_scan_dirs token adds more directories to the scan
898 list. It defaults to "elilo,boot", but you can set it to any directory or
899 directories you like.
900
901 0.2.6 (4/14/2012):
902 ------------------
903
904 - Added "volume" keyword to configuration file's stanza options. This
905 option changes the volume from which subsequent files (specified by
906 "loader" and "icon") are loaded. You pass "volume" the name/label of the
907 FILESYSTEM you want to use (not the GPT partition name), or a number
908 followed by a colon (e.g., "1:"). The former should reliably identify a
909 filesystem, assuming the name is unique. The latter assigns numbers based
910 on the order in which they're scanned, which may not be as reliable but
911 should work when a volume is unnamed.
912
913 - Fixed bug in 0.2.5 that caused failure of Linux initial RAM disk
914 mapping on some (but not all) systems. Affected computers include at
915 least some Intel motherboards, maybe others.
916
917 0.2.5 (4/9/2012):
918 -----------------
919
920 - Fixed bug that caused an inability to associate initial RAM disks with
921 Linux kernels stored in a volume's root directory.
922
923 - Volume badges (that override default badges) are now stored in
924 .VolumeBadge.icns. Although undocumented, rEFInd formerly loaded custom
925 volume badges from .VolumeIcon.icns. This carryover from rEFIt was a
926 confusing name, given the next (new) feature, so I've changed and
927 documented the name....
928
929 - Added ability to set a default icon for a loader stored in the root
930 directory of a volume: The icon is stored in .VolumeIcon.icns. This icon
931 is also used for Mac OS X volumes booted from the standard location.
932
933 - Fixed bug that caused icons to drop back to generic icons when rEFInd
934 was launched in certain ways (such as from an EFI shell in rEFInd's
935 directory) on certain systems.
936
937 - Fixed bug that caused "unknown disable flag" to be shown (very briefly)
938 instead of "unknown hideui flag" when an improper hideui flag was set.
939
940 0.2.4 (4/5/2012):
941 -----------------
942
943 - Created new refind.conf entry: "showtools". This entry takes options of
944 "shell", "gptsync", "about", "exit", "reboot", and "shutdown". This
945 option is in some respects an affirmative version of portions of the old
946 "disable" and "hideui" options; however, it enables users to specify the
947 order in which these options appear on the screen. Also, the "exit"
948 option is new; it terminates the program. The effect is usually to return
949 to whatever tool launched it or to launch a default OS; however, this is
950 somewhat unpredictable. The default therefore omits the "exit" option, as
951 well as "gptsync", which has always been dangerous (but necessary on most
952 MacOS/Windows dual-boot setups on Macs). As part of this reconfiguration,
953 I've eliminated the "rescue Linux" option, which always seemed pointless
954 to me.
955
956 - Folded "disable" and "hideui" refind.conf entries into one ("disable"),
957 and reduced the number of options to six: "banner", "label",
958 "singleuser", "hwtest", "arrows", and "all". ("arrows" is new and
959 disables the scroll arrows when a system has too many tags to display
960 simultaneously.)
961
962 - Added max_tags option to the refind.conf file, enabling users to reduce
963 the maximum number of OS loader tags that can be displayed at once.
964
965 - Updated rEFIt icon, based on the 128x128 volume label from the rEFIt CD
966 image.
967
968 - Added x86 and x86-64 EFI shells to the CD image version of the binary,
969 but NOT to the binary zip file. The logic is that the CD image is more
970 likely to be used directly as an emergency disc and so may need this
971 feature, even though the source isn't part of the rEFInd project. (The
972 source is readily available from the TianoCore project.)
973
974 - EFI shells may now be stored at /shellx64.efi for x86-64 systems or at
975 /shellia32.efi for x86 systems. The /EFI/tools/shell.efi name is also
976 recognized; however, if both files are present, two EFI shell icons will
977 appear on the main menu. The /efi/{refind-path/apps/shell.efi filename,
978 which was never officially documented but worked as a carryover from
979 rEFIt, is no longer valid.
980
981 0.2.3 (3/26/2012):
982 ------------------
983
984 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused hangs when launching a second program
985 after returning from a first. There are some weird system-to-system
986 differences, though, and this fix causes (apparently harmless) error
987 messages about "(re)opening our installation volume" on at least one
988 system (a 32-bit Mac Mini). I'm committing this change because, imperfect
989 though it is, it's preferable to the earlier version, at least on my
990 small sample of computers.
991
992 - Because of news that the Linux kernel developers are planning to use the
993 filename linux.conf to hold Linux kernel configuration data for EFI
994 booting, I'm transitioning rEFInd away from that name and to
995 refind_linux.conf to avoid a conflict. This version can use either name,
996 with refind_linux.conf taking precedence if both are present.
997
998 - Added logo for Arch Linux.
999
1000 0.2.2 (3/23/2012):
1001 ------------------
1002
1003 - Fixed bug that caused program failure when Linux kernels with EFI stub
1004 support were detected with no associated version numbers. rEFInd now
1005 permits automatic linking of *ONE* versionless kernel to *ONE*
1006 versionless initrd file.
1007
1008 - Fixed bug that caused program hangs when a boot loader filename or label
1009 was too long. Such names are now properly truncated and program execution
1010 continues.
1011
1012 - Fixed bug that caused no text to appear in submenus on UEFI systems with
1013 small screens (800x600). NOTE: Problem still occurs on screens smaller
1014 than this, but such systems are very rare.
1015
1016 0.2.1 (3/19/2012):
1017 ------------------
1018
1019 - Added ability to set a "default_selection" that's a title or a substring
1020 of one -- the name given to a stanza in a "menuentry" or the boot
1021 loader's filename, in most cases, although "Mac OS X", "Windows XP
1022 (XoM)", and "Microsoft EFI boot" are also titles.
1023
1024 - Added support for semi-automatic scans of Linux kernels with EFI stub
1025 loader support. The program auto-detects matching initial RAM disk files
1026 and loads additional options from the "linux.conf" file in the same
1027 directory as the kernel.
1028
1029 - Added support for "submenuentry" keyword and associated sub-stanza
1030 entries in refind.conf file.
1031
1032 - Renamed icons/os_mint.icns to icons/os_linuxmint.icns to match the
1033 filename Linux Mint ACTUALLY uses for its ESP boot loader directory.
1034
1035
1036 0.2.0 (3/14/2012):
1037 ------------------
1038
1039 - Initial public release