4 - The "dont_scan_volumes" parameter now also works with legacy-boot
5 volumes. Unlike with EFI volumes, where the option you pass must exactly
6 match an entire volume name, when applied to legacy-boot volumes, it
7 matches any part of the description that appears beneath the item when
8 you select it in the rEFInd main menu.
10 - Can now boot in legacy mode from second (and probably later) hard disks!
12 - rEFInd now limits the length of the firmware name string shown in the
13 system information screen to 65 characters. This is done because at least
14 one EFI presents a longer string by default, and this causes the entire
15 information display to come up empty on 800x600 displays.
17 - rEFInd now uses the partition's name (as stored in the GPT data
18 structures) as a fallback for the filesystem's name if the latter can't
19 be found. Exceptions are if the partition name is one of three generic
20 names used by GPT fdisk: "Microsoft basic data", "Linux filesystem", or
21 "Apple HFS/HFS+". These are ignored in favor of the descriptive fallback
22 (e.g., "20 GiB Btrfs volume")
24 - It's now possible to specify a volume by partition GUID number in a
25 manual boot stanza. This should be more reliable (albeit also more
26 awkward) than using a filesystem number (such as fs0: or fs1:).
28 - Fixed memory-allocation bug that could cause error message displays,
29 and possibly hangs, when re-scanning boot loaders.
34 - Attempt to fix rEFInd perpetually re-scanning after ejecting a disc on
37 - Added check to remove redundant (or non-functional if Secure Boot is
38 active) kernel entries for Ubuntu, which is now including two versions of
39 kernels, one signed and the other unsigned.
41 - Fixed bug in install.sh that could cause it to display error messages
42 if the dmraid utility was not installed.
44 - The HFS+ driver now reports a correct volume name.
46 - Fixed some EFI filesystem driver bugs that could cause lockups under
47 some circumstances. These bugs could affect any of the filesystem
50 - Added "gdisk" option to the "showtools" configuration file token. When
51 active, this adds gdisk.efi or gdisk_{arch}.efi, if present in the
52 EFI\tools directory, to the tools row.
54 - Fixed mistaken identification of the MOK utility as the "MOK utility
61 - Added "debian" directory to source, which facilitates creation of Debian
62 packages. Packages built in this way are built with GNU-EFI and don't run
63 any post-installation script, so although the rEFInd binaries are on the
64 hard disk, they aren't installed to be bootable; you must manually run
65 install.sh. Also, at least on Ubuntu, the Make.common file's /usr/lib64
66 references must be changed to /usr/lib. This is more of a proof of
67 concept and a "leg up" for distribution maintainers than anything else.
69 - Two new options, big_icon_size and small_icon_size, set the size of
70 the first-row OS icons and of the second-row tool icons, respectively.
71 The big_icon_size option also indirectly sets the size of disk-type
72 badges; they're 1/4 the size of the big icons. Default values are 128 and
73 48, respectively, to match the actual icon files provided with rEFInd. If
74 the icon you're using is of a different size than you've specified,
75 rEFInd scales it. For best quality, you should both provide icons drawn
76 to the right size and set the icon sizes in refind.conf.
78 - rEFInd now automatically scales icons to fit the standard icon sizes.
79 This won't have any effect with the icons that come with rEFInd, but it
80 can help if you want to use another icon, since you needn't scale it in a
81 graphics program before using it. Note that rEFInd uses bitmap icons, so
82 scaling by a huge amount (say, a 16x16 icon to fit the standard 128x128
83 OS icon) is not likely to look good.
85 - Added new option, banner_scale, that tells rEFInd how to handle banners:
86 Set to "noscale" (the default), banners are not scaled, although they'll
87 be cropped if they're too big for the display. This is the same as the
88 behavior in previous versions. Set to "fillscreen", rEFInd now scales the
89 banner image (larger or smaller) to fill the display.
91 - Adjusted the post-installation script in refind.spec (used to generate
92 RPMs, and therefore also indirectly Debian packages) to search for
93 existing shim program files under the filesnames shim.efi and shimx64.efi
94 rather than just shim.efi. Ubuntu uses shimx64.efi, so Debian packages
95 were failing to detect Ubuntu's shim in previous versions. (Note,
96 however, that Ubuntu's early shim 0.1 is unsuitable for use with rEFInd
97 The newer 0.4 version that's in the repositories now should work fine;
98 it's only when installing on an older system that's NOT been updated that
104 - Can now specify complete paths, optionally including volumes, in
107 - Added shimx64.efi to the default dont_scan_files list.
109 - Added windows_recovery_files token, to specify what program(s) launch a
110 Windows recovery utility; and the "windows_recovery" option to
111 "showtools," to control whether or not to display the Windows recovery
112 utility on the second row of icons.
114 - The use_graphics_for, also_scan_dirs, dont_scan_dirs, dont_scan_files,
115 and scan_driver_dirs tokens in refind.conf now support "+" as the first
116 option, which causes the remaining options to be added to the default
117 value rather than replacing that value. (This has no practical effect for
118 scan_driver_dirs, though, since it has a null default value.)
120 - Added support for specifying the configuration file at program launch,
121 via the "-c" parameter, as in "refind_x64.efi -c foo.conf" to use the
122 foo.conf file as the main configuration file.
124 - Scans of ext2/3/4fs and ReiserFS partitions now omit partitions with
125 duplicate filesystem UUIDs. These are likely parts of RAID arrays and so
126 would have the same boot loaders or kernels as the first one with a given
129 - Added feature in install.sh: Script now tries to locate and mount an ESP
130 in Linux, if it's currently unmounted.
132 - Fixed bug in mkrlconf.sh and install.sh that caused a stray line break
133 and PARTUUID= specification to appear in generated refind_linux.conf file
134 under some circumstances.
139 - Added support for multiple "default_selection" targets. These MUST be
140 comma-separated AND enclosed in quotes, as in:
141 default_selection "fred,ginger"
142 This example will launch "fred" by default if it's available; and if
143 it's not, rEFInd will attempt to launch "ginger" as the default.
145 - Added support for time-sensitive "default_selection" setting. This token
146 may now have either one or three options. If one, it's interpreted as it
147 has been in the past, as setting a default that's independent of times.
148 If you follow this default by two times, however, those are interpreted
149 as the start and end times (in 24-hour format) for a default setting. For
150 instance, "default_selection foo 8:00 17:00" causes foo to be the default
151 from 8:00 (AM) to 17:00 (aka 5:00 PM). You can include multiple
152 "default_selection" lines to set different defaults for a variety of
153 times. If they're in conflict, the last one takes precedence. Note that
154 times are hardware clock's native value, which may be local time or UTC,
155 depending on your computer.
157 - Added support for a blank-screen startup: Set "screensaver -1" and the
158 screen saver will be initialized when rEFInd starts. If you set a low
159 "timeout" value, the result will be a boot straight to the default OS
160 unless you hit a key soon after rEFInd starts. Once you hit a key, the
161 screensaver will be disabled.
163 - Added --ownhfs {target} option to install.sh. This option causes rEFInd
164 to install to an HFS+ partition in a way that's more consistent with the
165 way the Mac's native boot loader is installed. Note that you should NOT
166 install to an already-bootable partition with this option, since it will
167 overwrite the existing boot loader, which would render OS X unbootable.
172 - Fixed bug that caused unbootable exFAT partitions to show up as
173 bootable on Macs with BIOS/CSM/legacy boot options enabled.
175 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused installs to the ESP on recent
176 versions of OS X to fail.
178 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to hang on some Macs when multiple EFI
179 drivers were present.
181 - Fixed bug that caused clear to default gray screen when launching OSes
182 with 'use_graphics_for' enabled, even when the rEFInd background is not
183 gray. Now rEFInd clears to the same background color used in its menu.
184 When launching OS X, though, the OS X boot loader will itself clear to
185 gray a second or so later; and when launching Linux, it will clear to
186 black a second or so later.
191 - My initial 0.7.4 release broke legacy-boot ability on Macs, so I quickly
192 released this version using the original 0.7.4 filenames to fix the
198 - Fixed options passing to loader to include loader's filename as the first
199 option. This omission had no effect on most boot loaders, but caused
200 VMware's mboot64.efi to fail.
202 - Added support for memtest86 as second-row option. Program must be
203 stored in EFI/tools, EFI/tools/memtest, EFI/tools/memtest86, EFI/memtest,
204 or EFI/memtest86; and must use the name memtest86.efi, memtest86_x64.efi,
205 memtest86x64.efi, or bootx64.efi (changing "x64" to "ia32" on IA-32
206 systems). The memtest86 program is scanned for when the "showtools"
207 option includes the "memtest" or "memtest86" token, which it does by
210 - Added space to end of "Boot %s from %s" string; enables adding a space
211 to the end of the "default_selection" item (in quotes) to set a default
212 that matches a volume name that's identical to another one except for
213 extra characters at the end of the non-wanted volume's name.
215 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to hang when launching boot loaders
216 under some conditions. (Launching from Firewire drives on Macs is the
217 known case, but there may be others.)
222 - Fixed bug that caused missing media-type badges on BIOS-mode boot
225 - Fixed bug that caused failure when launching BIOS-mode OSes on Macs.
230 - Fixed bug that caused display glitches in the final entry on the first
231 row of icons if the second row of icons was empty.
233 - Fixed bug that could cause incorrect scanning or even a rEFInd crash when
234 using volume specification in also_scan_dirs token.
236 - Added protection against loading invalid drivers and other EFI programs.
237 (Some EFIs crash when attempting to load such drivers and programs.)
239 - Added PreLoader.efi and shim-fedora.efi to default dont_scan_files list;
240 it's now "shim.efi, shim-fedora.efi, PreLoader.efi, TextMode.efi,
241 ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi, MokManager.efi, HashTool.efi,
242 HashTool-signed.efi".
244 - Added icon for Funtoo Linux.
246 - Fixed reading of volume badges from user-specified icons directory, which
249 - Fixed handling of /.VolumeBadge.icns (or /.VolumeBadge.png) files, which
255 - Fixed build problem with recent development versions of EDK2.
257 - Added scan for Boot Repair's backup of the Windows boot loader
258 (bkpbootmgfw.efi). If found, give separate entries for it and for
259 bootmgfw.efi, each with its own descriptive text label.
261 - Fixed also_scan_dirs; used to have bug that caused it to ignore
262 volume specification, if present.
264 - Fixed bug in driver cache that caused Btrfs driver to hang sometimes.
269 - Added Btrfs signature to rEFInd, so that it can identify the filesystem
270 type for volumes that lack labels.
272 - Changed some critical filesystem driver pointers from 32-bit to 64-bit.
273 This *SHOULD* enable use of over-2TiB filesystems (for those filesystems
274 that support such large volumes). This capability is largely untested,
277 - Added a cache to the filesystem driver core, and therefore to all the
278 filesystem drivers. This cache greatly improves performance in
279 VirtualBox, and offers modest performance improvements on a few "real"
280 computers. The most dramatic improvement is on ext2/3fs under VirtualBox:
281 Loading a kernel and initrd used to take ~200 seconds on my system, but
282 now takes ~3 seconds! On most "real" hardware, the improvement is much
283 less dramatic -- an improvement of a second or less, presumably because
284 of cacheing within the EFI or on the hard disk itself.
286 - Filter boot loaders based on a test of their validity; keeps out Linux
287 kernels without EFI stub loader code, loaders for the wrong architecture,
288 non-EFI loaders, etc.
290 - New Btrfs driver, contributed by Samuel Liao based on GRUB 2.00 Btrfs
296 - Changed the 64-bit EFI shell included in the CD-R and USB flash drive
297 images to a version 2 shell that should support the "bcfg" command.
299 - Added support for PreBootloader to refind.spec's built-in installation
302 - Added support for the Linux Foundation's PreLoader to install.sh. It's
303 treated just like shim, including using the --shim option (or, now,
304 --preloader); but it searches for and copies HashTool.efi rather than
305 MokManager.efi, and filenames are adjusted appropriately.
307 - Added code to determine Linux root filesystem from /etc/fstab file, if
308 it's on the same partition as the kernel and if the refind_linux.conf
309 file is not available. This enables rEFInd to boot Linux without any
310 rEFInd-specific configuration files on some (but not all) systems.
315 - New feature: rEFInd now ignores symbolic links to files on filesystems
316 that support them. This prevents the "vmlinuz" symbolic link that some
317 distributions create in the root directory from appearing in the loader
318 list. Note that this does NOT affect symbolic links to directories.
320 - Added icons for Lubuntu and Kubuntu.
322 - Improved the install.sh script so that it does a better job dealing with
323 directory names that contain spaces.
325 - rEFInd now tries to guess the Linux distribution type based on the kernel
326 filename (Fedora and RHEL only) or the "ID" or "NAME" variables in
327 /etc/os-release on the kernel's partition. None of these is guaranteed to
328 work. A fallback of the Tux penguin icon remains in place in case rEFInd
329 can't find anything substantive enough for a guess.
331 - Added "EFI\opensuse" to the locations searched for MOK utilities, since
332 OpenSUSE now uses that name.
334 - Renamed "Reboot to Firmware User Interface" to "Reboot to Computer Setup
337 - Fixed bug in gptsync that caused it to hang if the disk had too few GPT
338 partitions to fill the MBR.
343 - Added support for "screensaver" token. If set to a positive integer, this
344 causes the screen to blank after the specified number of seconds of
345 inactivity. Pressing most keys (unfortunately NOT including Shift, Alt,
346 or Ctrl) will restore the display and restart the screen saver timeout.
348 - Added icon for ChromeOS (os_chrome.icns in the icons subdirectory).
349 ChromeBooks reportedly boots using the fallback filename, but if a user
350 wants to install rEFInd on a ChromeBook, renaming the original EFI/BOOT
351 directory to EFI/chrome and then installing rEFInd in the fallback
352 filename will bring up this new icon for ChromeOS.
354 - Added new option to reboot the computer into the firmware's user
355 interface. This option is active by default, or can be set via the
356 "firmware" option to the "showtools" token in refind.conf. It works
357 on only some computers, though; older computers lack this feature, and
358 when rEFInd is told to use this feature on such computers, the directive
361 - Upgraded LodePNG library from version 20121216 to 20130415 and
362 restructured rEFInd-specific modifications to simplify future upgrades.
364 - Replaced hexadecimal error code with description if an error is
365 encountered when saving a screen shot.
367 - Enable multiple screen shots: Rather than naming all screen shots
368 "screenshot.bmp", the name is now "screenshot_###.bmp", where "###" is a
369 sequence number, starting with "001".
374 - Modified default banner to include the new rEFInd icon, provided by Erik
377 - Worked around a suspected firmware bug that caused rEFInd 0.6.6 to 0.6.8
378 to hang at startup on some systems (DUET and some Macs).
380 - Modified rEFInd to search for gptsync under the names gptsync.efi and
381 gptsync_{arch}.efi, where {arch} is ia32 or x64. (Previous versions
382 searched only for gptsync.efi.)
384 - Added gptsync program from rEFIt project, but with some changes to
385 improve flexibility and make it less likely that UEFI users will
386 accidentally trash their systems.
388 - Changed timeout code so that the timeout continues if the keyboard is
389 disconnected. This can help in booting a headless server or a system with
390 a bluetooth or other keyboard that's not recognized by the EFI.
395 - Added workaround for presumed EFI bug that was causing "Invalid
396 Parameter" errors when scanning for boot loaders on some computers.
398 - Added search for an EFI shell called shell.efi in the root directory
399 (previously this name was only accepted in EFI\tools).
401 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail on some systems (Fedora
402 18, for instance) because of a problem identifying the ESP.
404 - Fixed bug that caused icons named after boot loaders to not be used.
409 - Added a more explicit error message summarizing options when a launch of
410 a program results in a Secure Boot failure.
412 - Changed MOK tool detection to scan all volumes, not just the rEFInd
413 home volume. This is desirable because the Linux Foundation's HashTool
414 can only scan its own volume, making it desirable to place copies of this
415 program on every volume that holds EFI boot loader binaries.
417 - Added support for launching the Linux Foundation HashTool as a means of
418 managing MOKs (or MOK hashes, at any rate).
420 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to present an entry for itself as a
421 Microsoft OS if it was launched as EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi.
423 - Fixed bug that caused dont_scan_volumes option to be added to
426 - Fixed dont_scan_volumes so that it works with OS X boot loaders.
428 - Fixed broken mixing of PNG and ICNS icons when using a user-specified
429 icons directory -- previously, an ICNS file in the default directory
430 would override a PNG file in the user-specified directory.
435 - rEFInd now ignores the fallback boot loader (EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
436 EFI/BOOT/bootia32.efi) if it's identical to another boot loader on
437 the same volume. This is intended to help unclutter the display on
438 systems that run Windows, since Windows tends to duplicate its own boot
439 loader under the fallback name.
441 - Added new "font" token to refind.conf, which enables specifying a font in
442 the form of a PNG file. This file must contain monospace glyphs for the
443 95 characters from ASCII 32 to 126 (space through tilde), inclusive, plus
444 a glyph to be displayed for characters outside of this range, for a total
447 - Replaced the old font (inherited from rEFInd) with an anti-aliased
448 version of Luxi Mono Regular 14 point.
450 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore manual boot stanzas in files
451 included via the "include" token in refind.conf.
453 - Fixed bug that caused ASSERT error on some systems (and conceivably a
454 crash on startup on some) when default_selection line in refind.conf was
455 commented out or empty.
457 - Fixed bug that caused "Binary is whitelisted" message to persist on
458 screen after loading MOK-signed drivers in Secure Boot mode.
460 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore the "icon" token in refind.conf
463 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused the script to fail to update
464 drivers when rEFInd was installed in EFI/BOOT/.
469 - Improved text color support: rEFInd now uses black text against light
470 backgrounds and white text against dark backgrounds.
472 - Added support for PNGs as banners, icons, and selectors.
474 - Added icon for ALT Linux.
476 - Added "safemode" option to "hideui" token, to hide option to boot into
477 safe mode for OS X ("-v -x" option to boot.efi).
479 - Added icon for Haiku (os_haiku.icns).
481 - Enable transparency of icons & main-menu text when the banner icon is
482 sized to cover these areas.
484 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to crash if fed a banner image that's
485 too big. Note that "too big" can be substantially smaller than the screen
491 - Revised install.sh to copy ext2fs driver, rather than ext4fs driver, for
492 ext2/3 filesystems. This can help keep non-functional entries from links
493 from /vmlinuz to /boot/vmlinuz out of the menu if the system uses ext4fs
494 on root and ext2fs or ext3fs on /boot.
496 - Fixed a couple of memory management bugs that cause rEFInd to hang at
497 startup on some systems.
502 - Added the ability to specify a volume name or number in the
503 "dont_scan_dirs" and "also_scan_dirs" tokens.
505 - Fixed a bug that caused removable EFI media to not appear in scan lists
506 if rEFInd was installed as EFI/BOOT/boot{arch}.efi on a hard disk.
508 - Modified ISO-9660 driver so that it can handle discs with other than
509 2048-byte sectors. This makes it useful for reading "hybrid ISO" images
510 burned to USB flash disks.
512 - New mvrefind.sh script to move a rEFInd installation between a standard
513 location (typically EFI/refind) and one of the fallback locations
514 (EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot). It can also do more exotic locations.
516 - The install.sh script now installs to EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
517 EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi if it's run in BIOS mode. This is
518 intended to give some chance of producing a bootable installation should
519 a user accidentally install Linux in EFI mode and then install rEFInd
520 from that installation.
522 - The install.sh script now tries to find an existing rEFInd installation
523 and upgrade it, even if it's in EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot rather
526 - New "--yes" option to install.sh to help with unattended or automated
527 installations (as from an RPM or Debian package).
532 - Inclusion of a sample refind.spec file for the benefit of RPM
533 distribution maintainers who might want to include rEFInd. It's a bit
534 rough, but it gets you a good chunk of the way there....
536 - The EFI filesystem drivers can now be built with the GNU-EFI toolkit as
537 well as with the TianoCore EDK2. See the BUILDING.txt file for details on
538 how to build them with either toolkit. This improvement doesn't affect
539 users of my binary packages, but it should make it easier for Linux
540 distributions to adopt rEFInd into their package systems.
542 - Tweaked refind.inf file for better build results using "native" TianoCore
543 EDK2 build process (vs. the Makefile-based build process that I use under
544 Linux). This won't affect those who use my binary builds or build under
545 Linux with the "make" command.
547 - Fixed bug that prevented Secure Boot launches from working when rEFInd
548 was built with GNU-EFI rather than the TianoCore EDK2.
550 - Substantial reworking of Secure Boot code, based on James Bottomley's
551 PreLoader program. This new code eliminates the limitation of launching
552 just one driver in Secure Boot mode and is likely to be more reliable
553 with future or obscure boot loaders. It should also work with non-x86-64
554 systems, although this relies on a platform-specific shim program, which
555 to date exists only for x86-64. The basic features are the same as before
556 -- rEFInd relies on shim for authentication functions and will launch
557 programs that are signed by Secure Boot keys, shim keys, or MOKs.
559 - Altered default for "textmode" option (when it's commented out) to not
560 adjust the text mode at all. (Prior versions set it to mode 0 by
566 - Added "--root" option to install.sh, to enable installation of rEFInd
567 to something other than the currently-running OS. This is intended for
568 use on emergency discs.
570 - Thanks to Stefan Agner, the ext4fs driver now supports the "meta_bg"
571 filesystem feature, which distributes metadata throughout the disk. This
572 feature isn't used by default, but can be set at filesystem creation time
573 by passing the "-O meta_bg,^resize_inode" option to mke2fs. (Using
574 "^resize_inode" is necessary because meta_bg is incompatible with
575 resize_inode, which IS used by default.) This feature can be used on
576 ext3fs and ext2fs as well as on ext4fs, so the ext4fs driver can now
577 handle some ext3fs and ext2fs partitions that the ext2fs driver can't
580 - Fixed some screen resolution-setting bugs.
582 - Added the "words" that make up a filesystem's label (delimited by spaces,
583 dashes, or underscores) to the list of bases used to search for OS icons.
584 For instance, if the filesystem's label is "Arch", rEFInd searches for
585 os_Arch.icns; if it's "Fedora 17", it searches for os_Fedora.icns and
586 os_17.icns; and if it's "NEW_GENTOO", it searches for os_NEW.icns and
589 - Refined hints displays to be more context-sensitive, particularly in text
592 - Instead of displaying a blank filesystem label when a filesystem has
593 none, rEFInd now displays the size and/or type of the filesystem, as in
594 "boot EFI\foo\bar.efi from 200 MiB ext3 volume" rather than "boot
595 EFI\foo\bar.efi from".
597 - Fixed a bug that caused the screen to clear after displaying an error
598 message but before displaying the "Hit any key to continue" message when
599 a boot loader launch failed.
604 - Fixed a memory allocation bug that could cause a program crash when
605 specifying certain values with the "also_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_volumes",
606 "dont_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_files", and "scan_driver_dirs" refind.conf
609 - Modified Linux kernel initrd-finding code so that if an initrd is
610 specified in refind_linux.conf, rEFInd will not add any initrd it finds.
611 This enables an override of the default initrd, and is likely to be
612 particularly helpful to Arch Linux users.
614 - Added ext4fs driver!
616 - Made "boot" the default value for "also_scan_dirs".
618 - Added identifying screen header to line editor.
620 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd's display to be mis-sized upon return
621 from a program that set the resolution itself.
623 - Adjusted "resolution" refind.conf parameter so that it can accept EITHER
624 a resolution as width and height OR a single digit as a UEFI mode number
625 (which is system-specific). This is done because some systems present the
626 same mode twice in their mode lists, perhaps varying in refresh rate,
627 monitor output, or some other salient characteristics; specifying the
628 mode number enables selecting the higher-numbered mode, whereas using
629 horizontal and vertical resolution values selects the lowest-numbered
632 - Added "textmode" refind.conf parameter to set the text mode used in
633 text-only displays, and for the line editor and boot-time handoff
634 display even in graphics mode.
636 - Fixed bug that caused tools (shell, etc.) to launch when they were
637 highlighted and F2 or Insert was pressed.
639 - Added "editor" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf, which
640 disables the boot options editor.
642 - Added hints text to rEFInd main menu and sub-menus. This can be disabled
643 by setting the new "hints" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf.
645 - Added "boot with minimal options" entry to refind_linux.conf file
646 generated by install.sh. This entry boots without the options extracted
647 from the /etc/default/grub file.
649 - Added keys subdirectory to main distribution, to hold public Secure
650 Boot/shim keys from known sources.
652 - Changed install.sh --drivers option to --alldrivers, added new
653 --nodrivers option, and made the default on Linux to install the one
654 driver that's used on /boot (or the root filesystem if /boot isn't a
655 separate partition). Of course, this won't install a non-existent driver,
656 and it also won't work properly if run from an emergency disk unless you
657 mount a separate /boot partition at that location.
659 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented creation of refind_linux.conf file
662 0.5.1.1 (12/12/2012):
663 ---------------------
665 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented it from working on OS X.
670 - Added support for "0" options to "textonly" and "scan_all_linux_kernels"
671 to reverse the usual meaning of these tokens. This is useful for
672 including these options in a secondary configuration file called with the
673 new "include" token to override a setting set in the main file.
675 - Added "include" token for refind.conf, to enable including a secondary
676 configuration file from a primary one.
678 - Modified install.sh so that it creates a simple refind_linux.conf file in
679 /boot, if that file doesn't already exist and if install.sh is run from
680 Linux. If that directory happens to be on a FAT, HFS+, ext2fs, ext3fs, or
681 ReiserFS volume, and if the necessary drivers are installed, the result
682 is that rEFInd will detect the Linux installation with no further
683 configuration on many systems. (Some may still require tweaking of kernel
684 options, though; for instance, adding "dolvm" on Gentoo systems that use
687 - Added --shim and --localkeys options to install.sh to help simplify setup
688 on systems with Secure Boot active.
690 - Fixed (maybe) bug that caused resolution options to not be displayed on
691 recent Macs with GOP graphics when specifying an invalid resolution in
694 - Fixed bug that caused some programs (EFI shells, in particular) to hang
695 when launching on some systems (DUET, in particular).
697 - Implemented a fix to enable ELILO to launch with Secure Boot active.
698 This fix might help with some other boot loaders in Secure Boot mode,
699 too, but I don't know of any specifics.
704 - Added the ability to include quote marks ('"') in refind.conf and
705 refind_linux.conf tokens by doubling them up, as in:
706 "ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value=""this is it"""
707 This example results in the following string being passed as an
709 ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value="this is it"
711 - Changed refind.conf-sample to uncomment the scan_all_linux_kernels
712 option by default. If this option is deleted or commented out, the
713 program default remains to not scan all Linux kernels; but with
714 increasing numbers of distributions shipping with kernels that include
715 EFI stub loader support, setting the configuration file default to scan
716 for them makes sense.
718 - Modified the "resolution" token so that it affects text mode as well
719 as graphics mode. On my systems, though, the actual text area is still
720 restricted to an 80x25 area. (This seems to be a firmware limitation; my
721 EFI shells are also so limited.)
723 - Fixed a bug that caused the options line editor to blank out lines that
724 were not actually edited.
726 - Added support for using Matthew Garrett's Shim program and its Machine
727 Owner Keys (MOKs) to extend Secure Boot capabilities. If rEFInd is
728 launched from Shim on a computer with Secure Boot active, rEFInd will
729 launch programs signed with either a standard UEFI Secure Boot key or a
730 MOK. For the moment, this feature works only on x86-64 systems.
732 - Added new "dont_scan_files" (aka "don't_scan_files") token for
733 refind.conf. The effect is similar to dont_scan_dirs, but it creates a
734 blacklist of filenames within directories rather than directory names.
735 I'm initially using it to place shim.efi and MokManager.efi in the
736 blacklist to keep these programs out of the OS list. (MokManager.efi is
737 scanned separately as a tool; see below.) I've moved checks for
738 ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi, and TextMode.efi to this list. (These
739 three had previously been blacklisted by hard-coding in ScanLoaderDir().)
741 - Added the directory from which rEFInd launched to dont_scan_dirs. This
742 works around a bug in which rEFInd would show itself as a bogus Windows
743 entry if it's installed as EFI/Microsoft/boot/bootmgfw.efi.
745 - Added support for launching MokManager.efi for managing the Machine Owner
746 Keys (MOKs) maintained by the shim boot loader developed by Fedora and
747 SUSE. This program is scanned and presented as a second-row tool.
749 - Added support for Apple's Recovery HD partition: If it's detected, a new
750 icon appears on the second row. This icon can be removed by explicitly
751 setting the "showtools" option in refind.conf and excluding the
752 "apple_recovery" option from that line.
754 - Fixed bug that caused text-mode ("textonly" refind.conf option enabled)
755 menu entries to be right-aligned rather than left-aligned when rEFInd was
756 compiled with the TianoCore EDK2.
758 - Added "--usedefault {devicename}" and "--drivers" options to the
759 install.sh script and changed the "esp" option to "--esp".
764 - Added an icon for gummiboot.
766 - Added a boot option editor: Pressing the Insert or F2 key from a boot
767 tag's options menu opens a simple text-mode line editor on which the boot
768 options may be edited for a one-time boot with altered options.
770 - Modified the "scan_delay" feature to delay and then perform a re-scan,
771 which may work better than the first attempt at this feature (which I'm
772 told isn't working as planned).
774 - Modified rEFInd to add a space after the command-line options only when
775 launching Mac OS X. On some early Macs, the extra space (which had been
776 present by default, as a carryover from rEFIt) causes problems when
777 booting Linux kernels from FAT partitions.
782 - Fixed some minor memory management issues.
784 - Added new "scan_delay" feature to impose a delay before scanning
787 - Changed default "scanfor" option from internal-external-optical to either
788 internal-external-optical-manual (for non-Macs) or
789 internal-hdbios-external-biosexternal-optical-cd-manual (for Macs). I've
790 done this for two reasons:
791 - Many Mac users have been confused by the fact that rEFInd needs
792 reconfiguration to detect Windows (or Linux installed in BIOS mode),
793 since rEFIt scans BIOS devices by default. Adding the BIOS options as
794 default for them should help them.
795 - Adding the "manual" option enables users to simply add manual boot
796 stanzas and have them work, which is more intuitive. Adding the
797 "manual" option will have no effect unless manual stanzas are created
798 or uncommented, so this part of the change won't affect users' working
799 default configurations.
801 - Added new legacy (BIOS) boot support for UEFI-based PCs.
806 - Fixed bug that caused a failure to boot BIOS-based OSes on Macs.
808 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail to detect rEFItBlesser.
813 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be corrupted by rEFInd on
816 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be truncated in the drivers
819 - Fixed bug in use_graphics_for option parsing that caused most options
820 to set graphics mode for OS X and/or Linux but not other boot
823 - Tweaked install script to better isolate the ESP under OS X.
828 - rEFInd now supports compilation using the TianoCore UDK2010/EDK2
829 development kit in addition to GNU-EFI.
831 - Added new "use_graphics_for" option to control which OSes to boot in
832 graphics mode. (This effect lasts for a fraction of a second on most
833 systems, since the boot loader that rEFInd launches is likely to set
834 graphics or text mode itself.)
836 - Graphics-mode booting now clears the screen to the current rEFInd
837 background color (rather than black) and does NOT display boot messages.
838 The intent is for a smoother transition when booting OS X, or perhaps
839 other OSes that don't display boot loader messages. In practice, this
840 effect will be tiny for many OSes, since the boot loader generally clears
841 the screen within a fraction of a second of being launched; but the
842 "flicker" of a rEFInd message in that time can sometimes be distracting.
844 - Filesystem drivers now work on EFI 1.x systems, such as Macs.
846 - Removed "linux.conf" as a valid alternative name for "refind_linux.conf"
847 for holding Linux kernel options. The kernel developers plan to use
848 "linux.conf" themselves.
853 - Added a message to install.sh when run on Macs to remind users to update
854 the "scanfor" line in refind.conf if they need to boot BIOS-based OSes
857 - Modified install.sh script to be smarter about running efibootmgr on
858 Linux. It now uses the whole path to the rEFInd binary as a key to
859 determine whether an existing entry exists, rather than just the filename
860 portion. If an entry exists and is the first entry in the boot order, the
861 script does nothing to the NVRAM entries. If such an entry exists but is
862 not the default, the script deletes that entry and creates a new one
863 (implicitly making it the first in the boot order). If such an entry does
864 not exist, the script creates a new one (again, making it the first in
867 - Added "dont_scan_dirs" configuration file option, which adds directories
868 to a "blacklist" of directories that are NOT scanned for boot loaders.
873 - Added "scanning for new boot loaders" message to the re-scan function
874 (hitting Esc at the main menu). It usually flashes up too quickly to
875 be of importance, but if the scan function takes a while because of
876 access to a CD that must be spun up, it should make it clear that the
879 - Modified install.sh script to detect rEFItBlesser on Macs, and if
880 present, to ask the user if it should be removed.
882 - Cleaned up the Make.common file for the filesystem drivers.
884 - Changed HFS+ driver to return volume label of "HFS+ volume" rather than
885 an empty label. (The driver doesn't currently read the real volume
888 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to appear in its own menu after
889 running a shell and then re-scanning for boot loaders.
894 - Inclusion of drivers for ISO-9660, HFS+, ReiserFS, and ext2fs. Most of
895 these drivers originated with rEFIt, although the HFS+ driver seems to
896 have come from Oracle's VirtualBox, with some files from Apple. I hadn't
897 included these drivers previously because the build process proved
898 challenging. As it is, they don't work on my Mac Mini, I suspect because
899 the build process with the UDK2010 development kit may not work with the
900 EFI 1.x that Apple uses.
902 - Addition of support for drivers in the "drivers_{arch}" subdirectory of
903 the main rEFInd binary directory (e.g., "drivers_x64" or "drivers_ia32").
904 Drivers may continue to be placed in the "drivers" subdirectory.
906 - Added new feature to eject CDs (and other removable media): Press F12 to
907 eject all such media. This function works only on some Macs, though (it
908 relies on an Apple-specific EFI extension, and this extension isn't even
909 implemented on all Macs, much less on UEFI-based PCs).
911 - Fixed a problem that could cause GRUB 2 to fail to read its configuration
912 file when launched from rEFInd.
917 - Removed the GRUB 2 detection "reciped" added with 0.3.2, since I've
918 received reports that it's not working as intended.
920 - Added re-scan feature: Press the Esc key to have rEFInd re-read its
921 configuration file, tell the EFI to scan for new filesystems, and re-scan
922 those filesystems for boot loaders. The main purpose is to enable
923 scanning a new removable medium that you insert after launching rEFInd;
924 however, it can also be used to immediately implement changes to the
925 configuration file or new drivers you load from an EFI shell.
927 - Fixed a bug that could cause the scroll-right arrow to be replaced by the
928 scroll-left arrow under some circumstances.
933 - Added new configuration file option: "icons_dir", which sets the name
934 of the subdirectory in which icons are found. See the documentation or
935 sample configuration file for a full description.
937 - Modified Makefile to generate rEFInd binary that includes architecture
938 code -- refind_ia32.efi or refind_x64.efi, rather than the generic
939 refind.efi. This is done mainly to help the install.sh script. The
940 program can be named anything you like on the disk. (The generic name
941 refind.efi is used on unknown architectures.)
943 - Improved install.sh script: Fixed bug on OS X 10.7 and enable it to be
944 used after building from source code (or via new "make install" Makefile
947 - Improved screen redraws to produce less flicker when moving among the
948 second-row tags or to the last tag on the first row.
953 - Improved menu navigation:
954 - In graphics mode, left & right arrow keys move left & right, while up &
955 down arrows move between rows.
956 - Page Up and Page Down now move through chunks of visible tags (in both
957 text & graphics modes), jumping from one row to another only when at
958 the edge of the row. In text mode, the "rows" are broken down as in
959 graphics mode, but they aren't visibly distinguished on the screen.
961 - Improved text-mode use: rEFInd now displays the proper number of entries
962 when first started in text mode and scrolling is done sensibly when too
963 many entries exist to fit on the screen.
968 - Added the install.sh script to install rEFInd on Linux and Mac OS X
969 systems. This script must be run as root (or via sudo). It requires
970 no options, but on Mac OS X, passing it the "esp" option causes it
971 to install rEFInd on the computer's ESP rather than the default of the
972 currently OS X boot partition. (Under Linux, the default is to install to
973 the ESP.) Note that there may be some unusual cases in which this script
976 - Does a better job of clearing the screen when launching OSes in text
979 - Added detection "recipe" for GRUB 2's BIOS Boot Partition.
981 - Fixed bogus detection of ESPs created by Linux's mkdosfs utility or
982 Windows as bootable partitions when "scanfor" includes BIOS scanning
989 - Fixed bug that caused spurious "Unsupported while scanning the root
990 directory" messages under some conitions on Macs.
992 - Modified loader scanning code to sort boot loader entries within a
993 directory by modification time, so that the most recently-modified loader
994 is first among those in a given directory. Thus, if you specify a
995 directory name (or volume name, for loaders stored in the root directory
996 of a volume) as the default_selection, the most recent of those loaders
997 will be the default. This is intended to help with Linux kernel
998 maintenance when using the EFI stub loader; set up this way, the most
999 recent kernel copied to your kernel directory will be the default,
1000 obviating the need to adjust the refind.conf file when adding a new
1001 kernel. If you want to change the default among those in the default
1002 directory, you can use "touch" to adjust the modification timestamp.
1004 - Tweaked code to find loader-specific .icns file so that it finds files
1005 for Linux kernels without .efi extensions. In this case, files should be
1006 named the same as the kernels they match, but with .icns extensions. For
1007 instance, bzImage-3.3.2 should have an icon called bzImage-3.3.2.icns.
1008 (The old code would have looked for an icon called bzImage-3.3.icns.)
1010 - Eliminated bogus OS loader tags for filenames that end in ".icns" when
1011 the scan_all_linux_kernels option is set.
1016 - I'm officially upgrading this project's status from "alpha" to "beta" and
1017 giving it a bump from 0.2.x to 0.3.0. This doesn't reflect any major
1018 milestone with this version; rather, it reflects my sense that rEFInd has
1019 been "out there" for a while, and although I've gotten bug reports,
1020 they've been minor and/or have been fixed. The program still has known
1021 bugs, but my impression is that it is, overall, usable by ordinary users.
1023 - Added "resolution" option to refind.conf, which enables setting the video
1024 resolution. To use it, pass two numeric values, as in "resolution 1024
1025 768" to use a 1024x768 video mode. Note that not all modes are supported.
1026 If you specify a non-supported video mode on a UEFI system, a message
1027 appears listing the supported video modes and you must then press a key
1028 to continue, using the default video mode (usually 800x600).
1029 Unfortunately, I don't know the calls to get a list of supported video
1030 modes on older EFI 1.x systems (including Macs), so on Macs setting an
1031 incorrect video mode silently fails (you keep using the default mode).
1032 This makes changing your video mode a hit-or-miss proposition on Macs.
1033 CAUTION: It's possible to set a legal video mode that your monitor can't
1034 handle, in which case you'll get a blank display until you boot an OS
1035 that resets the video mode.
1037 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused rEFInd to crash when returning from an
1038 EFI shell or other programs on Macs, particularly when rEFInd used
1039 graphical mode. I'm not 100% sure this bug is squashed because I still
1040 don't understand the cause and I only have one Mac for testing. See
1041 comments in the ReinitRefitLib() function in refit/lib.c for more
1044 - Added new refind.conf option: scan_all_linux_kernels, which causes Linux
1045 kernels that lack ".efi" extensions to be included in scans for EFI boot
1046 loaders. This may help integration with Linux distributions that don't
1047 give their kernels such names by default. Beware, though: It can detect
1048 unwanted files, such as older non-stub-loader kernels or .icns files used
1049 to give kernels with .efi extensions custom icons.
1051 - Improved EFI boot loader detection on boards with Gigabyte's Hybrid EFI,
1052 and perhaps other EFIs with a buggy StriCmp() function. Files with both
1053 ".efi" and ".EFI" extensions should now be detected as boot loaders.
1055 - Fixed a bug that caused rEFInd to fail to scan for drivers if the
1056 filesystem driver didn't set a volume name (that is, if the relevant
1057 field was set to NULL rather than even an empty string). In such
1058 situations, rEFInd now reports the volume name as "Unknown".
1063 - After much trial and tribulation, I've overcome a GNU-EFI limitation and
1064 enabled rEFInd to load EFI drivers. This feature was present in the
1065 original build of rEFIt but was removed in the versions that could
1066 compile under Linux, but now it's back -- and still being compiled under
1067 Linux! To use it, you should place your drivers in a convenient directory
1068 on the ESP (or whatever partition you use to launch rEFInd) and add a
1069 "scan_driver_dirs" entry to refind.conf to tell rEFInd where to look. (As
1070 always, you should specify the driver directory relative to the root of
1071 the filesystem.) Note that you can't launch drivers from another
1072 filesystem; they must be on the same volume that holds rEFInd. Those who
1073 compile from source code should note that implementing this feature
1074 necessitated using a more recent version of the GNU-EFI library. I'm
1075 currently using version 3.0p, and version 3.0i does NOT work. I don't
1076 know where the change occurred, but you may need to upgrade your GNU-EFI
1079 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to show up in its own menu sometimes.
1081 - Added new refind.conf token: also_scan_dirs. When scanning volumes for
1082 EFI boot loaders, rEFInd always scans the root directory and every
1083 subdirectory of the /EFI directory, but it doesn't recurse into these
1084 directories. The also_scan_dirs token adds more directories to the scan
1085 list. It defaults to "elilo,boot", but you can set it to any directory or
1086 directories you like.
1091 - Added "volume" keyword to configuration file's stanza options. This
1092 option changes the volume from which subsequent files (specified by
1093 "loader" and "icon") are loaded. You pass "volume" the name/label of the
1094 FILESYSTEM you want to use (not the GPT partition name), or a number
1095 followed by a colon (e.g., "1:"). The former should reliably identify a
1096 filesystem, assuming the name is unique. The latter assigns numbers based
1097 on the order in which they're scanned, which may not be as reliable but
1098 should work when a volume is unnamed.
1100 - Fixed bug in 0.2.5 that caused failure of Linux initial RAM disk
1101 mapping on some (but not all) systems. Affected computers include at
1102 least some Intel motherboards, maybe others.
1107 - Fixed bug that caused an inability to associate initial RAM disks with
1108 Linux kernels stored in a volume's root directory.
1110 - Volume badges (that override default badges) are now stored in
1111 .VolumeBadge.icns. Although undocumented, rEFInd formerly loaded custom
1112 volume badges from .VolumeIcon.icns. This carryover from rEFIt was a
1113 confusing name, given the next (new) feature, so I've changed and
1114 documented the name....
1116 - Added ability to set a default icon for a loader stored in the root
1117 directory of a volume: The icon is stored in .VolumeIcon.icns. This icon
1118 is also used for Mac OS X volumes booted from the standard location.
1120 - Fixed bug that caused icons to drop back to generic icons when rEFInd
1121 was launched in certain ways (such as from an EFI shell in rEFInd's
1122 directory) on certain systems.
1124 - Fixed bug that caused "unknown disable flag" to be shown (very briefly)
1125 instead of "unknown hideui flag" when an improper hideui flag was set.
1130 - Created new refind.conf entry: "showtools". This entry takes options of
1131 "shell", "gptsync", "about", "exit", "reboot", and "shutdown". This
1132 option is in some respects an affirmative version of portions of the old
1133 "disable" and "hideui" options; however, it enables users to specify the
1134 order in which these options appear on the screen. Also, the "exit"
1135 option is new; it terminates the program. The effect is usually to return
1136 to whatever tool launched it or to launch a default OS; however, this is
1137 somewhat unpredictable. The default therefore omits the "exit" option, as
1138 well as "gptsync", which has always been dangerous (but necessary on most
1139 MacOS/Windows dual-boot setups on Macs). As part of this reconfiguration,
1140 I've eliminated the "rescue Linux" option, which always seemed pointless
1143 - Folded "disable" and "hideui" refind.conf entries into one ("disable"),
1144 and reduced the number of options to six: "banner", "label",
1145 "singleuser", "hwtest", "arrows", and "all". ("arrows" is new and
1146 disables the scroll arrows when a system has too many tags to display
1149 - Added max_tags option to the refind.conf file, enabling users to reduce
1150 the maximum number of OS loader tags that can be displayed at once.
1152 - Updated rEFIt icon, based on the 128x128 volume label from the rEFIt CD
1155 - Added x86 and x86-64 EFI shells to the CD image version of the binary,
1156 but NOT to the binary zip file. The logic is that the CD image is more
1157 likely to be used directly as an emergency disc and so may need this
1158 feature, even though the source isn't part of the rEFInd project. (The
1159 source is readily available from the TianoCore project.)
1161 - EFI shells may now be stored at /shellx64.efi for x86-64 systems or at
1162 /shellia32.efi for x86 systems. The /EFI/tools/shell.efi name is also
1163 recognized; however, if both files are present, two EFI shell icons will
1164 appear on the main menu. The /efi/{refind-path/apps/shell.efi filename,
1165 which was never officially documented but worked as a carryover from
1166 rEFIt, is no longer valid.
1171 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused hangs when launching a second program
1172 after returning from a first. There are some weird system-to-system
1173 differences, though, and this fix causes (apparently harmless) error
1174 messages about "(re)opening our installation volume" on at least one
1175 system (a 32-bit Mac Mini). I'm committing this change because, imperfect
1176 though it is, it's preferable to the earlier version, at least on my
1177 small sample of computers.
1179 - Because of news that the Linux kernel developers are planning to use the
1180 filename linux.conf to hold Linux kernel configuration data for EFI
1181 booting, I'm transitioning rEFInd away from that name and to
1182 refind_linux.conf to avoid a conflict. This version can use either name,
1183 with refind_linux.conf taking precedence if both are present.
1185 - Added logo for Arch Linux.
1190 - Fixed bug that caused program failure when Linux kernels with EFI stub
1191 support were detected with no associated version numbers. rEFInd now
1192 permits automatic linking of *ONE* versionless kernel to *ONE*
1193 versionless initrd file.
1195 - Fixed bug that caused program hangs when a boot loader filename or label
1196 was too long. Such names are now properly truncated and program execution
1199 - Fixed bug that caused no text to appear in submenus on UEFI systems with
1200 small screens (800x600). NOTE: Problem still occurs on screens smaller
1201 than this, but such systems are very rare.
1206 - Added ability to set a "default_selection" that's a title or a substring
1207 of one -- the name given to a stanza in a "menuentry" or the boot
1208 loader's filename, in most cases, although "Mac OS X", "Windows XP
1209 (XoM)", and "Microsoft EFI boot" are also titles.
1211 - Added support for semi-automatic scans of Linux kernels with EFI stub
1212 loader support. The program auto-detects matching initial RAM disk files
1213 and loads additional options from the "linux.conf" file in the same
1214 directory as the kernel.
1216 - Added support for "submenuentry" keyword and associated sub-stanza
1217 entries in refind.conf file.
1219 - Renamed icons/os_mint.icns to icons/os_linuxmint.icns to match the
1220 filename Linux Mint ACTUALLY uses for its ESP boot loader directory.
1226 - Initial public release