]> code.delx.au - refind/blob - NEWS.txt
0.9.0 release.
[refind] / NEWS.txt
1 0.9.0 (7/26/2015):
2 ------------------
3
4 - New icon for Kali Linux, submitted by Francesco D'Eugenio.
5
6 - Minor code changes to ensure that rEFInd compiles with GCC 5.1. (Tested
7 with GNU-EFI on a Fedora 22 system; not yet tested with the TianoCore
8 EDK2.)
9
10 - Added new "fold_linux_kernels" token to refind.conf. This option, when
11 active (the default) "folds" all Linux kernels in a directory into a
12 single entry on the rEFInd menu. The kernel with the most recent time
13 stamp is launched by default. To launch another kernel, you must press F2
14 or Insert; additional kernels appear as options on the first kernel's
15 submenu. To see the pre-0.9.0 behavior, you must set "fold_linux_kernels
16 false" (or one of its synonyms, "off" or "0"). The point of this option
17 is to help de-clutter the rEFInd main menu.
18
19 - Added new Linux root (/) partition auto-discovery feature, based on
20 Freedesktop.org's Discoverable Partitions Spec (DPS)
21 (http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Specifications/DiscoverablePartitionsSpec/):
22 If no refind_linux.conf file or /etc/fstab file is found, and if a
23 partition with the correct DPS type code for the system architecture is
24 found, rEFInd adds "ro root=/dev/disk/by-partuuid/{GUID}" to the kernel
25 options. This will not help on LVM setups, and will get it right for only
26 one installation on systems with multiple Linux installations, but it may
27 help some users, if/when the DPS type codes become more common.
28
29 - Fixed bug that caused a rEFInd crash if an empty refind_linux.conf
30 file was encountered.
31
32 - The mkrlconf.sh script now checks the OS on which it's running, which
33 should help avoid confusion or problems by users who mistakenly run it
34 under OS X.
35
36 - rEFInd now skips checking for various BIOS-mode boot sector signatures
37 when running on a UEFI-based PC; these checks are run only on Macs. This
38 may reduce startup time on systems with many partitions.
39
40 - Fixed Debian debinstall script to work correctly on IA32 systems. It had
41 a bug that caused filesystem drivers and gptsync to not be packaged for
42 IA32.
43
44 - Modified Debian postinst file to call install.sh with --localkeys option
45 if sbsign and openssl are available, even when NOT in Secure Boot mode or
46 if shim is not detected. This helps with my Ubuntu PPA when using custom
47 Secure Boot keys, since the PPA is delivered unsigned. (Users will have
48 to have added their own local keys to their firmware's db.) For
49 consistency, I've made the same change to the RPM .spec file.
50
51 0.8.7 (3/1/2015):
52 -----------------
53
54 - Fixed install.sh bug that caused inappropriate installation under the
55 name bootx64.efi (or bootia32.efi) under Linux, with a failure to update
56 the boot entries in NVRAM, has been fixed.
57
58 - Added identification of XFS as filesystem type in volume descriptions.
59
60 - More fixes to filesystem type detection code. Previous version sometimes
61 identified FAT or NTFS (or anything with a boot loader) as a whole-disk
62 device rather than the correct filesystem type.
63
64 - Added protections to the code to reduce the risk of crashes that might
65 occur when dereferencing NULL pointers in various situations.
66
67 - I'm deprecating the use of filesystem numbers (as in "fs0:") because
68 they're unreliable -- filesystem numbers can change between boots and
69 might not be the same as those used in an EFI shell or other program.
70 Sooner or later I'll remove code supporting this feature. In the
71 meantime, if it doesn't work for you, please switch to using filesystem
72 labels, partition labels, or partition GUIDs.
73
74 - Added detection of FreeBSD's BIOS-mode GPT boot loader. Previously,
75 rEFInd could detect FreeBSD's BIOS-mode MBR boot loader, which gave
76 FreeBSD an appropriate icon on Macs; but the BIOS-mode GPT boot loader
77 code is different, so some recent FreeBSD installations showed up with
78 generic grey diamond icons. This change creates FreeBSD icons instead.
79
80 - Added "Secure Boot [active|inactive]" notice to "about" menu for x86
81 (32-bit) systems, since there are now a few 32-bit UEFI systems that
82 support Secure Boot. (AFAIK, these are mostly tablets and convertibles
83 such as the ASUS T100.)
84
85 - Added KeyTool.efi and KeyTool-signed.efi to list of MOK managers. KeyTool
86 is the "super-deluxe" Secure Boot key and hash manager provided as part
87 of the efitools package.
88
89 - Fixed more instances of "invalid parameter" errors on some EFIs.
90
91 - Improved Secure Boot detection in install.sh.
92
93 - install.sh should no longer complain when copying Shim or MokManager over
94 itself.
95
96 0.8.6 (2/8/2015):
97 -----------------
98
99 - Removed special case of ignoring an HFS+ name of "HFS+ volume", since the
100 old rEFInd HFS+ driver that produced this name for all HFS+ volumes has
101 long since been updated to deliver a real name.
102
103 - Addition of new Windows 8 OS icon. On Macs and for BIOS/legacy boots, the
104 new icon is now used for Windows Vista, 7, and 8, while the old one is
105 used for earlier versions of Windows. For EFI-mode boots, the new icon is
106 used universally.
107
108 - If the NTFS driver is loaded, rEFInd now scans NTFS volumes on Macs for
109 the presence of Windows boot files, and removes any NTFS volume that
110 lacks such files from the BIOS/legacy boot list. This should help
111 unclutter the display on Macs that contain NTFS data partitions.
112
113 - Fixed bug that caused misidentification of both whole disks and NTFS
114 volumes as being FAT. (This bug affected the identification of devices
115 and locations in the rEFInd menu, not actual access to devices.)
116
117 - Code refactoring to clear out legacy-boot functions from the
118 ever-expanding refind/main.c file.
119
120 - Added new "badges" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf. This
121 option hides the device-type badges associated with the OS boot options.
122
123 - Reverted rEFIt commit r472, introduced in rEFInd 0.8.5 to support more
124 BMP images because I've received bug reports that it's causing existing
125 selection images to fail to load.
126
127 - Fixed install.sh bug that caused misidentification of installation
128 directory under OS X if an already-mounted ESP has spaces in its path.
129
130 - Fixed Mac-specific install.sh bug that could cause misidentification of
131 the ESP on disks with partition numbers of 10 or above.
132
133
134 0.8.5 (2/1/2015):
135 -----------------
136
137 - Added NTFS EFI filesystem driver.
138
139 - Minor improvements to filesystem driver framework code.
140
141 - Changes to
142
143 - Fixed bug in Btrfs driver's address reference.
144
145 - Improved install.sh to make it smarter about figuring out where to
146 install on Macs. Specifically, this version now upgrades existing
147 installations, if found (as it always has under Linux), rather than
148 blindly install to EFI/BOOT; it installs to EFI/refind if not existing
149 installation is found; it installs using the --shortform option to bless,
150 which seems to eliminate the 30-second delay problem; and it can handle
151 an HFS+ ESP, which it treats as a separate HFS+ volume (as if the user
152 had used --ownhfs). These changes do not affect behavior under Linux.
153
154 - Added missing check of architecture type for several tools.
155
156 - Applied rEFIt commit r472, which adds support for BMP images with negative
157 height fields, indicating that the image is NOT vertically flipped. This
158 commit and r467 were not incorporated in the original rEFInd because I
159 forked it from a Debian rEFIt package that had been patched to build
160 under GNU-EFI, and was apparently based on a slightly earlier version.
161
162 - Applied rEFIt commit r467, which improves Mac handling of legacy boots
163 from other than the first hard disk.
164
165
166 0.8.4 (12/8/2014):
167 ------------------
168
169 - Tweaked default for dont_scan_volumes: Removed "Recovery HD". This change
170 better suits the needs of OS X 10.10 ("Yosemite") installations, but may
171 result in some stray Recovery HD entries on some Macs.
172
173 - Updated icons for Fedora and Ubuntu and added an icon for Xubuntu.
174
175 - Added new configuration option, "enable_and_lock_vmx", which sets an
176 Intel CPU feature that's required for some types of virtualization to
177 work. Most EFIs enable setting this feature in their own setup utilities,
178 but some (such as most Macs) don't.
179
180 - If rEFInd can't locate an icons directory (either the default or one
181 specified by the icons_dir token), the program switches to text-only
182 mode.
183
184 - If a loader contains the string "grub" and no other clue to the loader's
185 OS association exists, search for os_grub.{png|icns} (which is not
186 provided with rEFInd) or os_linux.{png|icns}. (Previous versions provided
187 a generic loader icon for GRUB.)
188
189 - Fixed bug that caused dont_scan_files to not work with special-case
190 boot loaders (for OS X and Windows) when specifying the complete path to
191 the loader (e.g., EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi).
192
193 - Added support for the iPXE network boot tool (see BUILDING.txt for
194 building and basic use instructions).
195
196 0.8.3 (7/6/2014):
197 -----------------
198
199 - Added new feature: Setting "timeout = -1" in refind.conf causes rEFInd to
200 immediately boot the default option UNLESS a keypress is in the buffer
201 when rEFInd launches. In that case, if the keypress corresponds to a
202 shortcut key, the associated boot loader is launched; or if not, the menu
203 is displayed.
204
205 - Added new icons for Clover boot loader and for Mythbuntu Linux
206 distribution.
207
208 - rEFInd now displays the partition's label, when one is available, when
209 offering a BIOS-mode boot option for a partition with no filesystem
210 driver. This works only on Macs doing BIOS-mode booting.
211
212 - Removed GPLv2 code from the FSW core files. This was done because the
213 Btrfs driver is derived from the GRUB Btrfs driver, which is licensed
214 under the GPLv3. Ironically, the GPLv2 and GPLv3 are incompatible
215 licenses, so ensuring that the Btrfs driver doesn't rely on GPLv2 code
216 was legally necessary. In most cases, I reverted to the original rEFIt
217 code, although I kept my own cache code; since I wrote it, I can
218 change its license to a BSD license.
219
220 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to unload drivers immediately after loading
221 them. This didn't affect rEFInd's own drivers because they didn't include
222 the unload hooks, but it did affect some other drivers.
223
224 - Changed default scan_all_linux_kernels setting from "false" to "true",
225 and commented the option out in refind.conf-sample. This should not
226 affect most people, since refind.conf-sample had this option commented
227 out, and most rEFInd users either use it that way or don't have Linux
228 kernels installed at all. I've made this change because I want rEFInd to
229 "do the right thing" by default in as many cases as possible. For a while
230 now, rEFInd has been excluding non-bootable files from its menu, and most
231 kernels "in the wild" now include the EFI stub. Thus, enabling this
232 support by default seems worthwhile. If you prefer to not scan Linux
233 kernels by default, simply uncomment the "scan_all_linux_kernels" line
234 and ensure it's set to "false".
235
236 0.8.2.1 (6/8/2014):
237 -------------------
238
239 - Removed stray bit of debugging code that caused a prompt to press a
240 key to appear at rEFInd startup.
241
242 0.8.2 (6/8/2014):
243 -----------------
244
245 - Changed behavior when default_selection is not set: It now boots the
246 previously-booted loader, assuming it's still available; if not, rEFInd
247 boots the first loader (as it does now). Behavior is unchanged if
248 default_selection is set. Note that this behavior depends on the ability
249 of rEFInd to store an EFI variable in NVRAM. It therefore fails on
250 systems with flaky NVRAM storage. You can view the previously-booted
251 loader in the
252 /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/PreviousBoot-36d08fa7-cf0b-42f5-8f14-68df73ed3740
253 variable under Linux.
254
255 - Added icon for Mageia Linux (os_mageia.png).
256
257 - Fixed bug that could misidentify a not-quite-GUID as a GUID in a
258 manual boot stanza's "volume" line.
259
260 - I've updated my personal build system, and therefore the rEFInd Makefiles
261 and related files, to use TianoCore UDK2014 rather than UDK2010.
262
263 - Added "deep_uefi_legacy_scan" token. When not set (the default), rEFInd
264 does not modify EFI NVRAM settings when scanning for BIOS-mode boot
265 loaders on UEFI-based (non-Mac) computers. Some computers require
266 uncommenting this setting for rEFInd to reliably detect some BIOS-mode
267 boot devices. Passing "0", "off", or "false" as an option resets it to
268 the default value (useful in a loaded secondary configuration file to
269 override a setting in the main file).
270
271 0.8.1 (5/15/2014):
272 ------------------
273
274 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to fail to detect boot loaders stored
275 on the root directory of a partition.
276
277 - Added two new bitmap fonts to those distributed with rEFInd: Ubuntu Mono
278 and Nimbus Mono. Both come in 12-, 14-, 16-, and 24-point sizes.
279
280 - Messages about pauses for scanning and re-scanning of boot loaders are
281 now suppressed when doing an initial delayed scan when scan_delay is 1
282 second.
283
284 - Improved centering of legacy boot option descriptions on some systems'
285 screens.
286
287 - Fixed bug that could cause a BIOS-mode boot to boot from an inappropriate
288 device if that device had an innately high boot priority (as set by the
289 firmware).
290
291 - Changed icons from ICNS to PNG form. There are several reasons to do
292 this, all of them minor; but together they're enough to warrant a change.
293 PNG is more common, and therefore more accessible to most users --
294 particularly those who don't use OS X. The PNG files are smaller than
295 their ICNS equivalents. PNG supports a wider range of sizes (although I'm
296 not now using anything that ICNS doesn't support, I might in the future).
297 The icon-scaling support added a few versions ago makes ICNS's support
298 for multiple icon sizes relatively unimportant.
299
300 - Reversed order of search for icons by extension: rEFInd now searches
301 for PNG files before ICNS files, rather than the other way around. This
302 makes it possible to override a volume icon for rEFInd by giving it the
303 name .VolumeIcon.png, even when a .VolumeIcon.icns file exists on the
304 volume and is used by OS X.
305
306 - Fixed bug that caused .VolumeIcon.icns to take higher-than-intended
307 precedence in icon setting for OS X.
308
309 - Chainloading to BIOS-mode boot loaders now works on UEFI-based PCs when
310 rEFInd is built with GNU-EFI, not just when built with Tianocore.
311
312 0.8.0 (5/4/2014):
313 -----------------
314
315 - The "dont_scan_volumes" parameter now also works with legacy-boot
316 volumes. Unlike with EFI volumes, where the option you pass must exactly
317 match an entire volume name, when applied to legacy-boot volumes, it
318 matches any part of the description that appears beneath the item when
319 you select it in the rEFInd main menu.
320
321 - Can now boot in legacy mode from second (and probably later) hard disks!
322
323 - rEFInd now limits the length of the firmware name string shown in the
324 system information screen to 65 characters. This is done because at least
325 one EFI presents a longer string by default, and this causes the entire
326 information display to come up empty on 800x600 displays.
327
328 - rEFInd now uses the partition's name (as stored in the GPT data
329 structures) as a fallback for the filesystem's name if the latter can't
330 be found. Exceptions are if the partition name is one of three generic
331 names used by GPT fdisk: "Microsoft basic data", "Linux filesystem", or
332 "Apple HFS/HFS+". These are ignored in favor of the descriptive fallback
333 (e.g., "20 GiB Btrfs volume")
334
335 - It's now possible to specify a volume by partition GUID number in a
336 manual boot stanza. This should be more reliable (albeit also more
337 awkward) than using a filesystem number (such as fs0: or fs1:).
338
339 - Fixed memory-allocation bug that could cause error message displays,
340 and possibly hangs, when re-scanning boot loaders.
341
342 0.7.9 (4/20/2014):
343 ------------------
344
345 - Attempt to fix rEFInd perpetually re-scanning after ejecting a disc on
346 some Macs.
347
348 - Added check to remove redundant (or non-functional if Secure Boot is
349 active) kernel entries for Ubuntu, which is now including two versions of
350 kernels, one signed and the other unsigned.
351
352 - Fixed bug in install.sh that could cause it to display error messages
353 if the dmraid utility was not installed.
354
355 - The HFS+ driver now reports a correct volume name.
356
357 - Fixed some EFI filesystem driver bugs that could cause lockups under
358 some circumstances. These bugs could affect any of the filesystem
359 drivers.
360
361 - Added "gdisk" option to the "showtools" configuration file token. When
362 active, this adds gdisk.efi or gdisk_{arch}.efi, if present in the
363 EFI\tools directory, to the tools row.
364
365 - Fixed mistaken identification of the MOK utility as the "MOK utility
366 utility."
367
368
369 0.7.8 (3/9/2014):
370 -----------------
371
372 - Added "debian" directory to source, which facilitates creation of Debian
373 packages. Packages built in this way are built with GNU-EFI and don't run
374 any post-installation script, so although the rEFInd binaries are on the
375 hard disk, they aren't installed to be bootable; you must manually run
376 install.sh. Also, at least on Ubuntu, the Make.common file's /usr/lib64
377 references must be changed to /usr/lib. This is more of a proof of
378 concept and a "leg up" for distribution maintainers than anything else.
379
380 - Two new options, big_icon_size and small_icon_size, set the size of
381 the first-row OS icons and of the second-row tool icons, respectively.
382 The big_icon_size option also indirectly sets the size of disk-type
383 badges; they're 1/4 the size of the big icons. Default values are 128 and
384 48, respectively, to match the actual icon files provided with rEFInd. If
385 the icon you're using is of a different size than you've specified,
386 rEFInd scales it. For best quality, you should both provide icons drawn
387 to the right size and set the icon sizes in refind.conf.
388
389 - rEFInd now automatically scales icons to fit the standard icon sizes.
390 This won't have any effect with the icons that come with rEFInd, but it
391 can help if you want to use another icon, since you needn't scale it in a
392 graphics program before using it. Note that rEFInd uses bitmap icons, so
393 scaling by a huge amount (say, a 16x16 icon to fit the standard 128x128
394 OS icon) is not likely to look good.
395
396 - Added new option, banner_scale, that tells rEFInd how to handle banners:
397 Set to "noscale" (the default), banners are not scaled, although they'll
398 be cropped if they're too big for the display. This is the same as the
399 behavior in previous versions. Set to "fillscreen", rEFInd now scales the
400 banner image (larger or smaller) to fill the display.
401
402 - Adjusted the post-installation script in refind.spec (used to generate
403 RPMs, and therefore also indirectly Debian packages) to search for
404 existing shim program files under the filesnames shim.efi and shimx64.efi
405 rather than just shim.efi. Ubuntu uses shimx64.efi, so Debian packages
406 were failing to detect Ubuntu's shim in previous versions. (Note,
407 however, that Ubuntu's early shim 0.1 is unsuitable for use with rEFInd
408 The newer 0.4 version that's in the repositories now should work fine;
409 it's only when installing on an older system that's NOT been updated that
410 problems might arise.
411
412 0.7.7 (1/3/2014):
413 -----------------
414
415 - Can now specify complete paths, optionally including volumes, in
416 dont_scan_files.
417
418 - Added shimx64.efi to the default dont_scan_files list.
419
420 - Added windows_recovery_files token, to specify what program(s) launch a
421 Windows recovery utility; and the "windows_recovery" option to
422 "showtools," to control whether or not to display the Windows recovery
423 utility on the second row of icons.
424
425 - The use_graphics_for, also_scan_dirs, dont_scan_dirs, dont_scan_files,
426 and scan_driver_dirs tokens in refind.conf now support "+" as the first
427 option, which causes the remaining options to be added to the default
428 value rather than replacing that value. (This has no practical effect for
429 scan_driver_dirs, though, since it has a null default value.)
430
431 - Added support for specifying the configuration file at program launch,
432 via the "-c" parameter, as in "refind_x64.efi -c foo.conf" to use the
433 foo.conf file as the main configuration file.
434
435 - Scans of ext2/3/4fs and ReiserFS partitions now omit partitions with
436 duplicate filesystem UUIDs. These are likely parts of RAID arrays and so
437 would have the same boot loaders or kernels as the first one with a given
438 UUID.
439
440 - Added feature in install.sh: Script now tries to locate and mount an ESP
441 in Linux, if it's currently unmounted.
442
443 - Fixed bug in mkrlconf.sh and install.sh that caused a stray line break
444 and PARTUUID= specification to appear in generated refind_linux.conf file
445 under some circumstances.
446
447 0.7.6 (12/15/2013):
448 -------------------
449
450 - Added support for multiple "default_selection" targets. These MUST be
451 comma-separated AND enclosed in quotes, as in:
452 default_selection "fred,ginger"
453 This example will launch "fred" by default if it's available; and if
454 it's not, rEFInd will attempt to launch "ginger" as the default.
455
456 - Added support for time-sensitive "default_selection" setting. This token
457 may now have either one or three options. If one, it's interpreted as it
458 has been in the past, as setting a default that's independent of times.
459 If you follow this default by two times, however, those are interpreted
460 as the start and end times (in 24-hour format) for a default setting. For
461 instance, "default_selection foo 8:00 17:00" causes foo to be the default
462 from 8:00 (AM) to 17:00 (aka 5:00 PM). You can include multiple
463 "default_selection" lines to set different defaults for a variety of
464 times. If they're in conflict, the last one takes precedence. Note that
465 times are hardware clock's native value, which may be local time or UTC,
466 depending on your computer.
467
468 - Added support for a blank-screen startup: Set "screensaver -1" and the
469 screen saver will be initialized when rEFInd starts. If you set a low
470 "timeout" value, the result will be a boot straight to the default OS
471 unless you hit a key soon after rEFInd starts. Once you hit a key, the
472 screensaver will be disabled.
473
474 - Added --ownhfs {target} option to install.sh. This option causes rEFInd
475 to install to an HFS+ partition in a way that's more consistent with the
476 way the Mac's native boot loader is installed. Note that you should NOT
477 install to an already-bootable partition with this option, since it will
478 overwrite the existing boot loader, which would render OS X unbootable.
479
480 0.7.5 (11/10/2013):
481 -------------------
482
483 - Fixed bug that caused unbootable exFAT partitions to show up as
484 bootable on Macs with BIOS/CSM/legacy boot options enabled.
485
486 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused installs to the ESP on recent
487 versions of OS X to fail.
488
489 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to hang on some Macs when multiple EFI
490 drivers were present.
491
492 - Fixed bug that caused clear to default gray screen when launching OSes
493 with 'use_graphics_for' enabled, even when the rEFInd background is not
494 gray. Now rEFInd clears to the same background color used in its menu.
495 When launching OS X, though, the OS X boot loader will itself clear to
496 gray a second or so later; and when launching Linux, it will clear to
497 black a second or so later.
498
499 0.7.4.1 (8/25/2013):
500 --------------------
501
502 - My initial 0.7.4 release broke legacy-boot ability on Macs, so I quickly
503 released this version using the original 0.7.4 filenames to fix the
504 problem.
505
506 0.7.4 (8/25/2013):
507 ------------------
508
509 - Fixed options passing to loader to include loader's filename as the first
510 option. This omission had no effect on most boot loaders, but caused
511 VMware's mboot64.efi to fail.
512
513 - Added support for memtest86 as second-row option. Program must be
514 stored in EFI/tools, EFI/tools/memtest, EFI/tools/memtest86, EFI/memtest,
515 or EFI/memtest86; and must use the name memtest86.efi, memtest86_x64.efi,
516 memtest86x64.efi, or bootx64.efi (changing "x64" to "ia32" on IA-32
517 systems). The memtest86 program is scanned for when the "showtools"
518 option includes the "memtest" or "memtest86" token, which it does by
519 default.
520
521 - Added space to end of "Boot %s from %s" string; enables adding a space
522 to the end of the "default_selection" item (in quotes) to set a default
523 that matches a volume name that's identical to another one except for
524 extra characters at the end of the non-wanted volume's name.
525
526 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to hang when launching boot loaders
527 under some conditions. (Launching from Firewire drives on Macs is the
528 known case, but there may be others.)
529
530 0.7.3 (8/7/2013):
531 -----------------
532
533 - Fixed bug that caused missing media-type badges on BIOS-mode boot
534 loaders on Macs.
535
536 - Fixed bug that caused failure when launching BIOS-mode OSes on Macs.
537
538 0.7.2 (8/6/2013):
539 -----------------
540
541 - Fixed bug that caused display glitches in the final entry on the first
542 row of icons if the second row of icons was empty.
543
544 - Fixed bug that could cause incorrect scanning or even a rEFInd crash when
545 using volume specification in also_scan_dirs token.
546
547 - Added protection against loading invalid drivers and other EFI programs.
548 (Some EFIs crash when attempting to load such drivers and programs.)
549
550 - Added PreLoader.efi and shim-fedora.efi to default dont_scan_files list;
551 it's now "shim.efi, shim-fedora.efi, PreLoader.efi, TextMode.efi,
552 ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi, MokManager.efi, HashTool.efi,
553 HashTool-signed.efi".
554
555 - Added icon for Funtoo Linux.
556
557 - Fixed reading of volume badges from user-specified icons directory, which
558 was broken.
559
560 - Fixed handling of /.VolumeBadge.icns (or /.VolumeBadge.png) files, which
561 was broken.
562
563 0.7.1 (7/8/2013):
564 -----------------
565
566 - Fixed build problem with recent development versions of EDK2.
567
568 - Added scan for Boot Repair's backup of the Windows boot loader
569 (bkpbootmgfw.efi). If found, give separate entries for it and for
570 bootmgfw.efi, each with its own descriptive text label.
571
572 - Fixed also_scan_dirs; used to have bug that caused it to ignore
573 volume specification, if present.
574
575 - Fixed bug in driver cache that caused Btrfs driver to hang sometimes.
576
577 0.7.0 (6/27/2013):
578 ------------------
579
580 - Added Btrfs signature to rEFInd, so that it can identify the filesystem
581 type for volumes that lack labels.
582
583 - Changed some critical filesystem driver pointers from 32-bit to 64-bit.
584 This *SHOULD* enable use of over-2TiB filesystems (for those filesystems
585 that support such large volumes). This capability is largely untested,
586 though.
587
588 - Added a cache to the filesystem driver core, and therefore to all the
589 filesystem drivers. This cache greatly improves performance in
590 VirtualBox, and offers modest performance improvements on a few "real"
591 computers. The most dramatic improvement is on ext2/3fs under VirtualBox:
592 Loading a kernel and initrd used to take ~200 seconds on my system, but
593 now takes ~3 seconds! On most "real" hardware, the improvement is much
594 less dramatic -- an improvement of a second or less, presumably because
595 of cacheing within the EFI or on the hard disk itself.
596
597 - Filter boot loaders based on a test of their validity; keeps out Linux
598 kernels without EFI stub loader code, loaders for the wrong architecture,
599 non-EFI loaders, etc.
600
601 - New Btrfs driver, contributed by Samuel Liao based on GRUB 2.00 Btrfs
602 code.
603
604 0.6.12 (6/18/2013):
605 -------------------
606
607 - Changed the 64-bit EFI shell included in the CD-R and USB flash drive
608 images to a version 2 shell that should support the "bcfg" command.
609
610 - Added support for PreBootloader to refind.spec's built-in installation
611 script.
612
613 - Added support for the Linux Foundation's PreLoader to install.sh. It's
614 treated just like shim, including using the --shim option (or, now,
615 --preloader); but it searches for and copies HashTool.efi rather than
616 MokManager.efi, and filenames are adjusted appropriately.
617
618 - Added code to determine Linux root filesystem from /etc/fstab file, if
619 it's on the same partition as the kernel and if the refind_linux.conf
620 file is not available. This enables rEFInd to boot Linux without any
621 rEFInd-specific configuration files on some (but not all) systems.
622
623 0.6.11 (5/13/2013):
624 -------------------
625
626 - New feature: rEFInd now ignores symbolic links to files on filesystems
627 that support them. This prevents the "vmlinuz" symbolic link that some
628 distributions create in the root directory from appearing in the loader
629 list. Note that this does NOT affect symbolic links to directories.
630
631 - Added icons for Lubuntu and Kubuntu.
632
633 - Improved the install.sh script so that it does a better job dealing with
634 directory names that contain spaces.
635
636 - rEFInd now tries to guess the Linux distribution type based on the kernel
637 filename (Fedora and RHEL only) or the "ID" or "NAME" variables in
638 /etc/os-release on the kernel's partition. None of these is guaranteed to
639 work. A fallback of the Tux penguin icon remains in place in case rEFInd
640 can't find anything substantive enough for a guess.
641
642 - Added "EFI\opensuse" to the locations searched for MOK utilities, since
643 OpenSUSE now uses that name.
644
645 - Renamed "Reboot to Firmware User Interface" to "Reboot to Computer Setup
646 Utility" in menu.
647
648 - Fixed bug in gptsync that caused it to hang if the disk had too few GPT
649 partitions to fill the MBR.
650
651 0.6.10 (5/5/2013):
652 ------------------
653
654 - Added support for "screensaver" token. If set to a positive integer, this
655 causes the screen to blank after the specified number of seconds of
656 inactivity. Pressing most keys (unfortunately NOT including Shift, Alt,
657 or Ctrl) will restore the display and restart the screen saver timeout.
658
659 - Added icon for ChromeOS (os_chrome.icns in the icons subdirectory).
660 ChromeBooks reportedly boots using the fallback filename, but if a user
661 wants to install rEFInd on a ChromeBook, renaming the original EFI/BOOT
662 directory to EFI/chrome and then installing rEFInd in the fallback
663 filename will bring up this new icon for ChromeOS.
664
665 - Added new option to reboot the computer into the firmware's user
666 interface. This option is active by default, or can be set via the
667 "firmware" option to the "showtools" token in refind.conf. It works
668 on only some computers, though; older computers lack this feature, and
669 when rEFInd is told to use this feature on such computers, the directive
670 is quietly ignored.
671
672 - Upgraded LodePNG library from version 20121216 to 20130415 and
673 restructured rEFInd-specific modifications to simplify future upgrades.
674
675 - Replaced hexadecimal error code with description if an error is
676 encountered when saving a screen shot.
677
678 - Enable multiple screen shots: Rather than naming all screen shots
679 "screenshot.bmp", the name is now "screenshot_###.bmp", where "###" is a
680 sequence number, starting with "001".
681
682 0.6.9 (4/25/2013):
683 ------------------
684
685 - Modified default banner to include the new rEFInd icon, provided by Erik
686 Kemperman.
687
688 - Worked around a suspected firmware bug that caused rEFInd 0.6.6 to 0.6.8
689 to hang at startup on some systems (DUET and some Macs).
690
691 - Modified rEFInd to search for gptsync under the names gptsync.efi and
692 gptsync_{arch}.efi, where {arch} is ia32 or x64. (Previous versions
693 searched only for gptsync.efi.)
694
695 - Added gptsync program from rEFIt project, but with some changes to
696 improve flexibility and make it less likely that UEFI users will
697 accidentally trash their systems.
698
699 - Changed timeout code so that the timeout continues if the keyboard is
700 disconnected. This can help in booting a headless server or a system with
701 a bluetooth or other keyboard that's not recognized by the EFI.
702
703 0.6.8 (3/18/2013):
704 ------------------
705
706 - Added workaround for presumed EFI bug that was causing "Invalid
707 Parameter" errors when scanning for boot loaders on some computers.
708
709 - Added search for an EFI shell called shell.efi in the root directory
710 (previously this name was only accepted in EFI\tools).
711
712 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail on some systems (Fedora
713 18, for instance) because of a problem identifying the ESP.
714
715 - Fixed bug that caused icons named after boot loaders to not be used.
716
717 0.6.7 (2/3/2013):
718 -----------------
719
720 - Added a more explicit error message summarizing options when a launch of
721 a program results in a Secure Boot failure.
722
723 - Changed MOK tool detection to scan all volumes, not just the rEFInd
724 home volume. This is desirable because the Linux Foundation's HashTool
725 can only scan its own volume, making it desirable to place copies of this
726 program on every volume that holds EFI boot loader binaries.
727
728 - Added support for launching the Linux Foundation HashTool as a means of
729 managing MOKs (or MOK hashes, at any rate).
730
731 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to present an entry for itself as a
732 Microsoft OS if it was launched as EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi.
733
734 - Fixed bug that caused dont_scan_volumes option to be added to
735 also_scan_dirs list.
736
737 - Fixed dont_scan_volumes so that it works with OS X boot loaders.
738
739 - Fixed broken mixing of PNG and ICNS icons when using a user-specified
740 icons directory -- previously, an ICNS file in the default directory
741 would override a PNG file in the user-specified directory.
742
743 0.6.6 (1/26/2013):
744 ------------------
745
746 - rEFInd now ignores the fallback boot loader (EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
747 EFI/BOOT/bootia32.efi) if it's identical to another boot loader on
748 the same volume. This is intended to help unclutter the display on
749 systems that run Windows, since Windows tends to duplicate its own boot
750 loader under the fallback name.
751
752 - Added new "font" token to refind.conf, which enables specifying a font in
753 the form of a PNG file. This file must contain monospace glyphs for the
754 95 characters from ASCII 32 to 126 (space through tilde), inclusive, plus
755 a glyph to be displayed for characters outside of this range, for a total
756 of 96 glyphs.
757
758 - Replaced the old font (inherited from rEFInd) with an anti-aliased
759 version of Luxi Mono Regular 14 point.
760
761 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore manual boot stanzas in files
762 included via the "include" token in refind.conf.
763
764 - Fixed bug that caused ASSERT error on some systems (and conceivably a
765 crash on startup on some) when default_selection line in refind.conf was
766 commented out or empty.
767
768 - Fixed bug that caused "Binary is whitelisted" message to persist on
769 screen after loading MOK-signed drivers in Secure Boot mode.
770
771 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore the "icon" token in refind.conf
772 manual boot stanzas.
773
774 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused the script to fail to update
775 drivers when rEFInd was installed in EFI/BOOT/.
776
777 0.6.5 (1/16/2013):
778 ------------------
779
780 - Improved text color support: rEFInd now uses black text against light
781 backgrounds and white text against dark backgrounds.
782
783 - Added support for PNGs as banners, icons, and selectors.
784
785 - Added icon for ALT Linux.
786
787 - Added "safemode" option to "hideui" token, to hide option to boot into
788 safe mode for OS X ("-v -x" option to boot.efi).
789
790 - Added icon for Haiku (os_haiku.icns).
791
792 - Enable transparency of icons & main-menu text when the banner icon is
793 sized to cover these areas.
794
795 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to crash if fed a banner image that's
796 too big. Note that "too big" can be substantially smaller than the screen
797 resolution!
798
799 0.6.4 (1/8/2013):
800 -----------------
801
802 - Revised install.sh to copy ext2fs driver, rather than ext4fs driver, for
803 ext2/3 filesystems. This can help keep non-functional entries from links
804 from /vmlinuz to /boot/vmlinuz out of the menu if the system uses ext4fs
805 on root and ext2fs or ext3fs on /boot.
806
807 - Fixed a couple of memory management bugs that cause rEFInd to hang at
808 startup on some systems.
809
810 0.6.3 (1/6/2013):
811 -----------------
812
813 - Added the ability to specify a volume name or number in the
814 "dont_scan_dirs" and "also_scan_dirs" tokens.
815
816 - Fixed a bug that caused removable EFI media to not appear in scan lists
817 if rEFInd was installed as EFI/BOOT/boot{arch}.efi on a hard disk.
818
819 - Modified ISO-9660 driver so that it can handle discs with other than
820 2048-byte sectors. This makes it useful for reading "hybrid ISO" images
821 burned to USB flash disks.
822
823 - New mvrefind.sh script to move a rEFInd installation between a standard
824 location (typically EFI/refind) and one of the fallback locations
825 (EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot). It can also do more exotic locations.
826
827 - The install.sh script now installs to EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
828 EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi if it's run in BIOS mode. This is
829 intended to give some chance of producing a bootable installation should
830 a user accidentally install Linux in EFI mode and then install rEFInd
831 from that installation.
832
833 - The install.sh script now tries to find an existing rEFInd installation
834 and upgrade it, even if it's in EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot rather
835 than in EFI/refind.
836
837 - New "--yes" option to install.sh to help with unattended or automated
838 installations (as from an RPM or Debian package).
839
840 0.6.2 (12/30/2012):
841 -------------------
842
843 - Inclusion of a sample refind.spec file for the benefit of RPM
844 distribution maintainers who might want to include rEFInd. It's a bit
845 rough, but it gets you a good chunk of the way there....
846
847 - The EFI filesystem drivers can now be built with the GNU-EFI toolkit as
848 well as with the TianoCore EDK2. See the BUILDING.txt file for details on
849 how to build them with either toolkit. This improvement doesn't affect
850 users of my binary packages, but it should make it easier for Linux
851 distributions to adopt rEFInd into their package systems.
852
853 - Tweaked refind.inf file for better build results using "native" TianoCore
854 EDK2 build process (vs. the Makefile-based build process that I use under
855 Linux). This won't affect those who use my binary builds or build under
856 Linux with the "make" command.
857
858 - Fixed bug that prevented Secure Boot launches from working when rEFInd
859 was built with GNU-EFI rather than the TianoCore EDK2.
860
861 - Substantial reworking of Secure Boot code, based on James Bottomley's
862 PreLoader program. This new code eliminates the limitation of launching
863 just one driver in Secure Boot mode and is likely to be more reliable
864 with future or obscure boot loaders. It should also work with non-x86-64
865 systems, although this relies on a platform-specific shim program, which
866 to date exists only for x86-64. The basic features are the same as before
867 -- rEFInd relies on shim for authentication functions and will launch
868 programs that are signed by Secure Boot keys, shim keys, or MOKs.
869
870 - Altered default for "textmode" option (when it's commented out) to not
871 adjust the text mode at all. (Prior versions set it to mode 0 by
872 default.)
873
874 0.6.1 (12/21/2012):
875 -------------------
876
877 - Added "--root" option to install.sh, to enable installation of rEFInd
878 to something other than the currently-running OS. This is intended for
879 use on emergency discs.
880
881 - Thanks to Stefan Agner, the ext4fs driver now supports the "meta_bg"
882 filesystem feature, which distributes metadata throughout the disk. This
883 feature isn't used by default, but can be set at filesystem creation time
884 by passing the "-O meta_bg,^resize_inode" option to mke2fs. (Using
885 "^resize_inode" is necessary because meta_bg is incompatible with
886 resize_inode, which IS used by default.) This feature can be used on
887 ext3fs and ext2fs as well as on ext4fs, so the ext4fs driver can now
888 handle some ext3fs and ext2fs partitions that the ext2fs driver can't
889 handle.
890
891 - Fixed some screen resolution-setting bugs.
892
893 - Added the "words" that make up a filesystem's label (delimited by spaces,
894 dashes, or underscores) to the list of bases used to search for OS icons.
895 For instance, if the filesystem's label is "Arch", rEFInd searches for
896 os_Arch.icns; if it's "Fedora 17", it searches for os_Fedora.icns and
897 os_17.icns; and if it's "NEW_GENTOO", it searches for os_NEW.icns and
898 os_GENTOO.icns.
899
900 - Refined hints displays to be more context-sensitive, particularly in text
901 mode.
902
903 - Instead of displaying a blank filesystem label when a filesystem has
904 none, rEFInd now displays the size and/or type of the filesystem, as in
905 "boot EFI\foo\bar.efi from 200 MiB ext3 volume" rather than "boot
906 EFI\foo\bar.efi from".
907
908 - Fixed a bug that caused the screen to clear after displaying an error
909 message but before displaying the "Hit any key to continue" message when
910 a boot loader launch failed.
911
912 0.6.0 (12/16/2012):
913 -------------------
914
915 - Fixed a memory allocation bug that could cause a program crash when
916 specifying certain values with the "also_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_volumes",
917 "dont_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_files", and "scan_driver_dirs" refind.conf
918 options.
919
920 - Modified Linux kernel initrd-finding code so that if an initrd is
921 specified in refind_linux.conf, rEFInd will not add any initrd it finds.
922 This enables an override of the default initrd, and is likely to be
923 particularly helpful to Arch Linux users.
924
925 - Added ext4fs driver!
926
927 - Made "boot" the default value for "also_scan_dirs".
928
929 - Added identifying screen header to line editor.
930
931 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd's display to be mis-sized upon return
932 from a program that set the resolution itself.
933
934 - Adjusted "resolution" refind.conf parameter so that it can accept EITHER
935 a resolution as width and height OR a single digit as a UEFI mode number
936 (which is system-specific). This is done because some systems present the
937 same mode twice in their mode lists, perhaps varying in refresh rate,
938 monitor output, or some other salient characteristics; specifying the
939 mode number enables selecting the higher-numbered mode, whereas using
940 horizontal and vertical resolution values selects the lowest-numbered
941 mode.
942
943 - Added "textmode" refind.conf parameter to set the text mode used in
944 text-only displays, and for the line editor and boot-time handoff
945 display even in graphics mode.
946
947 - Fixed bug that caused tools (shell, etc.) to launch when they were
948 highlighted and F2 or Insert was pressed.
949
950 - Added "editor" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf, which
951 disables the boot options editor.
952
953 - Added hints text to rEFInd main menu and sub-menus. This can be disabled
954 by setting the new "hints" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf.
955
956 - Added "boot with minimal options" entry to refind_linux.conf file
957 generated by install.sh. This entry boots without the options extracted
958 from the /etc/default/grub file.
959
960 - Added keys subdirectory to main distribution, to hold public Secure
961 Boot/shim keys from known sources.
962
963 - Changed install.sh --drivers option to --alldrivers, added new
964 --nodrivers option, and made the default on Linux to install the one
965 driver that's used on /boot (or the root filesystem if /boot isn't a
966 separate partition). Of course, this won't install a non-existent driver,
967 and it also won't work properly if run from an emergency disk unless you
968 mount a separate /boot partition at that location.
969
970 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented creation of refind_linux.conf file
971 on Linux systems.
972
973 0.5.1.1 (12/12/2012):
974 ---------------------
975
976 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented it from working on OS X.
977
978 0.5.1 (12/11/2012):
979 -------------------
980
981 - Added support for "0" options to "textonly" and "scan_all_linux_kernels"
982 to reverse the usual meaning of these tokens. This is useful for
983 including these options in a secondary configuration file called with the
984 new "include" token to override a setting set in the main file.
985
986 - Added "include" token for refind.conf, to enable including a secondary
987 configuration file from a primary one.
988
989 - Modified install.sh so that it creates a simple refind_linux.conf file in
990 /boot, if that file doesn't already exist and if install.sh is run from
991 Linux. If that directory happens to be on a FAT, HFS+, ext2fs, ext3fs, or
992 ReiserFS volume, and if the necessary drivers are installed, the result
993 is that rEFInd will detect the Linux installation with no further
994 configuration on many systems. (Some may still require tweaking of kernel
995 options, though; for instance, adding "dolvm" on Gentoo systems that use
996 LVM.)
997
998 - Added --shim and --localkeys options to install.sh to help simplify setup
999 on systems with Secure Boot active.
1000
1001 - Fixed (maybe) bug that caused resolution options to not be displayed on
1002 recent Macs with GOP graphics when specifying an invalid resolution in
1003 refind.conf.
1004
1005 - Fixed bug that caused some programs (EFI shells, in particular) to hang
1006 when launching on some systems (DUET, in particular).
1007
1008 - Implemented a fix to enable ELILO to launch with Secure Boot active.
1009 This fix might help with some other boot loaders in Secure Boot mode,
1010 too, but I don't know of any specifics.
1011
1012 0.5.0 (12/6/2012):
1013 ------------------
1014
1015 - Added the ability to include quote marks ('"') in refind.conf and
1016 refind_linux.conf tokens by doubling them up, as in:
1017 "ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value=""this is it"""
1018 This example results in the following string being passed as an
1019 option:
1020 ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value="this is it"
1021
1022 - Changed refind.conf-sample to uncomment the scan_all_linux_kernels
1023 option by default. If this option is deleted or commented out, the
1024 program default remains to not scan all Linux kernels; but with
1025 increasing numbers of distributions shipping with kernels that include
1026 EFI stub loader support, setting the configuration file default to scan
1027 for them makes sense.
1028
1029 - Modified the "resolution" token so that it affects text mode as well
1030 as graphics mode. On my systems, though, the actual text area is still
1031 restricted to an 80x25 area. (This seems to be a firmware limitation; my
1032 EFI shells are also so limited.)
1033
1034 - Fixed a bug that caused the options line editor to blank out lines that
1035 were not actually edited.
1036
1037 - Added support for using Matthew Garrett's Shim program and its Machine
1038 Owner Keys (MOKs) to extend Secure Boot capabilities. If rEFInd is
1039 launched from Shim on a computer with Secure Boot active, rEFInd will
1040 launch programs signed with either a standard UEFI Secure Boot key or a
1041 MOK. For the moment, this feature works only on x86-64 systems.
1042
1043 - Added new "dont_scan_files" (aka "don't_scan_files") token for
1044 refind.conf. The effect is similar to dont_scan_dirs, but it creates a
1045 blacklist of filenames within directories rather than directory names.
1046 I'm initially using it to place shim.efi and MokManager.efi in the
1047 blacklist to keep these programs out of the OS list. (MokManager.efi is
1048 scanned separately as a tool; see below.) I've moved checks for
1049 ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi, and TextMode.efi to this list. (These
1050 three had previously been blacklisted by hard-coding in ScanLoaderDir().)
1051
1052 - Added the directory from which rEFInd launched to dont_scan_dirs. This
1053 works around a bug in which rEFInd would show itself as a bogus Windows
1054 entry if it's installed as EFI/Microsoft/boot/bootmgfw.efi.
1055
1056 - Added support for launching MokManager.efi for managing the Machine Owner
1057 Keys (MOKs) maintained by the shim boot loader developed by Fedora and
1058 SUSE. This program is scanned and presented as a second-row tool.
1059
1060 - Added support for Apple's Recovery HD partition: If it's detected, a new
1061 icon appears on the second row. This icon can be removed by explicitly
1062 setting the "showtools" option in refind.conf and excluding the
1063 "apple_recovery" option from that line.
1064
1065 - Fixed bug that caused text-mode ("textonly" refind.conf option enabled)
1066 menu entries to be right-aligned rather than left-aligned when rEFInd was
1067 compiled with the TianoCore EDK2.
1068
1069 - Added "--usedefault {devicename}" and "--drivers" options to the
1070 install.sh script and changed the "esp" option to "--esp".
1071
1072 0.4.7 (11/6/2012):
1073 ------------------
1074
1075 - Added an icon for gummiboot.
1076
1077 - Added a boot option editor: Pressing the Insert or F2 key from a boot
1078 tag's options menu opens a simple text-mode line editor on which the boot
1079 options may be edited for a one-time boot with altered options.
1080
1081 - Modified the "scan_delay" feature to delay and then perform a re-scan,
1082 which may work better than the first attempt at this feature (which I'm
1083 told isn't working as planned).
1084
1085 - Modified rEFInd to add a space after the command-line options only when
1086 launching Mac OS X. On some early Macs, the extra space (which had been
1087 present by default, as a carryover from rEFIt) causes problems when
1088 booting Linux kernels from FAT partitions.
1089
1090 0.4.6 (10/6/2012):
1091 ------------------
1092
1093 - Fixed some minor memory management issues.
1094
1095 - Added new "scan_delay" feature to impose a delay before scanning
1096 for disks.
1097
1098 - Changed default "scanfor" option from internal-external-optical to either
1099 internal-external-optical-manual (for non-Macs) or
1100 internal-hdbios-external-biosexternal-optical-cd-manual (for Macs). I've
1101 done this for two reasons:
1102 - Many Mac users have been confused by the fact that rEFInd needs
1103 reconfiguration to detect Windows (or Linux installed in BIOS mode),
1104 since rEFIt scans BIOS devices by default. Adding the BIOS options as
1105 default for them should help them.
1106 - Adding the "manual" option enables users to simply add manual boot
1107 stanzas and have them work, which is more intuitive. Adding the
1108 "manual" option will have no effect unless manual stanzas are created
1109 or uncommented, so this part of the change won't affect users' working
1110 default configurations.
1111
1112 - Added new legacy (BIOS) boot support for UEFI-based PCs.
1113
1114 0.4.5 (8/12/2012):
1115 ------------------
1116
1117 - Fixed bug that caused a failure to boot BIOS-based OSes on Macs.
1118
1119 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail to detect rEFItBlesser.
1120
1121 0.4.4 (6/23/2012):
1122 ------------------
1123
1124 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be corrupted by rEFInd on
1125 32-bit systems.
1126
1127 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be truncated in the drivers
1128 on 32-bit systems.
1129
1130 - Fixed bug in use_graphics_for option parsing that caused most options
1131 to set graphics mode for OS X and/or Linux but not other boot
1132 loaders/OSes.
1133
1134 - Tweaked install script to better isolate the ESP under OS X.
1135
1136 0.4.3 (6/21/2012):
1137 ------------------
1138
1139 - rEFInd now supports compilation using the TianoCore UDK2010/EDK2
1140 development kit in addition to GNU-EFI.
1141
1142 - Added new "use_graphics_for" option to control which OSes to boot in
1143 graphics mode. (This effect lasts for a fraction of a second on most
1144 systems, since the boot loader that rEFInd launches is likely to set
1145 graphics or text mode itself.)
1146
1147 - Graphics-mode booting now clears the screen to the current rEFInd
1148 background color (rather than black) and does NOT display boot messages.
1149 The intent is for a smoother transition when booting OS X, or perhaps
1150 other OSes that don't display boot loader messages. In practice, this
1151 effect will be tiny for many OSes, since the boot loader generally clears
1152 the screen within a fraction of a second of being launched; but the
1153 "flicker" of a rEFInd message in that time can sometimes be distracting.
1154
1155 - Filesystem drivers now work on EFI 1.x systems, such as Macs.
1156
1157 - Removed "linux.conf" as a valid alternative name for "refind_linux.conf"
1158 for holding Linux kernel options. The kernel developers plan to use
1159 "linux.conf" themselves.
1160
1161 0.4.2 (6/3/2012):
1162 -----------------
1163
1164 - Added a message to install.sh when run on Macs to remind users to update
1165 the "scanfor" line in refind.conf if they need to boot BIOS-based OSes
1166 via rEFInd.
1167
1168 - Modified install.sh script to be smarter about running efibootmgr on
1169 Linux. It now uses the whole path to the rEFInd binary as a key to
1170 determine whether an existing entry exists, rather than just the filename
1171 portion. If an entry exists and is the first entry in the boot order, the
1172 script does nothing to the NVRAM entries. If such an entry exists but is
1173 not the default, the script deletes that entry and creates a new one
1174 (implicitly making it the first in the boot order). If such an entry does
1175 not exist, the script creates a new one (again, making it the first in
1176 the boot order).
1177
1178 - Added "dont_scan_dirs" configuration file option, which adds directories
1179 to a "blacklist" of directories that are NOT scanned for boot loaders.
1180
1181 0.4.1 (5/25/2012):
1182 ------------------
1183
1184 - Added "scanning for new boot loaders" message to the re-scan function
1185 (hitting Esc at the main menu). It usually flashes up too quickly to
1186 be of importance, but if the scan function takes a while because of
1187 access to a CD that must be spun up, it should make it clear that the
1188 system hasn't hung.
1189
1190 - Modified install.sh script to detect rEFItBlesser on Macs, and if
1191 present, to ask the user if it should be removed.
1192
1193 - Cleaned up the Make.common file for the filesystem drivers.
1194
1195 - Changed HFS+ driver to return volume label of "HFS+ volume" rather than
1196 an empty label. (The driver doesn't currently read the real volume
1197 label.)
1198
1199 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to appear in its own menu after
1200 running a shell and then re-scanning for boot loaders.
1201
1202 0.4.0 (5/20/2012):
1203 ------------------
1204
1205 - Inclusion of drivers for ISO-9660, HFS+, ReiserFS, and ext2fs. Most of
1206 these drivers originated with rEFIt, although the HFS+ driver seems to
1207 have come from Oracle's VirtualBox, with some files from Apple. I hadn't
1208 included these drivers previously because the build process proved
1209 challenging. As it is, they don't work on my Mac Mini, I suspect because
1210 the build process with the UDK2010 development kit may not work with the
1211 EFI 1.x that Apple uses.
1212
1213 - Addition of support for drivers in the "drivers_{arch}" subdirectory of
1214 the main rEFInd binary directory (e.g., "drivers_x64" or "drivers_ia32").
1215 Drivers may continue to be placed in the "drivers" subdirectory.
1216
1217 - Added new feature to eject CDs (and other removable media): Press F12 to
1218 eject all such media. This function works only on some Macs, though (it
1219 relies on an Apple-specific EFI extension, and this extension isn't even
1220 implemented on all Macs, much less on UEFI-based PCs).
1221
1222 - Fixed a problem that could cause GRUB 2 to fail to read its configuration
1223 file when launched from rEFInd.
1224
1225 0.3.5 (5/15/2012):
1226 ------------------
1227
1228 - Removed the GRUB 2 detection "reciped" added with 0.3.2, since I've
1229 received reports that it's not working as intended.
1230
1231 - Added re-scan feature: Press the Esc key to have rEFInd re-read its
1232 configuration file, tell the EFI to scan for new filesystems, and re-scan
1233 those filesystems for boot loaders. The main purpose is to enable
1234 scanning a new removable medium that you insert after launching rEFInd;
1235 however, it can also be used to immediately implement changes to the
1236 configuration file or new drivers you load from an EFI shell.
1237
1238 - Fixed a bug that could cause the scroll-right arrow to be replaced by the
1239 scroll-left arrow under some circumstances.
1240
1241 0.3.4 (5/9/2012):
1242 -----------------
1243
1244 - Added new configuration file option: "icons_dir", which sets the name
1245 of the subdirectory in which icons are found. See the documentation or
1246 sample configuration file for a full description.
1247
1248 - Modified Makefile to generate rEFInd binary that includes architecture
1249 code -- refind_ia32.efi or refind_x64.efi, rather than the generic
1250 refind.efi. This is done mainly to help the install.sh script. The
1251 program can be named anything you like on the disk. (The generic name
1252 refind.efi is used on unknown architectures.)
1253
1254 - Improved install.sh script: Fixed bug on OS X 10.7 and enable it to be
1255 used after building from source code (or via new "make install" Makefile
1256 target).
1257
1258 - Improved screen redraws to produce less flicker when moving among the
1259 second-row tags or to the last tag on the first row.
1260
1261 0.3.3 (5/6/2012):
1262 -----------------
1263
1264 - Improved menu navigation:
1265 - In graphics mode, left & right arrow keys move left & right, while up &
1266 down arrows move between rows.
1267 - Page Up and Page Down now move through chunks of visible tags (in both
1268 text & graphics modes), jumping from one row to another only when at
1269 the edge of the row. In text mode, the "rows" are broken down as in
1270 graphics mode, but they aren't visibly distinguished on the screen.
1271
1272 - Improved text-mode use: rEFInd now displays the proper number of entries
1273 when first started in text mode and scrolling is done sensibly when too
1274 many entries exist to fit on the screen.
1275
1276 0.3.2 (5/4/2012):
1277 -----------------
1278
1279 - Added the install.sh script to install rEFInd on Linux and Mac OS X
1280 systems. This script must be run as root (or via sudo). It requires
1281 no options, but on Mac OS X, passing it the "esp" option causes it
1282 to install rEFInd on the computer's ESP rather than the default of the
1283 currently OS X boot partition. (Under Linux, the default is to install to
1284 the ESP.) Note that there may be some unusual cases in which this script
1285 will fail to work.
1286
1287 - Does a better job of clearing the screen when launching OSes in text
1288 mode.
1289
1290 - Added detection "recipe" for GRUB 2's BIOS Boot Partition.
1291
1292 - Fixed bogus detection of ESPs created by Linux's mkdosfs utility or
1293 Windows as bootable partitions when "scanfor" includes BIOS scanning
1294 options.
1295
1296
1297 0.3.1 (4/27/2012):
1298 ------------------
1299
1300 - Fixed bug that caused spurious "Unsupported while scanning the root
1301 directory" messages under some conitions on Macs.
1302
1303 - Modified loader scanning code to sort boot loader entries within a
1304 directory by modification time, so that the most recently-modified loader
1305 is first among those in a given directory. Thus, if you specify a
1306 directory name (or volume name, for loaders stored in the root directory
1307 of a volume) as the default_selection, the most recent of those loaders
1308 will be the default. This is intended to help with Linux kernel
1309 maintenance when using the EFI stub loader; set up this way, the most
1310 recent kernel copied to your kernel directory will be the default,
1311 obviating the need to adjust the refind.conf file when adding a new
1312 kernel. If you want to change the default among those in the default
1313 directory, you can use "touch" to adjust the modification timestamp.
1314
1315 - Tweaked code to find loader-specific .icns file so that it finds files
1316 for Linux kernels without .efi extensions. In this case, files should be
1317 named the same as the kernels they match, but with .icns extensions. For
1318 instance, bzImage-3.3.2 should have an icon called bzImage-3.3.2.icns.
1319 (The old code would have looked for an icon called bzImage-3.3.icns.)
1320
1321 - Eliminated bogus OS loader tags for filenames that end in ".icns" when
1322 the scan_all_linux_kernels option is set.
1323
1324 0.3.0 (4/22/2012):
1325 ------------------
1326
1327 - I'm officially upgrading this project's status from "alpha" to "beta" and
1328 giving it a bump from 0.2.x to 0.3.0. This doesn't reflect any major
1329 milestone with this version; rather, it reflects my sense that rEFInd has
1330 been "out there" for a while, and although I've gotten bug reports,
1331 they've been minor and/or have been fixed. The program still has known
1332 bugs, but my impression is that it is, overall, usable by ordinary users.
1333
1334 - Added "resolution" option to refind.conf, which enables setting the video
1335 resolution. To use it, pass two numeric values, as in "resolution 1024
1336 768" to use a 1024x768 video mode. Note that not all modes are supported.
1337 If you specify a non-supported video mode on a UEFI system, a message
1338 appears listing the supported video modes and you must then press a key
1339 to continue, using the default video mode (usually 800x600).
1340 Unfortunately, I don't know the calls to get a list of supported video
1341 modes on older EFI 1.x systems (including Macs), so on Macs setting an
1342 incorrect video mode silently fails (you keep using the default mode).
1343 This makes changing your video mode a hit-or-miss proposition on Macs.
1344 CAUTION: It's possible to set a legal video mode that your monitor can't
1345 handle, in which case you'll get a blank display until you boot an OS
1346 that resets the video mode.
1347
1348 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused rEFInd to crash when returning from an
1349 EFI shell or other programs on Macs, particularly when rEFInd used
1350 graphical mode. I'm not 100% sure this bug is squashed because I still
1351 don't understand the cause and I only have one Mac for testing. See
1352 comments in the ReinitRefitLib() function in refit/lib.c for more
1353 details.
1354
1355 - Added new refind.conf option: scan_all_linux_kernels, which causes Linux
1356 kernels that lack ".efi" extensions to be included in scans for EFI boot
1357 loaders. This may help integration with Linux distributions that don't
1358 give their kernels such names by default. Beware, though: It can detect
1359 unwanted files, such as older non-stub-loader kernels or .icns files used
1360 to give kernels with .efi extensions custom icons.
1361
1362 - Improved EFI boot loader detection on boards with Gigabyte's Hybrid EFI,
1363 and perhaps other EFIs with a buggy StriCmp() function. Files with both
1364 ".efi" and ".EFI" extensions should now be detected as boot loaders.
1365
1366 - Fixed a bug that caused rEFInd to fail to scan for drivers if the
1367 filesystem driver didn't set a volume name (that is, if the relevant
1368 field was set to NULL rather than even an empty string). In such
1369 situations, rEFInd now reports the volume name as "Unknown".
1370
1371 0.2.7 (4/19/2012):
1372 ------------------
1373
1374 - After much trial and tribulation, I've overcome a GNU-EFI limitation and
1375 enabled rEFInd to load EFI drivers. This feature was present in the
1376 original build of rEFIt but was removed in the versions that could
1377 compile under Linux, but now it's back -- and still being compiled under
1378 Linux! To use it, you should place your drivers in a convenient directory
1379 on the ESP (or whatever partition you use to launch rEFInd) and add a
1380 "scan_driver_dirs" entry to refind.conf to tell rEFInd where to look. (As
1381 always, you should specify the driver directory relative to the root of
1382 the filesystem.) Note that you can't launch drivers from another
1383 filesystem; they must be on the same volume that holds rEFInd. Those who
1384 compile from source code should note that implementing this feature
1385 necessitated using a more recent version of the GNU-EFI library. I'm
1386 currently using version 3.0p, and version 3.0i does NOT work. I don't
1387 know where the change occurred, but you may need to upgrade your GNU-EFI
1388 installation.
1389
1390 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to show up in its own menu sometimes.
1391
1392 - Added new refind.conf token: also_scan_dirs. When scanning volumes for
1393 EFI boot loaders, rEFInd always scans the root directory and every
1394 subdirectory of the /EFI directory, but it doesn't recurse into these
1395 directories. The also_scan_dirs token adds more directories to the scan
1396 list. It defaults to "elilo,boot", but you can set it to any directory or
1397 directories you like.
1398
1399 0.2.6 (4/14/2012):
1400 ------------------
1401
1402 - Added "volume" keyword to configuration file's stanza options. This
1403 option changes the volume from which subsequent files (specified by
1404 "loader" and "icon") are loaded. You pass "volume" the name/label of the
1405 FILESYSTEM you want to use (not the GPT partition name), or a number
1406 followed by a colon (e.g., "1:"). The former should reliably identify a
1407 filesystem, assuming the name is unique. The latter assigns numbers based
1408 on the order in which they're scanned, which may not be as reliable but
1409 should work when a volume is unnamed.
1410
1411 - Fixed bug in 0.2.5 that caused failure of Linux initial RAM disk
1412 mapping on some (but not all) systems. Affected computers include at
1413 least some Intel motherboards, maybe others.
1414
1415 0.2.5 (4/9/2012):
1416 -----------------
1417
1418 - Fixed bug that caused an inability to associate initial RAM disks with
1419 Linux kernels stored in a volume's root directory.
1420
1421 - Volume badges (that override default badges) are now stored in
1422 .VolumeBadge.icns. Although undocumented, rEFInd formerly loaded custom
1423 volume badges from .VolumeIcon.icns. This carryover from rEFIt was a
1424 confusing name, given the next (new) feature, so I've changed and
1425 documented the name....
1426
1427 - Added ability to set a default icon for a loader stored in the root
1428 directory of a volume: The icon is stored in .VolumeIcon.icns. This icon
1429 is also used for Mac OS X volumes booted from the standard location.
1430
1431 - Fixed bug that caused icons to drop back to generic icons when rEFInd
1432 was launched in certain ways (such as from an EFI shell in rEFInd's
1433 directory) on certain systems.
1434
1435 - Fixed bug that caused "unknown disable flag" to be shown (very briefly)
1436 instead of "unknown hideui flag" when an improper hideui flag was set.
1437
1438 0.2.4 (4/5/2012):
1439 -----------------
1440
1441 - Created new refind.conf entry: "showtools". This entry takes options of
1442 "shell", "gptsync", "about", "exit", "reboot", and "shutdown". This
1443 option is in some respects an affirmative version of portions of the old
1444 "disable" and "hideui" options; however, it enables users to specify the
1445 order in which these options appear on the screen. Also, the "exit"
1446 option is new; it terminates the program. The effect is usually to return
1447 to whatever tool launched it or to launch a default OS; however, this is
1448 somewhat unpredictable. The default therefore omits the "exit" option, as
1449 well as "gptsync", which has always been dangerous (but necessary on most
1450 MacOS/Windows dual-boot setups on Macs). As part of this reconfiguration,
1451 I've eliminated the "rescue Linux" option, which always seemed pointless
1452 to me.
1453
1454 - Folded "disable" and "hideui" refind.conf entries into one ("disable"),
1455 and reduced the number of options to six: "banner", "label",
1456 "singleuser", "hwtest", "arrows", and "all". ("arrows" is new and
1457 disables the scroll arrows when a system has too many tags to display
1458 simultaneously.)
1459
1460 - Added max_tags option to the refind.conf file, enabling users to reduce
1461 the maximum number of OS loader tags that can be displayed at once.
1462
1463 - Updated rEFIt icon, based on the 128x128 volume label from the rEFIt CD
1464 image.
1465
1466 - Added x86 and x86-64 EFI shells to the CD image version of the binary,
1467 but NOT to the binary zip file. The logic is that the CD image is more
1468 likely to be used directly as an emergency disc and so may need this
1469 feature, even though the source isn't part of the rEFInd project. (The
1470 source is readily available from the TianoCore project.)
1471
1472 - EFI shells may now be stored at /shellx64.efi for x86-64 systems or at
1473 /shellia32.efi for x86 systems. The /EFI/tools/shell.efi name is also
1474 recognized; however, if both files are present, two EFI shell icons will
1475 appear on the main menu. The /efi/{refind-path/apps/shell.efi filename,
1476 which was never officially documented but worked as a carryover from
1477 rEFIt, is no longer valid.
1478
1479 0.2.3 (3/26/2012):
1480 ------------------
1481
1482 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused hangs when launching a second program
1483 after returning from a first. There are some weird system-to-system
1484 differences, though, and this fix causes (apparently harmless) error
1485 messages about "(re)opening our installation volume" on at least one
1486 system (a 32-bit Mac Mini). I'm committing this change because, imperfect
1487 though it is, it's preferable to the earlier version, at least on my
1488 small sample of computers.
1489
1490 - Because of news that the Linux kernel developers are planning to use the
1491 filename linux.conf to hold Linux kernel configuration data for EFI
1492 booting, I'm transitioning rEFInd away from that name and to
1493 refind_linux.conf to avoid a conflict. This version can use either name,
1494 with refind_linux.conf taking precedence if both are present.
1495
1496 - Added logo for Arch Linux.
1497
1498 0.2.2 (3/23/2012):
1499 ------------------
1500
1501 - Fixed bug that caused program failure when Linux kernels with EFI stub
1502 support were detected with no associated version numbers. rEFInd now
1503 permits automatic linking of *ONE* versionless kernel to *ONE*
1504 versionless initrd file.
1505
1506 - Fixed bug that caused program hangs when a boot loader filename or label
1507 was too long. Such names are now properly truncated and program execution
1508 continues.
1509
1510 - Fixed bug that caused no text to appear in submenus on UEFI systems with
1511 small screens (800x600). NOTE: Problem still occurs on screens smaller
1512 than this, but such systems are very rare.
1513
1514 0.2.1 (3/19/2012):
1515 ------------------
1516
1517 - Added ability to set a "default_selection" that's a title or a substring
1518 of one -- the name given to a stanza in a "menuentry" or the boot
1519 loader's filename, in most cases, although "Mac OS X", "Windows XP
1520 (XoM)", and "Microsoft EFI boot" are also titles.
1521
1522 - Added support for semi-automatic scans of Linux kernels with EFI stub
1523 loader support. The program auto-detects matching initial RAM disk files
1524 and loads additional options from the "linux.conf" file in the same
1525 directory as the kernel.
1526
1527 - Added support for "submenuentry" keyword and associated sub-stanza
1528 entries in refind.conf file.
1529
1530 - Renamed icons/os_mint.icns to icons/os_linuxmint.icns to match the
1531 filename Linux Mint ACTUALLY uses for its ESP boot loader directory.
1532
1533
1534 0.2.0 (3/14/2012):
1535 ------------------
1536
1537 - Initial public release