]> code.delx.au - refind/blob - NEWS.txt
Added OS check to mkrlconf.sh. Bypass checks for BIOS-mode boot
[refind] / NEWS.txt
1 0.8.8 (3/??/2015):
2 ------------------
3
4 - The mkrlconf.sh script now checks the OS on which it's running, which
5 should help avoid confusion or problems by users who mistakenly run it
6 under OS X.
7
8 - rEFInd now skips checking for various BIOS-mode boot sector signatures
9 when running on a UEFI-based PC; these checks are run only on Macs. This
10 may reduce startup time on systems with many partitions.
11
12 - Fixed Debian debinstall script to work correctly on IA32 systems. It had
13 a bug that caused filesystem drivers and gptsync to not be packaged for
14 IA32.
15
16 - Modified Debian postinst file to call install.sh with --localkeys option
17 if sbsign and openssl are available, even when NOT in Secure Boot mode or
18 if shim is not detected. This helps with my Ubuntu PPA when using custom
19 Secure Boot keys, since the PPA is delivered unsigned. (Users will have
20 to have added their own local keys to their firmware's db.) For
21 consistency, I've made the same change to the RPM .spec file.
22
23 0.8.7 (3/1/2015):
24 -----------------
25
26 - Fixed install.sh bug that caused inappropriate installation under the
27 name bootx64.efi (or bootia32.efi) under Linux, with a failure to update
28 the boot entries in NVRAM, has been fixed.
29
30 - Added identification of XFS as filesystem type in volume descriptions.
31
32 - More fixes to filesystem type detection code. Previous version sometimes
33 identified FAT or NTFS (or anything with a boot loader) as a whole-disk
34 device rather than the correct filesystem type.
35
36 - Added protections to the code to reduce the risk of crashes that might
37 occur when dereferencing NULL pointers in various situations.
38
39 - I'm deprecating the use of filesystem numbers (as in "fs0:") because
40 they're unreliable -- filesystem numbers can change between boots and
41 might not be the same as those used in an EFI shell or other program.
42 Sooner or later I'll remove code supporting this feature. In the
43 meantime, if it doesn't work for you, please switch to using filesystem
44 labels, partition labels, or partition GUIDs.
45
46 - Added detection of FreeBSD's BIOS-mode GPT boot loader. Previously,
47 rEFInd could detect FreeBSD's BIOS-mode MBR boot loader, which gave
48 FreeBSD an appropriate icon on Macs; but the BIOS-mode GPT boot loader
49 code is different, so some recent FreeBSD installations showed up with
50 generic grey diamond icons. This change creates FreeBSD icons instead.
51
52 - Added "Secure Boot [active|inactive]" notice to "about" menu for x86
53 (32-bit) systems, since there are now a few 32-bit UEFI systems that
54 support Secure Boot. (AFAIK, these are mostly tablets and convertibles
55 such as the ASUS T100.)
56
57 - Added KeyTool.efi and KeyTool-signed.efi to list of MOK managers. KeyTool
58 is the "super-deluxe" Secure Boot key and hash manager provided as part
59 of the efitools package.
60
61 - Fixed more instances of "invalid parameter" errors on some EFIs.
62
63 - Improved Secure Boot detection in install.sh.
64
65 - install.sh should no longer complain when copying Shim or MokManager over
66 itself.
67
68 0.8.6 (2/8/2015):
69 -----------------
70
71 - Removed special case of ignoring an HFS+ name of "HFS+ volume", since the
72 old rEFInd HFS+ driver that produced this name for all HFS+ volumes has
73 long since been updated to deliver a real name.
74
75 - Addition of new Windows 8 OS icon. On Macs and for BIOS/legacy boots, the
76 new icon is now used for Windows Vista, 7, and 8, while the old one is
77 used for earlier versions of Windows. For EFI-mode boots, the new icon is
78 used universally.
79
80 - If the NTFS driver is loaded, rEFInd now scans NTFS volumes on Macs for
81 the presence of Windows boot files, and removes any NTFS volume that
82 lacks such files from the BIOS/legacy boot list. This should help
83 unclutter the display on Macs that contain NTFS data partitions.
84
85 - Fixed bug that caused misidentification of both whole disks and NTFS
86 volumes as being FAT. (This bug affected the identification of devices
87 and locations in the rEFInd menu, not actual access to devices.)
88
89 - Code refactoring to clear out legacy-boot functions from the
90 ever-expanding refind/main.c file.
91
92 - Added new "badges" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf. This
93 option hides the device-type badges associated with the OS boot options.
94
95 - Reverted rEFIt commit r472, introduced in rEFInd 0.8.5 to support more
96 BMP images because I've received bug reports that it's causing existing
97 selection images to fail to load.
98
99 - Fixed install.sh bug that caused misidentification of installation
100 directory under OS X if an already-mounted ESP has spaces in its path.
101
102 - Fixed Mac-specific install.sh bug that could cause misidentification of
103 the ESP on disks with partition numbers of 10 or above.
104
105
106 0.8.5 (2/1/2015):
107 -----------------
108
109 - Added NTFS EFI filesystem driver.
110
111 - Minor improvements to filesystem driver framework code.
112
113 - Changes to
114
115 - Fixed bug in Btrfs driver's address reference.
116
117 - Improved install.sh to make it smarter about figuring out where to
118 install on Macs. Specifically, this version now upgrades existing
119 installations, if found (as it always has under Linux), rather than
120 blindly install to EFI/BOOT; it installs to EFI/refind if not existing
121 installation is found; it installs using the --shortform option to bless,
122 which seems to eliminate the 30-second delay problem; and it can handle
123 an HFS+ ESP, which it treats as a separate HFS+ volume (as if the user
124 had used --ownhfs). These changes do not affect behavior under Linux.
125
126 - Added missing check of architecture type for several tools.
127
128 - Applied rEFIt commit r472, which adds support for BMP images with negative
129 height fields, indicating that the image is NOT vertically flipped. This
130 commit and r467 were not incorporated in the original rEFInd because I
131 forked it from a Debian rEFIt package that had been patched to build
132 under GNU-EFI, and was apparently based on a slightly earlier version.
133
134 - Applied rEFIt commit r467, which improves Mac handling of legacy boots
135 from other than the first hard disk.
136
137
138 0.8.4 (12/8/2014):
139 ------------------
140
141 - Tweaked default for dont_scan_volumes: Removed "Recovery HD". This change
142 better suits the needs of OS X 10.10 ("Yosemite") installations, but may
143 result in some stray Recovery HD entries on some Macs.
144
145 - Updated icons for Fedora and Ubuntu and added an icon for Xubuntu.
146
147 - Added new configuration option, "enable_and_lock_vmx", which sets an
148 Intel CPU feature that's required for some types of virtualization to
149 work. Most EFIs enable setting this feature in their own setup utilities,
150 but some (such as most Macs) don't.
151
152 - If rEFInd can't locate an icons directory (either the default or one
153 specified by the icons_dir token), the program switches to text-only
154 mode.
155
156 - If a loader contains the string "grub" and no other clue to the loader's
157 OS association exists, search for os_grub.{png|icns} (which is not
158 provided with rEFInd) or os_linux.{png|icns}. (Previous versions provided
159 a generic loader icon for GRUB.)
160
161 - Fixed bug that caused dont_scan_files to not work with special-case
162 boot loaders (for OS X and Windows) when specifying the complete path to
163 the loader (e.g., EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi).
164
165 - Added support for the iPXE network boot tool (see BUILDING.txt for
166 building and basic use instructions).
167
168 0.8.3 (7/6/2014):
169 -----------------
170
171 - Added new feature: Setting "timeout = -1" in refind.conf causes rEFInd to
172 immediately boot the default option UNLESS a keypress is in the buffer
173 when rEFInd launches. In that case, if the keypress corresponds to a
174 shortcut key, the associated boot loader is launched; or if not, the menu
175 is displayed.
176
177 - Added new icons for Clover boot loader and for Mythbuntu Linux
178 distribution.
179
180 - rEFInd now displays the partition's label, when one is available, when
181 offering a BIOS-mode boot option for a partition with no filesystem
182 driver. This works only on Macs doing BIOS-mode booting.
183
184 - Removed GPLv2 code from the FSW core files. This was done because the
185 Btrfs driver is derived from the GRUB Btrfs driver, which is licensed
186 under the GPLv3. Ironically, the GPLv2 and GPLv3 are incompatible
187 licenses, so ensuring that the Btrfs driver doesn't rely on GPLv2 code
188 was legally necessary. In most cases, I reverted to the original rEFIt
189 code, although I kept my own cache code; since I wrote it, I can
190 change its license to a BSD license.
191
192 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to unload drivers immediately after loading
193 them. This didn't affect rEFInd's own drivers because they didn't include
194 the unload hooks, but it did affect some other drivers.
195
196 - Changed default scan_all_linux_kernels setting from "false" to "true",
197 and commented the option out in refind.conf-sample. This should not
198 affect most people, since refind.conf-sample had this option commented
199 out, and most rEFInd users either use it that way or don't have Linux
200 kernels installed at all. I've made this change because I want rEFInd to
201 "do the right thing" by default in as many cases as possible. For a while
202 now, rEFInd has been excluding non-bootable files from its menu, and most
203 kernels "in the wild" now include the EFI stub. Thus, enabling this
204 support by default seems worthwhile. If you prefer to not scan Linux
205 kernels by default, simply uncomment the "scan_all_linux_kernels" line
206 and ensure it's set to "false".
207
208 0.8.2.1 (6/8/2014):
209 -------------------
210
211 - Removed stray bit of debugging code that caused a prompt to press a
212 key to appear at rEFInd startup.
213
214 0.8.2 (6/8/2014):
215 -----------------
216
217 - Changed behavior when default_selection is not set: It now boots the
218 previously-booted loader, assuming it's still available; if not, rEFInd
219 boots the first loader (as it does now). Behavior is unchanged if
220 default_selection is set. Note that this behavior depends on the ability
221 of rEFInd to store an EFI variable in NVRAM. It therefore fails on
222 systems with flaky NVRAM storage. You can view the previously-booted
223 loader in the
224 /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/PreviousBoot-36d08fa7-cf0b-42f5-8f14-68df73ed3740
225 variable under Linux.
226
227 - Added icon for Mageia Linux (os_mageia.png).
228
229 - Fixed bug that could misidentify a not-quite-GUID as a GUID in a
230 manual boot stanza's "volume" line.
231
232 - I've updated my personal build system, and therefore the rEFInd Makefiles
233 and related files, to use TianoCore UDK2014 rather than UDK2010.
234
235 - Added "deep_uefi_legacy_scan" token. When not set (the default), rEFInd
236 does not modify EFI NVRAM settings when scanning for BIOS-mode boot
237 loaders on UEFI-based (non-Mac) computers. Some computers require
238 uncommenting this setting for rEFInd to reliably detect some BIOS-mode
239 boot devices. Passing "0", "off", or "false" as an option resets it to
240 the default value (useful in a loaded secondary configuration file to
241 override a setting in the main file).
242
243 0.8.1 (5/15/2014):
244 ------------------
245
246 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to fail to detect boot loaders stored
247 on the root directory of a partition.
248
249 - Added two new bitmap fonts to those distributed with rEFInd: Ubuntu Mono
250 and Nimbus Mono. Both come in 12-, 14-, 16-, and 24-point sizes.
251
252 - Messages about pauses for scanning and re-scanning of boot loaders are
253 now suppressed when doing an initial delayed scan when scan_delay is 1
254 second.
255
256 - Improved centering of legacy boot option descriptions on some systems'
257 screens.
258
259 - Fixed bug that could cause a BIOS-mode boot to boot from an inappropriate
260 device if that device had an innately high boot priority (as set by the
261 firmware).
262
263 - Changed icons from ICNS to PNG form. There are several reasons to do
264 this, all of them minor; but together they're enough to warrant a change.
265 PNG is more common, and therefore more accessible to most users --
266 particularly those who don't use OS X. The PNG files are smaller than
267 their ICNS equivalents. PNG supports a wider range of sizes (although I'm
268 not now using anything that ICNS doesn't support, I might in the future).
269 The icon-scaling support added a few versions ago makes ICNS's support
270 for multiple icon sizes relatively unimportant.
271
272 - Reversed order of search for icons by extension: rEFInd now searches
273 for PNG files before ICNS files, rather than the other way around. This
274 makes it possible to override a volume icon for rEFInd by giving it the
275 name .VolumeIcon.png, even when a .VolumeIcon.icns file exists on the
276 volume and is used by OS X.
277
278 - Fixed bug that caused .VolumeIcon.icns to take higher-than-intended
279 precedence in icon setting for OS X.
280
281 - Chainloading to BIOS-mode boot loaders now works on UEFI-based PCs when
282 rEFInd is built with GNU-EFI, not just when built with Tianocore.
283
284 0.8.0 (5/4/2014):
285 -----------------
286
287 - The "dont_scan_volumes" parameter now also works with legacy-boot
288 volumes. Unlike with EFI volumes, where the option you pass must exactly
289 match an entire volume name, when applied to legacy-boot volumes, it
290 matches any part of the description that appears beneath the item when
291 you select it in the rEFInd main menu.
292
293 - Can now boot in legacy mode from second (and probably later) hard disks!
294
295 - rEFInd now limits the length of the firmware name string shown in the
296 system information screen to 65 characters. This is done because at least
297 one EFI presents a longer string by default, and this causes the entire
298 information display to come up empty on 800x600 displays.
299
300 - rEFInd now uses the partition's name (as stored in the GPT data
301 structures) as a fallback for the filesystem's name if the latter can't
302 be found. Exceptions are if the partition name is one of three generic
303 names used by GPT fdisk: "Microsoft basic data", "Linux filesystem", or
304 "Apple HFS/HFS+". These are ignored in favor of the descriptive fallback
305 (e.g., "20 GiB Btrfs volume")
306
307 - It's now possible to specify a volume by partition GUID number in a
308 manual boot stanza. This should be more reliable (albeit also more
309 awkward) than using a filesystem number (such as fs0: or fs1:).
310
311 - Fixed memory-allocation bug that could cause error message displays,
312 and possibly hangs, when re-scanning boot loaders.
313
314 0.7.9 (4/20/2014):
315 ------------------
316
317 - Attempt to fix rEFInd perpetually re-scanning after ejecting a disc on
318 some Macs.
319
320 - Added check to remove redundant (or non-functional if Secure Boot is
321 active) kernel entries for Ubuntu, which is now including two versions of
322 kernels, one signed and the other unsigned.
323
324 - Fixed bug in install.sh that could cause it to display error messages
325 if the dmraid utility was not installed.
326
327 - The HFS+ driver now reports a correct volume name.
328
329 - Fixed some EFI filesystem driver bugs that could cause lockups under
330 some circumstances. These bugs could affect any of the filesystem
331 drivers.
332
333 - Added "gdisk" option to the "showtools" configuration file token. When
334 active, this adds gdisk.efi or gdisk_{arch}.efi, if present in the
335 EFI\tools directory, to the tools row.
336
337 - Fixed mistaken identification of the MOK utility as the "MOK utility
338 utility."
339
340
341 0.7.8 (3/9/2014):
342 -----------------
343
344 - Added "debian" directory to source, which facilitates creation of Debian
345 packages. Packages built in this way are built with GNU-EFI and don't run
346 any post-installation script, so although the rEFInd binaries are on the
347 hard disk, they aren't installed to be bootable; you must manually run
348 install.sh. Also, at least on Ubuntu, the Make.common file's /usr/lib64
349 references must be changed to /usr/lib. This is more of a proof of
350 concept and a "leg up" for distribution maintainers than anything else.
351
352 - Two new options, big_icon_size and small_icon_size, set the size of
353 the first-row OS icons and of the second-row tool icons, respectively.
354 The big_icon_size option also indirectly sets the size of disk-type
355 badges; they're 1/4 the size of the big icons. Default values are 128 and
356 48, respectively, to match the actual icon files provided with rEFInd. If
357 the icon you're using is of a different size than you've specified,
358 rEFInd scales it. For best quality, you should both provide icons drawn
359 to the right size and set the icon sizes in refind.conf.
360
361 - rEFInd now automatically scales icons to fit the standard icon sizes.
362 This won't have any effect with the icons that come with rEFInd, but it
363 can help if you want to use another icon, since you needn't scale it in a
364 graphics program before using it. Note that rEFInd uses bitmap icons, so
365 scaling by a huge amount (say, a 16x16 icon to fit the standard 128x128
366 OS icon) is not likely to look good.
367
368 - Added new option, banner_scale, that tells rEFInd how to handle banners:
369 Set to "noscale" (the default), banners are not scaled, although they'll
370 be cropped if they're too big for the display. This is the same as the
371 behavior in previous versions. Set to "fillscreen", rEFInd now scales the
372 banner image (larger or smaller) to fill the display.
373
374 - Adjusted the post-installation script in refind.spec (used to generate
375 RPMs, and therefore also indirectly Debian packages) to search for
376 existing shim program files under the filesnames shim.efi and shimx64.efi
377 rather than just shim.efi. Ubuntu uses shimx64.efi, so Debian packages
378 were failing to detect Ubuntu's shim in previous versions. (Note,
379 however, that Ubuntu's early shim 0.1 is unsuitable for use with rEFInd
380 The newer 0.4 version that's in the repositories now should work fine;
381 it's only when installing on an older system that's NOT been updated that
382 problems might arise.
383
384 0.7.7 (1/3/2014):
385 -----------------
386
387 - Can now specify complete paths, optionally including volumes, in
388 dont_scan_files.
389
390 - Added shimx64.efi to the default dont_scan_files list.
391
392 - Added windows_recovery_files token, to specify what program(s) launch a
393 Windows recovery utility; and the "windows_recovery" option to
394 "showtools," to control whether or not to display the Windows recovery
395 utility on the second row of icons.
396
397 - The use_graphics_for, also_scan_dirs, dont_scan_dirs, dont_scan_files,
398 and scan_driver_dirs tokens in refind.conf now support "+" as the first
399 option, which causes the remaining options to be added to the default
400 value rather than replacing that value. (This has no practical effect for
401 scan_driver_dirs, though, since it has a null default value.)
402
403 - Added support for specifying the configuration file at program launch,
404 via the "-c" parameter, as in "refind_x64.efi -c foo.conf" to use the
405 foo.conf file as the main configuration file.
406
407 - Scans of ext2/3/4fs and ReiserFS partitions now omit partitions with
408 duplicate filesystem UUIDs. These are likely parts of RAID arrays and so
409 would have the same boot loaders or kernels as the first one with a given
410 UUID.
411
412 - Added feature in install.sh: Script now tries to locate and mount an ESP
413 in Linux, if it's currently unmounted.
414
415 - Fixed bug in mkrlconf.sh and install.sh that caused a stray line break
416 and PARTUUID= specification to appear in generated refind_linux.conf file
417 under some circumstances.
418
419 0.7.6 (12/15/2013):
420 -------------------
421
422 - Added support for multiple "default_selection" targets. These MUST be
423 comma-separated AND enclosed in quotes, as in:
424 default_selection "fred,ginger"
425 This example will launch "fred" by default if it's available; and if
426 it's not, rEFInd will attempt to launch "ginger" as the default.
427
428 - Added support for time-sensitive "default_selection" setting. This token
429 may now have either one or three options. If one, it's interpreted as it
430 has been in the past, as setting a default that's independent of times.
431 If you follow this default by two times, however, those are interpreted
432 as the start and end times (in 24-hour format) for a default setting. For
433 instance, "default_selection foo 8:00 17:00" causes foo to be the default
434 from 8:00 (AM) to 17:00 (aka 5:00 PM). You can include multiple
435 "default_selection" lines to set different defaults for a variety of
436 times. If they're in conflict, the last one takes precedence. Note that
437 times are hardware clock's native value, which may be local time or UTC,
438 depending on your computer.
439
440 - Added support for a blank-screen startup: Set "screensaver -1" and the
441 screen saver will be initialized when rEFInd starts. If you set a low
442 "timeout" value, the result will be a boot straight to the default OS
443 unless you hit a key soon after rEFInd starts. Once you hit a key, the
444 screensaver will be disabled.
445
446 - Added --ownhfs {target} option to install.sh. This option causes rEFInd
447 to install to an HFS+ partition in a way that's more consistent with the
448 way the Mac's native boot loader is installed. Note that you should NOT
449 install to an already-bootable partition with this option, since it will
450 overwrite the existing boot loader, which would render OS X unbootable.
451
452 0.7.5 (11/10/2013):
453 -------------------
454
455 - Fixed bug that caused unbootable exFAT partitions to show up as
456 bootable on Macs with BIOS/CSM/legacy boot options enabled.
457
458 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused installs to the ESP on recent
459 versions of OS X to fail.
460
461 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to hang on some Macs when multiple EFI
462 drivers were present.
463
464 - Fixed bug that caused clear to default gray screen when launching OSes
465 with 'use_graphics_for' enabled, even when the rEFInd background is not
466 gray. Now rEFInd clears to the same background color used in its menu.
467 When launching OS X, though, the OS X boot loader will itself clear to
468 gray a second or so later; and when launching Linux, it will clear to
469 black a second or so later.
470
471 0.7.4.1 (8/25/2013):
472 --------------------
473
474 - My initial 0.7.4 release broke legacy-boot ability on Macs, so I quickly
475 released this version using the original 0.7.4 filenames to fix the
476 problem.
477
478 0.7.4 (8/25/2013):
479 ------------------
480
481 - Fixed options passing to loader to include loader's filename as the first
482 option. This omission had no effect on most boot loaders, but caused
483 VMware's mboot64.efi to fail.
484
485 - Added support for memtest86 as second-row option. Program must be
486 stored in EFI/tools, EFI/tools/memtest, EFI/tools/memtest86, EFI/memtest,
487 or EFI/memtest86; and must use the name memtest86.efi, memtest86_x64.efi,
488 memtest86x64.efi, or bootx64.efi (changing "x64" to "ia32" on IA-32
489 systems). The memtest86 program is scanned for when the "showtools"
490 option includes the "memtest" or "memtest86" token, which it does by
491 default.
492
493 - Added space to end of "Boot %s from %s" string; enables adding a space
494 to the end of the "default_selection" item (in quotes) to set a default
495 that matches a volume name that's identical to another one except for
496 extra characters at the end of the non-wanted volume's name.
497
498 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to hang when launching boot loaders
499 under some conditions. (Launching from Firewire drives on Macs is the
500 known case, but there may be others.)
501
502 0.7.3 (8/7/2013):
503 -----------------
504
505 - Fixed bug that caused missing media-type badges on BIOS-mode boot
506 loaders on Macs.
507
508 - Fixed bug that caused failure when launching BIOS-mode OSes on Macs.
509
510 0.7.2 (8/6/2013):
511 -----------------
512
513 - Fixed bug that caused display glitches in the final entry on the first
514 row of icons if the second row of icons was empty.
515
516 - Fixed bug that could cause incorrect scanning or even a rEFInd crash when
517 using volume specification in also_scan_dirs token.
518
519 - Added protection against loading invalid drivers and other EFI programs.
520 (Some EFIs crash when attempting to load such drivers and programs.)
521
522 - Added PreLoader.efi and shim-fedora.efi to default dont_scan_files list;
523 it's now "shim.efi, shim-fedora.efi, PreLoader.efi, TextMode.efi,
524 ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi, MokManager.efi, HashTool.efi,
525 HashTool-signed.efi".
526
527 - Added icon for Funtoo Linux.
528
529 - Fixed reading of volume badges from user-specified icons directory, which
530 was broken.
531
532 - Fixed handling of /.VolumeBadge.icns (or /.VolumeBadge.png) files, which
533 was broken.
534
535 0.7.1 (7/8/2013):
536 -----------------
537
538 - Fixed build problem with recent development versions of EDK2.
539
540 - Added scan for Boot Repair's backup of the Windows boot loader
541 (bkpbootmgfw.efi). If found, give separate entries for it and for
542 bootmgfw.efi, each with its own descriptive text label.
543
544 - Fixed also_scan_dirs; used to have bug that caused it to ignore
545 volume specification, if present.
546
547 - Fixed bug in driver cache that caused Btrfs driver to hang sometimes.
548
549 0.7.0 (6/27/2013):
550 ------------------
551
552 - Added Btrfs signature to rEFInd, so that it can identify the filesystem
553 type for volumes that lack labels.
554
555 - Changed some critical filesystem driver pointers from 32-bit to 64-bit.
556 This *SHOULD* enable use of over-2TiB filesystems (for those filesystems
557 that support such large volumes). This capability is largely untested,
558 though.
559
560 - Added a cache to the filesystem driver core, and therefore to all the
561 filesystem drivers. This cache greatly improves performance in
562 VirtualBox, and offers modest performance improvements on a few "real"
563 computers. The most dramatic improvement is on ext2/3fs under VirtualBox:
564 Loading a kernel and initrd used to take ~200 seconds on my system, but
565 now takes ~3 seconds! On most "real" hardware, the improvement is much
566 less dramatic -- an improvement of a second or less, presumably because
567 of cacheing within the EFI or on the hard disk itself.
568
569 - Filter boot loaders based on a test of their validity; keeps out Linux
570 kernels without EFI stub loader code, loaders for the wrong architecture,
571 non-EFI loaders, etc.
572
573 - New Btrfs driver, contributed by Samuel Liao based on GRUB 2.00 Btrfs
574 code.
575
576 0.6.12 (6/18/2013):
577 -------------------
578
579 - Changed the 64-bit EFI shell included in the CD-R and USB flash drive
580 images to a version 2 shell that should support the "bcfg" command.
581
582 - Added support for PreBootloader to refind.spec's built-in installation
583 script.
584
585 - Added support for the Linux Foundation's PreLoader to install.sh. It's
586 treated just like shim, including using the --shim option (or, now,
587 --preloader); but it searches for and copies HashTool.efi rather than
588 MokManager.efi, and filenames are adjusted appropriately.
589
590 - Added code to determine Linux root filesystem from /etc/fstab file, if
591 it's on the same partition as the kernel and if the refind_linux.conf
592 file is not available. This enables rEFInd to boot Linux without any
593 rEFInd-specific configuration files on some (but not all) systems.
594
595 0.6.11 (5/13/2013):
596 -------------------
597
598 - New feature: rEFInd now ignores symbolic links to files on filesystems
599 that support them. This prevents the "vmlinuz" symbolic link that some
600 distributions create in the root directory from appearing in the loader
601 list. Note that this does NOT affect symbolic links to directories.
602
603 - Added icons for Lubuntu and Kubuntu.
604
605 - Improved the install.sh script so that it does a better job dealing with
606 directory names that contain spaces.
607
608 - rEFInd now tries to guess the Linux distribution type based on the kernel
609 filename (Fedora and RHEL only) or the "ID" or "NAME" variables in
610 /etc/os-release on the kernel's partition. None of these is guaranteed to
611 work. A fallback of the Tux penguin icon remains in place in case rEFInd
612 can't find anything substantive enough for a guess.
613
614 - Added "EFI\opensuse" to the locations searched for MOK utilities, since
615 OpenSUSE now uses that name.
616
617 - Renamed "Reboot to Firmware User Interface" to "Reboot to Computer Setup
618 Utility" in menu.
619
620 - Fixed bug in gptsync that caused it to hang if the disk had too few GPT
621 partitions to fill the MBR.
622
623 0.6.10 (5/5/2013):
624 ------------------
625
626 - Added support for "screensaver" token. If set to a positive integer, this
627 causes the screen to blank after the specified number of seconds of
628 inactivity. Pressing most keys (unfortunately NOT including Shift, Alt,
629 or Ctrl) will restore the display and restart the screen saver timeout.
630
631 - Added icon for ChromeOS (os_chrome.icns in the icons subdirectory).
632 ChromeBooks reportedly boots using the fallback filename, but if a user
633 wants to install rEFInd on a ChromeBook, renaming the original EFI/BOOT
634 directory to EFI/chrome and then installing rEFInd in the fallback
635 filename will bring up this new icon for ChromeOS.
636
637 - Added new option to reboot the computer into the firmware's user
638 interface. This option is active by default, or can be set via the
639 "firmware" option to the "showtools" token in refind.conf. It works
640 on only some computers, though; older computers lack this feature, and
641 when rEFInd is told to use this feature on such computers, the directive
642 is quietly ignored.
643
644 - Upgraded LodePNG library from version 20121216 to 20130415 and
645 restructured rEFInd-specific modifications to simplify future upgrades.
646
647 - Replaced hexadecimal error code with description if an error is
648 encountered when saving a screen shot.
649
650 - Enable multiple screen shots: Rather than naming all screen shots
651 "screenshot.bmp", the name is now "screenshot_###.bmp", where "###" is a
652 sequence number, starting with "001".
653
654 0.6.9 (4/25/2013):
655 ------------------
656
657 - Modified default banner to include the new rEFInd icon, provided by Erik
658 Kemperman.
659
660 - Worked around a suspected firmware bug that caused rEFInd 0.6.6 to 0.6.8
661 to hang at startup on some systems (DUET and some Macs).
662
663 - Modified rEFInd to search for gptsync under the names gptsync.efi and
664 gptsync_{arch}.efi, where {arch} is ia32 or x64. (Previous versions
665 searched only for gptsync.efi.)
666
667 - Added gptsync program from rEFIt project, but with some changes to
668 improve flexibility and make it less likely that UEFI users will
669 accidentally trash their systems.
670
671 - Changed timeout code so that the timeout continues if the keyboard is
672 disconnected. This can help in booting a headless server or a system with
673 a bluetooth or other keyboard that's not recognized by the EFI.
674
675 0.6.8 (3/18/2013):
676 ------------------
677
678 - Added workaround for presumed EFI bug that was causing "Invalid
679 Parameter" errors when scanning for boot loaders on some computers.
680
681 - Added search for an EFI shell called shell.efi in the root directory
682 (previously this name was only accepted in EFI\tools).
683
684 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail on some systems (Fedora
685 18, for instance) because of a problem identifying the ESP.
686
687 - Fixed bug that caused icons named after boot loaders to not be used.
688
689 0.6.7 (2/3/2013):
690 -----------------
691
692 - Added a more explicit error message summarizing options when a launch of
693 a program results in a Secure Boot failure.
694
695 - Changed MOK tool detection to scan all volumes, not just the rEFInd
696 home volume. This is desirable because the Linux Foundation's HashTool
697 can only scan its own volume, making it desirable to place copies of this
698 program on every volume that holds EFI boot loader binaries.
699
700 - Added support for launching the Linux Foundation HashTool as a means of
701 managing MOKs (or MOK hashes, at any rate).
702
703 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to present an entry for itself as a
704 Microsoft OS if it was launched as EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi.
705
706 - Fixed bug that caused dont_scan_volumes option to be added to
707 also_scan_dirs list.
708
709 - Fixed dont_scan_volumes so that it works with OS X boot loaders.
710
711 - Fixed broken mixing of PNG and ICNS icons when using a user-specified
712 icons directory -- previously, an ICNS file in the default directory
713 would override a PNG file in the user-specified directory.
714
715 0.6.6 (1/26/2013):
716 ------------------
717
718 - rEFInd now ignores the fallback boot loader (EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
719 EFI/BOOT/bootia32.efi) if it's identical to another boot loader on
720 the same volume. This is intended to help unclutter the display on
721 systems that run Windows, since Windows tends to duplicate its own boot
722 loader under the fallback name.
723
724 - Added new "font" token to refind.conf, which enables specifying a font in
725 the form of a PNG file. This file must contain monospace glyphs for the
726 95 characters from ASCII 32 to 126 (space through tilde), inclusive, plus
727 a glyph to be displayed for characters outside of this range, for a total
728 of 96 glyphs.
729
730 - Replaced the old font (inherited from rEFInd) with an anti-aliased
731 version of Luxi Mono Regular 14 point.
732
733 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore manual boot stanzas in files
734 included via the "include" token in refind.conf.
735
736 - Fixed bug that caused ASSERT error on some systems (and conceivably a
737 crash on startup on some) when default_selection line in refind.conf was
738 commented out or empty.
739
740 - Fixed bug that caused "Binary is whitelisted" message to persist on
741 screen after loading MOK-signed drivers in Secure Boot mode.
742
743 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore the "icon" token in refind.conf
744 manual boot stanzas.
745
746 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused the script to fail to update
747 drivers when rEFInd was installed in EFI/BOOT/.
748
749 0.6.5 (1/16/2013):
750 ------------------
751
752 - Improved text color support: rEFInd now uses black text against light
753 backgrounds and white text against dark backgrounds.
754
755 - Added support for PNGs as banners, icons, and selectors.
756
757 - Added icon for ALT Linux.
758
759 - Added "safemode" option to "hideui" token, to hide option to boot into
760 safe mode for OS X ("-v -x" option to boot.efi).
761
762 - Added icon for Haiku (os_haiku.icns).
763
764 - Enable transparency of icons & main-menu text when the banner icon is
765 sized to cover these areas.
766
767 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to crash if fed a banner image that's
768 too big. Note that "too big" can be substantially smaller than the screen
769 resolution!
770
771 0.6.4 (1/8/2013):
772 -----------------
773
774 - Revised install.sh to copy ext2fs driver, rather than ext4fs driver, for
775 ext2/3 filesystems. This can help keep non-functional entries from links
776 from /vmlinuz to /boot/vmlinuz out of the menu if the system uses ext4fs
777 on root and ext2fs or ext3fs on /boot.
778
779 - Fixed a couple of memory management bugs that cause rEFInd to hang at
780 startup on some systems.
781
782 0.6.3 (1/6/2013):
783 -----------------
784
785 - Added the ability to specify a volume name or number in the
786 "dont_scan_dirs" and "also_scan_dirs" tokens.
787
788 - Fixed a bug that caused removable EFI media to not appear in scan lists
789 if rEFInd was installed as EFI/BOOT/boot{arch}.efi on a hard disk.
790
791 - Modified ISO-9660 driver so that it can handle discs with other than
792 2048-byte sectors. This makes it useful for reading "hybrid ISO" images
793 burned to USB flash disks.
794
795 - New mvrefind.sh script to move a rEFInd installation between a standard
796 location (typically EFI/refind) and one of the fallback locations
797 (EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot). It can also do more exotic locations.
798
799 - The install.sh script now installs to EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
800 EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi if it's run in BIOS mode. This is
801 intended to give some chance of producing a bootable installation should
802 a user accidentally install Linux in EFI mode and then install rEFInd
803 from that installation.
804
805 - The install.sh script now tries to find an existing rEFInd installation
806 and upgrade it, even if it's in EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot rather
807 than in EFI/refind.
808
809 - New "--yes" option to install.sh to help with unattended or automated
810 installations (as from an RPM or Debian package).
811
812 0.6.2 (12/30/2012):
813 -------------------
814
815 - Inclusion of a sample refind.spec file for the benefit of RPM
816 distribution maintainers who might want to include rEFInd. It's a bit
817 rough, but it gets you a good chunk of the way there....
818
819 - The EFI filesystem drivers can now be built with the GNU-EFI toolkit as
820 well as with the TianoCore EDK2. See the BUILDING.txt file for details on
821 how to build them with either toolkit. This improvement doesn't affect
822 users of my binary packages, but it should make it easier for Linux
823 distributions to adopt rEFInd into their package systems.
824
825 - Tweaked refind.inf file for better build results using "native" TianoCore
826 EDK2 build process (vs. the Makefile-based build process that I use under
827 Linux). This won't affect those who use my binary builds or build under
828 Linux with the "make" command.
829
830 - Fixed bug that prevented Secure Boot launches from working when rEFInd
831 was built with GNU-EFI rather than the TianoCore EDK2.
832
833 - Substantial reworking of Secure Boot code, based on James Bottomley's
834 PreLoader program. This new code eliminates the limitation of launching
835 just one driver in Secure Boot mode and is likely to be more reliable
836 with future or obscure boot loaders. It should also work with non-x86-64
837 systems, although this relies on a platform-specific shim program, which
838 to date exists only for x86-64. The basic features are the same as before
839 -- rEFInd relies on shim for authentication functions and will launch
840 programs that are signed by Secure Boot keys, shim keys, or MOKs.
841
842 - Altered default for "textmode" option (when it's commented out) to not
843 adjust the text mode at all. (Prior versions set it to mode 0 by
844 default.)
845
846 0.6.1 (12/21/2012):
847 -------------------
848
849 - Added "--root" option to install.sh, to enable installation of rEFInd
850 to something other than the currently-running OS. This is intended for
851 use on emergency discs.
852
853 - Thanks to Stefan Agner, the ext4fs driver now supports the "meta_bg"
854 filesystem feature, which distributes metadata throughout the disk. This
855 feature isn't used by default, but can be set at filesystem creation time
856 by passing the "-O meta_bg,^resize_inode" option to mke2fs. (Using
857 "^resize_inode" is necessary because meta_bg is incompatible with
858 resize_inode, which IS used by default.) This feature can be used on
859 ext3fs and ext2fs as well as on ext4fs, so the ext4fs driver can now
860 handle some ext3fs and ext2fs partitions that the ext2fs driver can't
861 handle.
862
863 - Fixed some screen resolution-setting bugs.
864
865 - Added the "words" that make up a filesystem's label (delimited by spaces,
866 dashes, or underscores) to the list of bases used to search for OS icons.
867 For instance, if the filesystem's label is "Arch", rEFInd searches for
868 os_Arch.icns; if it's "Fedora 17", it searches for os_Fedora.icns and
869 os_17.icns; and if it's "NEW_GENTOO", it searches for os_NEW.icns and
870 os_GENTOO.icns.
871
872 - Refined hints displays to be more context-sensitive, particularly in text
873 mode.
874
875 - Instead of displaying a blank filesystem label when a filesystem has
876 none, rEFInd now displays the size and/or type of the filesystem, as in
877 "boot EFI\foo\bar.efi from 200 MiB ext3 volume" rather than "boot
878 EFI\foo\bar.efi from".
879
880 - Fixed a bug that caused the screen to clear after displaying an error
881 message but before displaying the "Hit any key to continue" message when
882 a boot loader launch failed.
883
884 0.6.0 (12/16/2012):
885 -------------------
886
887 - Fixed a memory allocation bug that could cause a program crash when
888 specifying certain values with the "also_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_volumes",
889 "dont_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_files", and "scan_driver_dirs" refind.conf
890 options.
891
892 - Modified Linux kernel initrd-finding code so that if an initrd is
893 specified in refind_linux.conf, rEFInd will not add any initrd it finds.
894 This enables an override of the default initrd, and is likely to be
895 particularly helpful to Arch Linux users.
896
897 - Added ext4fs driver!
898
899 - Made "boot" the default value for "also_scan_dirs".
900
901 - Added identifying screen header to line editor.
902
903 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd's display to be mis-sized upon return
904 from a program that set the resolution itself.
905
906 - Adjusted "resolution" refind.conf parameter so that it can accept EITHER
907 a resolution as width and height OR a single digit as a UEFI mode number
908 (which is system-specific). This is done because some systems present the
909 same mode twice in their mode lists, perhaps varying in refresh rate,
910 monitor output, or some other salient characteristics; specifying the
911 mode number enables selecting the higher-numbered mode, whereas using
912 horizontal and vertical resolution values selects the lowest-numbered
913 mode.
914
915 - Added "textmode" refind.conf parameter to set the text mode used in
916 text-only displays, and for the line editor and boot-time handoff
917 display even in graphics mode.
918
919 - Fixed bug that caused tools (shell, etc.) to launch when they were
920 highlighted and F2 or Insert was pressed.
921
922 - Added "editor" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf, which
923 disables the boot options editor.
924
925 - Added hints text to rEFInd main menu and sub-menus. This can be disabled
926 by setting the new "hints" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf.
927
928 - Added "boot with minimal options" entry to refind_linux.conf file
929 generated by install.sh. This entry boots without the options extracted
930 from the /etc/default/grub file.
931
932 - Added keys subdirectory to main distribution, to hold public Secure
933 Boot/shim keys from known sources.
934
935 - Changed install.sh --drivers option to --alldrivers, added new
936 --nodrivers option, and made the default on Linux to install the one
937 driver that's used on /boot (or the root filesystem if /boot isn't a
938 separate partition). Of course, this won't install a non-existent driver,
939 and it also won't work properly if run from an emergency disk unless you
940 mount a separate /boot partition at that location.
941
942 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented creation of refind_linux.conf file
943 on Linux systems.
944
945 0.5.1.1 (12/12/2012):
946 ---------------------
947
948 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented it from working on OS X.
949
950 0.5.1 (12/11/2012):
951 -------------------
952
953 - Added support for "0" options to "textonly" and "scan_all_linux_kernels"
954 to reverse the usual meaning of these tokens. This is useful for
955 including these options in a secondary configuration file called with the
956 new "include" token to override a setting set in the main file.
957
958 - Added "include" token for refind.conf, to enable including a secondary
959 configuration file from a primary one.
960
961 - Modified install.sh so that it creates a simple refind_linux.conf file in
962 /boot, if that file doesn't already exist and if install.sh is run from
963 Linux. If that directory happens to be on a FAT, HFS+, ext2fs, ext3fs, or
964 ReiserFS volume, and if the necessary drivers are installed, the result
965 is that rEFInd will detect the Linux installation with no further
966 configuration on many systems. (Some may still require tweaking of kernel
967 options, though; for instance, adding "dolvm" on Gentoo systems that use
968 LVM.)
969
970 - Added --shim and --localkeys options to install.sh to help simplify setup
971 on systems with Secure Boot active.
972
973 - Fixed (maybe) bug that caused resolution options to not be displayed on
974 recent Macs with GOP graphics when specifying an invalid resolution in
975 refind.conf.
976
977 - Fixed bug that caused some programs (EFI shells, in particular) to hang
978 when launching on some systems (DUET, in particular).
979
980 - Implemented a fix to enable ELILO to launch with Secure Boot active.
981 This fix might help with some other boot loaders in Secure Boot mode,
982 too, but I don't know of any specifics.
983
984 0.5.0 (12/6/2012):
985 ------------------
986
987 - Added the ability to include quote marks ('"') in refind.conf and
988 refind_linux.conf tokens by doubling them up, as in:
989 "ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value=""this is it"""
990 This example results in the following string being passed as an
991 option:
992 ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value="this is it"
993
994 - Changed refind.conf-sample to uncomment the scan_all_linux_kernels
995 option by default. If this option is deleted or commented out, the
996 program default remains to not scan all Linux kernels; but with
997 increasing numbers of distributions shipping with kernels that include
998 EFI stub loader support, setting the configuration file default to scan
999 for them makes sense.
1000
1001 - Modified the "resolution" token so that it affects text mode as well
1002 as graphics mode. On my systems, though, the actual text area is still
1003 restricted to an 80x25 area. (This seems to be a firmware limitation; my
1004 EFI shells are also so limited.)
1005
1006 - Fixed a bug that caused the options line editor to blank out lines that
1007 were not actually edited.
1008
1009 - Added support for using Matthew Garrett's Shim program and its Machine
1010 Owner Keys (MOKs) to extend Secure Boot capabilities. If rEFInd is
1011 launched from Shim on a computer with Secure Boot active, rEFInd will
1012 launch programs signed with either a standard UEFI Secure Boot key or a
1013 MOK. For the moment, this feature works only on x86-64 systems.
1014
1015 - Added new "dont_scan_files" (aka "don't_scan_files") token for
1016 refind.conf. The effect is similar to dont_scan_dirs, but it creates a
1017 blacklist of filenames within directories rather than directory names.
1018 I'm initially using it to place shim.efi and MokManager.efi in the
1019 blacklist to keep these programs out of the OS list. (MokManager.efi is
1020 scanned separately as a tool; see below.) I've moved checks for
1021 ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi, and TextMode.efi to this list. (These
1022 three had previously been blacklisted by hard-coding in ScanLoaderDir().)
1023
1024 - Added the directory from which rEFInd launched to dont_scan_dirs. This
1025 works around a bug in which rEFInd would show itself as a bogus Windows
1026 entry if it's installed as EFI/Microsoft/boot/bootmgfw.efi.
1027
1028 - Added support for launching MokManager.efi for managing the Machine Owner
1029 Keys (MOKs) maintained by the shim boot loader developed by Fedora and
1030 SUSE. This program is scanned and presented as a second-row tool.
1031
1032 - Added support for Apple's Recovery HD partition: If it's detected, a new
1033 icon appears on the second row. This icon can be removed by explicitly
1034 setting the "showtools" option in refind.conf and excluding the
1035 "apple_recovery" option from that line.
1036
1037 - Fixed bug that caused text-mode ("textonly" refind.conf option enabled)
1038 menu entries to be right-aligned rather than left-aligned when rEFInd was
1039 compiled with the TianoCore EDK2.
1040
1041 - Added "--usedefault {devicename}" and "--drivers" options to the
1042 install.sh script and changed the "esp" option to "--esp".
1043
1044 0.4.7 (11/6/2012):
1045 ------------------
1046
1047 - Added an icon for gummiboot.
1048
1049 - Added a boot option editor: Pressing the Insert or F2 key from a boot
1050 tag's options menu opens a simple text-mode line editor on which the boot
1051 options may be edited for a one-time boot with altered options.
1052
1053 - Modified the "scan_delay" feature to delay and then perform a re-scan,
1054 which may work better than the first attempt at this feature (which I'm
1055 told isn't working as planned).
1056
1057 - Modified rEFInd to add a space after the command-line options only when
1058 launching Mac OS X. On some early Macs, the extra space (which had been
1059 present by default, as a carryover from rEFIt) causes problems when
1060 booting Linux kernels from FAT partitions.
1061
1062 0.4.6 (10/6/2012):
1063 ------------------
1064
1065 - Fixed some minor memory management issues.
1066
1067 - Added new "scan_delay" feature to impose a delay before scanning
1068 for disks.
1069
1070 - Changed default "scanfor" option from internal-external-optical to either
1071 internal-external-optical-manual (for non-Macs) or
1072 internal-hdbios-external-biosexternal-optical-cd-manual (for Macs). I've
1073 done this for two reasons:
1074 - Many Mac users have been confused by the fact that rEFInd needs
1075 reconfiguration to detect Windows (or Linux installed in BIOS mode),
1076 since rEFIt scans BIOS devices by default. Adding the BIOS options as
1077 default for them should help them.
1078 - Adding the "manual" option enables users to simply add manual boot
1079 stanzas and have them work, which is more intuitive. Adding the
1080 "manual" option will have no effect unless manual stanzas are created
1081 or uncommented, so this part of the change won't affect users' working
1082 default configurations.
1083
1084 - Added new legacy (BIOS) boot support for UEFI-based PCs.
1085
1086 0.4.5 (8/12/2012):
1087 ------------------
1088
1089 - Fixed bug that caused a failure to boot BIOS-based OSes on Macs.
1090
1091 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail to detect rEFItBlesser.
1092
1093 0.4.4 (6/23/2012):
1094 ------------------
1095
1096 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be corrupted by rEFInd on
1097 32-bit systems.
1098
1099 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be truncated in the drivers
1100 on 32-bit systems.
1101
1102 - Fixed bug in use_graphics_for option parsing that caused most options
1103 to set graphics mode for OS X and/or Linux but not other boot
1104 loaders/OSes.
1105
1106 - Tweaked install script to better isolate the ESP under OS X.
1107
1108 0.4.3 (6/21/2012):
1109 ------------------
1110
1111 - rEFInd now supports compilation using the TianoCore UDK2010/EDK2
1112 development kit in addition to GNU-EFI.
1113
1114 - Added new "use_graphics_for" option to control which OSes to boot in
1115 graphics mode. (This effect lasts for a fraction of a second on most
1116 systems, since the boot loader that rEFInd launches is likely to set
1117 graphics or text mode itself.)
1118
1119 - Graphics-mode booting now clears the screen to the current rEFInd
1120 background color (rather than black) and does NOT display boot messages.
1121 The intent is for a smoother transition when booting OS X, or perhaps
1122 other OSes that don't display boot loader messages. In practice, this
1123 effect will be tiny for many OSes, since the boot loader generally clears
1124 the screen within a fraction of a second of being launched; but the
1125 "flicker" of a rEFInd message in that time can sometimes be distracting.
1126
1127 - Filesystem drivers now work on EFI 1.x systems, such as Macs.
1128
1129 - Removed "linux.conf" as a valid alternative name for "refind_linux.conf"
1130 for holding Linux kernel options. The kernel developers plan to use
1131 "linux.conf" themselves.
1132
1133 0.4.2 (6/3/2012):
1134 -----------------
1135
1136 - Added a message to install.sh when run on Macs to remind users to update
1137 the "scanfor" line in refind.conf if they need to boot BIOS-based OSes
1138 via rEFInd.
1139
1140 - Modified install.sh script to be smarter about running efibootmgr on
1141 Linux. It now uses the whole path to the rEFInd binary as a key to
1142 determine whether an existing entry exists, rather than just the filename
1143 portion. If an entry exists and is the first entry in the boot order, the
1144 script does nothing to the NVRAM entries. If such an entry exists but is
1145 not the default, the script deletes that entry and creates a new one
1146 (implicitly making it the first in the boot order). If such an entry does
1147 not exist, the script creates a new one (again, making it the first in
1148 the boot order).
1149
1150 - Added "dont_scan_dirs" configuration file option, which adds directories
1151 to a "blacklist" of directories that are NOT scanned for boot loaders.
1152
1153 0.4.1 (5/25/2012):
1154 ------------------
1155
1156 - Added "scanning for new boot loaders" message to the re-scan function
1157 (hitting Esc at the main menu). It usually flashes up too quickly to
1158 be of importance, but if the scan function takes a while because of
1159 access to a CD that must be spun up, it should make it clear that the
1160 system hasn't hung.
1161
1162 - Modified install.sh script to detect rEFItBlesser on Macs, and if
1163 present, to ask the user if it should be removed.
1164
1165 - Cleaned up the Make.common file for the filesystem drivers.
1166
1167 - Changed HFS+ driver to return volume label of "HFS+ volume" rather than
1168 an empty label. (The driver doesn't currently read the real volume
1169 label.)
1170
1171 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to appear in its own menu after
1172 running a shell and then re-scanning for boot loaders.
1173
1174 0.4.0 (5/20/2012):
1175 ------------------
1176
1177 - Inclusion of drivers for ISO-9660, HFS+, ReiserFS, and ext2fs. Most of
1178 these drivers originated with rEFIt, although the HFS+ driver seems to
1179 have come from Oracle's VirtualBox, with some files from Apple. I hadn't
1180 included these drivers previously because the build process proved
1181 challenging. As it is, they don't work on my Mac Mini, I suspect because
1182 the build process with the UDK2010 development kit may not work with the
1183 EFI 1.x that Apple uses.
1184
1185 - Addition of support for drivers in the "drivers_{arch}" subdirectory of
1186 the main rEFInd binary directory (e.g., "drivers_x64" or "drivers_ia32").
1187 Drivers may continue to be placed in the "drivers" subdirectory.
1188
1189 - Added new feature to eject CDs (and other removable media): Press F12 to
1190 eject all such media. This function works only on some Macs, though (it
1191 relies on an Apple-specific EFI extension, and this extension isn't even
1192 implemented on all Macs, much less on UEFI-based PCs).
1193
1194 - Fixed a problem that could cause GRUB 2 to fail to read its configuration
1195 file when launched from rEFInd.
1196
1197 0.3.5 (5/15/2012):
1198 ------------------
1199
1200 - Removed the GRUB 2 detection "reciped" added with 0.3.2, since I've
1201 received reports that it's not working as intended.
1202
1203 - Added re-scan feature: Press the Esc key to have rEFInd re-read its
1204 configuration file, tell the EFI to scan for new filesystems, and re-scan
1205 those filesystems for boot loaders. The main purpose is to enable
1206 scanning a new removable medium that you insert after launching rEFInd;
1207 however, it can also be used to immediately implement changes to the
1208 configuration file or new drivers you load from an EFI shell.
1209
1210 - Fixed a bug that could cause the scroll-right arrow to be replaced by the
1211 scroll-left arrow under some circumstances.
1212
1213 0.3.4 (5/9/2012):
1214 -----------------
1215
1216 - Added new configuration file option: "icons_dir", which sets the name
1217 of the subdirectory in which icons are found. See the documentation or
1218 sample configuration file for a full description.
1219
1220 - Modified Makefile to generate rEFInd binary that includes architecture
1221 code -- refind_ia32.efi or refind_x64.efi, rather than the generic
1222 refind.efi. This is done mainly to help the install.sh script. The
1223 program can be named anything you like on the disk. (The generic name
1224 refind.efi is used on unknown architectures.)
1225
1226 - Improved install.sh script: Fixed bug on OS X 10.7 and enable it to be
1227 used after building from source code (or via new "make install" Makefile
1228 target).
1229
1230 - Improved screen redraws to produce less flicker when moving among the
1231 second-row tags or to the last tag on the first row.
1232
1233 0.3.3 (5/6/2012):
1234 -----------------
1235
1236 - Improved menu navigation:
1237 - In graphics mode, left & right arrow keys move left & right, while up &
1238 down arrows move between rows.
1239 - Page Up and Page Down now move through chunks of visible tags (in both
1240 text & graphics modes), jumping from one row to another only when at
1241 the edge of the row. In text mode, the "rows" are broken down as in
1242 graphics mode, but they aren't visibly distinguished on the screen.
1243
1244 - Improved text-mode use: rEFInd now displays the proper number of entries
1245 when first started in text mode and scrolling is done sensibly when too
1246 many entries exist to fit on the screen.
1247
1248 0.3.2 (5/4/2012):
1249 -----------------
1250
1251 - Added the install.sh script to install rEFInd on Linux and Mac OS X
1252 systems. This script must be run as root (or via sudo). It requires
1253 no options, but on Mac OS X, passing it the "esp" option causes it
1254 to install rEFInd on the computer's ESP rather than the default of the
1255 currently OS X boot partition. (Under Linux, the default is to install to
1256 the ESP.) Note that there may be some unusual cases in which this script
1257 will fail to work.
1258
1259 - Does a better job of clearing the screen when launching OSes in text
1260 mode.
1261
1262 - Added detection "recipe" for GRUB 2's BIOS Boot Partition.
1263
1264 - Fixed bogus detection of ESPs created by Linux's mkdosfs utility or
1265 Windows as bootable partitions when "scanfor" includes BIOS scanning
1266 options.
1267
1268
1269 0.3.1 (4/27/2012):
1270 ------------------
1271
1272 - Fixed bug that caused spurious "Unsupported while scanning the root
1273 directory" messages under some conitions on Macs.
1274
1275 - Modified loader scanning code to sort boot loader entries within a
1276 directory by modification time, so that the most recently-modified loader
1277 is first among those in a given directory. Thus, if you specify a
1278 directory name (or volume name, for loaders stored in the root directory
1279 of a volume) as the default_selection, the most recent of those loaders
1280 will be the default. This is intended to help with Linux kernel
1281 maintenance when using the EFI stub loader; set up this way, the most
1282 recent kernel copied to your kernel directory will be the default,
1283 obviating the need to adjust the refind.conf file when adding a new
1284 kernel. If you want to change the default among those in the default
1285 directory, you can use "touch" to adjust the modification timestamp.
1286
1287 - Tweaked code to find loader-specific .icns file so that it finds files
1288 for Linux kernels without .efi extensions. In this case, files should be
1289 named the same as the kernels they match, but with .icns extensions. For
1290 instance, bzImage-3.3.2 should have an icon called bzImage-3.3.2.icns.
1291 (The old code would have looked for an icon called bzImage-3.3.icns.)
1292
1293 - Eliminated bogus OS loader tags for filenames that end in ".icns" when
1294 the scan_all_linux_kernels option is set.
1295
1296 0.3.0 (4/22/2012):
1297 ------------------
1298
1299 - I'm officially upgrading this project's status from "alpha" to "beta" and
1300 giving it a bump from 0.2.x to 0.3.0. This doesn't reflect any major
1301 milestone with this version; rather, it reflects my sense that rEFInd has
1302 been "out there" for a while, and although I've gotten bug reports,
1303 they've been minor and/or have been fixed. The program still has known
1304 bugs, but my impression is that it is, overall, usable by ordinary users.
1305
1306 - Added "resolution" option to refind.conf, which enables setting the video
1307 resolution. To use it, pass two numeric values, as in "resolution 1024
1308 768" to use a 1024x768 video mode. Note that not all modes are supported.
1309 If you specify a non-supported video mode on a UEFI system, a message
1310 appears listing the supported video modes and you must then press a key
1311 to continue, using the default video mode (usually 800x600).
1312 Unfortunately, I don't know the calls to get a list of supported video
1313 modes on older EFI 1.x systems (including Macs), so on Macs setting an
1314 incorrect video mode silently fails (you keep using the default mode).
1315 This makes changing your video mode a hit-or-miss proposition on Macs.
1316 CAUTION: It's possible to set a legal video mode that your monitor can't
1317 handle, in which case you'll get a blank display until you boot an OS
1318 that resets the video mode.
1319
1320 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused rEFInd to crash when returning from an
1321 EFI shell or other programs on Macs, particularly when rEFInd used
1322 graphical mode. I'm not 100% sure this bug is squashed because I still
1323 don't understand the cause and I only have one Mac for testing. See
1324 comments in the ReinitRefitLib() function in refit/lib.c for more
1325 details.
1326
1327 - Added new refind.conf option: scan_all_linux_kernels, which causes Linux
1328 kernels that lack ".efi" extensions to be included in scans for EFI boot
1329 loaders. This may help integration with Linux distributions that don't
1330 give their kernels such names by default. Beware, though: It can detect
1331 unwanted files, such as older non-stub-loader kernels or .icns files used
1332 to give kernels with .efi extensions custom icons.
1333
1334 - Improved EFI boot loader detection on boards with Gigabyte's Hybrid EFI,
1335 and perhaps other EFIs with a buggy StriCmp() function. Files with both
1336 ".efi" and ".EFI" extensions should now be detected as boot loaders.
1337
1338 - Fixed a bug that caused rEFInd to fail to scan for drivers if the
1339 filesystem driver didn't set a volume name (that is, if the relevant
1340 field was set to NULL rather than even an empty string). In such
1341 situations, rEFInd now reports the volume name as "Unknown".
1342
1343 0.2.7 (4/19/2012):
1344 ------------------
1345
1346 - After much trial and tribulation, I've overcome a GNU-EFI limitation and
1347 enabled rEFInd to load EFI drivers. This feature was present in the
1348 original build of rEFIt but was removed in the versions that could
1349 compile under Linux, but now it's back -- and still being compiled under
1350 Linux! To use it, you should place your drivers in a convenient directory
1351 on the ESP (or whatever partition you use to launch rEFInd) and add a
1352 "scan_driver_dirs" entry to refind.conf to tell rEFInd where to look. (As
1353 always, you should specify the driver directory relative to the root of
1354 the filesystem.) Note that you can't launch drivers from another
1355 filesystem; they must be on the same volume that holds rEFInd. Those who
1356 compile from source code should note that implementing this feature
1357 necessitated using a more recent version of the GNU-EFI library. I'm
1358 currently using version 3.0p, and version 3.0i does NOT work. I don't
1359 know where the change occurred, but you may need to upgrade your GNU-EFI
1360 installation.
1361
1362 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to show up in its own menu sometimes.
1363
1364 - Added new refind.conf token: also_scan_dirs. When scanning volumes for
1365 EFI boot loaders, rEFInd always scans the root directory and every
1366 subdirectory of the /EFI directory, but it doesn't recurse into these
1367 directories. The also_scan_dirs token adds more directories to the scan
1368 list. It defaults to "elilo,boot", but you can set it to any directory or
1369 directories you like.
1370
1371 0.2.6 (4/14/2012):
1372 ------------------
1373
1374 - Added "volume" keyword to configuration file's stanza options. This
1375 option changes the volume from which subsequent files (specified by
1376 "loader" and "icon") are loaded. You pass "volume" the name/label of the
1377 FILESYSTEM you want to use (not the GPT partition name), or a number
1378 followed by a colon (e.g., "1:"). The former should reliably identify a
1379 filesystem, assuming the name is unique. The latter assigns numbers based
1380 on the order in which they're scanned, which may not be as reliable but
1381 should work when a volume is unnamed.
1382
1383 - Fixed bug in 0.2.5 that caused failure of Linux initial RAM disk
1384 mapping on some (but not all) systems. Affected computers include at
1385 least some Intel motherboards, maybe others.
1386
1387 0.2.5 (4/9/2012):
1388 -----------------
1389
1390 - Fixed bug that caused an inability to associate initial RAM disks with
1391 Linux kernels stored in a volume's root directory.
1392
1393 - Volume badges (that override default badges) are now stored in
1394 .VolumeBadge.icns. Although undocumented, rEFInd formerly loaded custom
1395 volume badges from .VolumeIcon.icns. This carryover from rEFIt was a
1396 confusing name, given the next (new) feature, so I've changed and
1397 documented the name....
1398
1399 - Added ability to set a default icon for a loader stored in the root
1400 directory of a volume: The icon is stored in .VolumeIcon.icns. This icon
1401 is also used for Mac OS X volumes booted from the standard location.
1402
1403 - Fixed bug that caused icons to drop back to generic icons when rEFInd
1404 was launched in certain ways (such as from an EFI shell in rEFInd's
1405 directory) on certain systems.
1406
1407 - Fixed bug that caused "unknown disable flag" to be shown (very briefly)
1408 instead of "unknown hideui flag" when an improper hideui flag was set.
1409
1410 0.2.4 (4/5/2012):
1411 -----------------
1412
1413 - Created new refind.conf entry: "showtools". This entry takes options of
1414 "shell", "gptsync", "about", "exit", "reboot", and "shutdown". This
1415 option is in some respects an affirmative version of portions of the old
1416 "disable" and "hideui" options; however, it enables users to specify the
1417 order in which these options appear on the screen. Also, the "exit"
1418 option is new; it terminates the program. The effect is usually to return
1419 to whatever tool launched it or to launch a default OS; however, this is
1420 somewhat unpredictable. The default therefore omits the "exit" option, as
1421 well as "gptsync", which has always been dangerous (but necessary on most
1422 MacOS/Windows dual-boot setups on Macs). As part of this reconfiguration,
1423 I've eliminated the "rescue Linux" option, which always seemed pointless
1424 to me.
1425
1426 - Folded "disable" and "hideui" refind.conf entries into one ("disable"),
1427 and reduced the number of options to six: "banner", "label",
1428 "singleuser", "hwtest", "arrows", and "all". ("arrows" is new and
1429 disables the scroll arrows when a system has too many tags to display
1430 simultaneously.)
1431
1432 - Added max_tags option to the refind.conf file, enabling users to reduce
1433 the maximum number of OS loader tags that can be displayed at once.
1434
1435 - Updated rEFIt icon, based on the 128x128 volume label from the rEFIt CD
1436 image.
1437
1438 - Added x86 and x86-64 EFI shells to the CD image version of the binary,
1439 but NOT to the binary zip file. The logic is that the CD image is more
1440 likely to be used directly as an emergency disc and so may need this
1441 feature, even though the source isn't part of the rEFInd project. (The
1442 source is readily available from the TianoCore project.)
1443
1444 - EFI shells may now be stored at /shellx64.efi for x86-64 systems or at
1445 /shellia32.efi for x86 systems. The /EFI/tools/shell.efi name is also
1446 recognized; however, if both files are present, two EFI shell icons will
1447 appear on the main menu. The /efi/{refind-path/apps/shell.efi filename,
1448 which was never officially documented but worked as a carryover from
1449 rEFIt, is no longer valid.
1450
1451 0.2.3 (3/26/2012):
1452 ------------------
1453
1454 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused hangs when launching a second program
1455 after returning from a first. There are some weird system-to-system
1456 differences, though, and this fix causes (apparently harmless) error
1457 messages about "(re)opening our installation volume" on at least one
1458 system (a 32-bit Mac Mini). I'm committing this change because, imperfect
1459 though it is, it's preferable to the earlier version, at least on my
1460 small sample of computers.
1461
1462 - Because of news that the Linux kernel developers are planning to use the
1463 filename linux.conf to hold Linux kernel configuration data for EFI
1464 booting, I'm transitioning rEFInd away from that name and to
1465 refind_linux.conf to avoid a conflict. This version can use either name,
1466 with refind_linux.conf taking precedence if both are present.
1467
1468 - Added logo for Arch Linux.
1469
1470 0.2.2 (3/23/2012):
1471 ------------------
1472
1473 - Fixed bug that caused program failure when Linux kernels with EFI stub
1474 support were detected with no associated version numbers. rEFInd now
1475 permits automatic linking of *ONE* versionless kernel to *ONE*
1476 versionless initrd file.
1477
1478 - Fixed bug that caused program hangs when a boot loader filename or label
1479 was too long. Such names are now properly truncated and program execution
1480 continues.
1481
1482 - Fixed bug that caused no text to appear in submenus on UEFI systems with
1483 small screens (800x600). NOTE: Problem still occurs on screens smaller
1484 than this, but such systems are very rare.
1485
1486 0.2.1 (3/19/2012):
1487 ------------------
1488
1489 - Added ability to set a "default_selection" that's a title or a substring
1490 of one -- the name given to a stanza in a "menuentry" or the boot
1491 loader's filename, in most cases, although "Mac OS X", "Windows XP
1492 (XoM)", and "Microsoft EFI boot" are also titles.
1493
1494 - Added support for semi-automatic scans of Linux kernels with EFI stub
1495 loader support. The program auto-detects matching initial RAM disk files
1496 and loads additional options from the "linux.conf" file in the same
1497 directory as the kernel.
1498
1499 - Added support for "submenuentry" keyword and associated sub-stanza
1500 entries in refind.conf file.
1501
1502 - Renamed icons/os_mint.icns to icons/os_linuxmint.icns to match the
1503 filename Linux Mint ACTUALLY uses for its ESP boot loader directory.
1504
1505
1506 0.2.0 (3/14/2012):
1507 ------------------
1508
1509 - Initial public release