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