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