href="mailto:rodsmith@rodsbooks.com">rodsmith@rodsbooks.com</a></p>
<p>Originally written: 3/14/2012; last Web page update:
-12/5/2012, referencing rEFInd 0.5.0</p>
+12/11/2012, referencing rEFInd 0.5.1</p>
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</tr>
<tr>
<td><tt>textonly</tt></td>
- <td>None</td>
- <td>rEFInd defaults to a graphical mode; however, if you prefer to do without the flashy graphics, you can run it in text mode by including this option.</td>
+ <td>None or <tt>0</tt></td>
+ <td>rEFInd defaults to a graphical mode; however, if you prefer to do without the flashy graphics, you can run it in text mode by including this option. Passing any option but <tt>0</tt> causes text mode to be used; passing a <tt>0</tt> causes graphics mode to be used. (This could be useful if you want to override a text-mode setting in an included secondary configuration file.)</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+ <td><tt>textmode</tt></td>
+ <td>text mode number</td>
+ <td>Sets the text-mode video resolution to be used in conjunction with <tt>textonly</tt> or for the line editor and program-launch screens. This option takes a single-digit code. Mode <tt>0</tt> is guaranteed to be present and should be 80x25. Mode <tt>1</tt> is supposed to be either invalid or 80x50, but some systems use this number for something else. Higher values are system-specific. If you set this option to an invalid value, rEFInd pauses during startup to tell you of that fact. Note that on some computers, setting this value without also using <tt>textonly</tt> results in an incorrect graphics video mode being set. Pressing the Esc key corrects the problem.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><tt>resolution</tt></td>
- <td>Two integer values</td>
- <td>Sets the video resolution used by rEFInd; takes a width and a height as options. For instance, <tt>resolution 1024 768</tt> sets the resolution to 1024x768. If you set a resolution that doesn't work on a UEFI-based system, rEFInd displays a message along with a list of valid modes. On an system built around EFI 1.<i>x</i> (such as a Mac), setting an incorrect resolution fails silently; you'll get the system's default resolution. You'll also get the system's default resolution if you set either resolution value to <tt>0</tt> or if you pass anything but two numbers. (Note that passing a resolution with an <tt>x</tt>, as in <tt>1024x768</tt>, will be interpreted as <i>one</i> option and so will cause the default resolution to be used.) Also, be aware that it is possible to set a valid resolution for your video card that's invalid for your monitor. If you do this, your monitor will go blank until you've booted an OS that resets the video mode.</td>
+ <td>one or two integer values</td>
+ <td>Sets the video resolution used by rEFInd; takes <i>either</i> a width and a height <i>or</i> a single UEFI video mode number as options. For instance, <tt>resolution 1024 768</tt> sets the resolution to 1024x768. On UEFI systems, <tt>resolution 1</tt> sets video mode 1, the resolution of which varies from system to system. If you set a resolution that doesn't work on a UEFI-based system, rEFInd displays a message along with a list of valid modes. On an system built around EFI 1.<i>x</i> (such as a Mac), setting an incorrect resolution fails silently; you'll get the system's default resolution. You'll also get the system's default resolution if you set both resolution values to <tt>0</tt> or if you pass anything but two numbers. (Note that passing a resolution with an <tt>x</tt>, as in <tt>1024x768</tt>, will be interpreted as <i>one</i> option and so will cause the default resolution to be used.) Also, be aware that it is possible to set a valid resolution for your video card that's invalid for your monitor. If you do this, your monitor will go blank until you've booted an OS that resets the video mode.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><tt>use_graphics_for</tt></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><tt>scan_all_linux_kernels</tt></td>
- <td>None</td>
- <td>When set, causes rEFInd to add Linux kernels (files with names that begin with <tt>vmlinuz</tt> or <tt>bzImage</tt>) to the list of EFI boot loaders, even if they lack <tt>.efi</tt> filename extensions. The hope is that this will simplify use of rEFInd on distributions that provide kernels with EFI stub loader support but that don't give those kernels names that end in <tt>.efi</tt>. Of course, the kernels must still be stored on a filesystem that rEFInd can read, and in a directory that it scans. (<a href="drivers.html">Drivers</a> and the <tt>also_scan_dirs</tt> options can help with those issues.) Note that this option can cause unwanted files to be improperly detected and given loader tags, such as older kernels without EFI stub loader support. Versions of rEFInd prior to 0.5.0 left this option commented out in the <tt>refind.conf-sample</tt> file, but as of version 0.5.0, this option is enabled in the default configuration file. The program default remains to not scan for such kernels, though, so you can delete or uncomment this option to keep them from appearing in your boot menu.</td>
+ <td>None or <tt>0</tt></td>
+ <td>When set, causes rEFInd to add Linux kernels (files with names that begin with <tt>vmlinuz</tt> or <tt>bzImage</tt>) to the list of EFI boot loaders, even if they lack <tt>.efi</tt> filename extensions. The hope is that this will simplify use of rEFInd on distributions that provide kernels with EFI stub loader support but that don't give those kernels names that end in <tt>.efi</tt>. Of course, the kernels must still be stored on a filesystem that rEFInd can read, and in a directory that it scans. (<a href="drivers.html">Drivers</a> and the <tt>also_scan_dirs</tt> options can help with those issues.) Note that this option can cause unwanted files to be improperly detected and given loader tags, such as older kernels without EFI stub loader support. Versions of rEFInd prior to 0.5.0 left this option commented out in the <tt>refind.conf-sample</tt> file, but as of version 0.5.0, this option is enabled in the default configuration file. The program default remains to not scan for such kernels, though, so you can delete or uncomment this option to keep them from appearing in your boot menu. Passing any option but <tt>0</tt> causes scans for all kernels to occur; passing a <tt>0</tt> causes these kernels to not be scanned. (This could be useful if you want to override a setting of <tt>scan_all_linux_kernels</tt> in an included secondary configuration file.)</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><tt>default_selection</tt></td>
<td>A substring of a boot loader's title; or a numeric position</td>
<td>Sets the default boot OS based on the loader's title, which appears in the main menu beneath the icons when you select the loader. You can enter any substring of the title as the <tt>default_selection</tt>, so long as it's two or more characters in length. It's best to use a unique substring, since rEFInd stops searching when it finds the first match. Because rEFInd sorts entries within a directory in descending order by file modification time, if you specify a directory (or volume name, for loaders in a partition's root directory) as the <tt>default_selection</tt>, the most recent loader in that directory will be the default. One-character entries are matched against the first character of the title, except for digits, which refer to the numeric order of the boot loader entries.</td>
</tr>
+<tr>
+ <td><tt>include</tt></td>
+ <td>filename</td>
+ <td>Includes the specified file into the current configuration file. Essentially, the included file replaces the <tt>include</tt> line, so positioning of this token is important if the included file includes options that contradict those in the main file. The included file must reside in the same directory as the rEFInd binary and the main configuration file. This option is valid only in the main configuration file; included files may not include third-tier configuration files.</td>
+</tr>
</table>
<p>Prior to version 0.2.4, rEFInd supported a token called <tt>disable</tt>, whose function partially overlapped with <tt>hideui</tt>. Version 0.2.4 merges many of the features of these two tokens into <tt>hideui</tt> and creates the new <tt>showtools</tt> option, which provides the remaining functionality in a more flexible way.</p>
<tr>
<td><tt>options</tt></td>
<td>options passed to the boot loader</td>
- <td>Pass arbitrary options to your boot loader with this line. Note that if the option string should contain spaces (as it often should) or characters that should not be modified by rEFInd's option parser (such as slashes or commas), it <i>must</i> be enclosed in quotes.</td>
+ <td>Pass arbitrary options to your boot loader with this line. Note that if the option string should contain spaces (as it often should) or characters that should not be modified by rEFInd's option parser (such as slashes or commas), it <i>must</i> be enclosed in quotes. If you must include quotes in an option, you can double them up, as in <tt>my_opt=""with quotes""</tt>, which passes <tt>my_opt="with quotes"</tt> as an option.</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><tt>disabled</tt></td>