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0.10.5 (3/4/2017)—This version includes a number of
+ modest changes, most of which will be of interest to relatively few
+ people:
+
+
+
The touch/tablet support has been improved and so may work with
+ a few more systems.
+
+
The refind-install script has been updated to work better
+ with disks other than those whose names take the form
+ /dev/sd? and /dev/hd? (in Linux).
+
+
For the benefit of new Apple laptops that lack physical Esc and
+ function keys, additional keybindings have been added: Backspace
+ (Delete on most Mac keyboards) now works the same as Esc, and Tab
+ now works the same as F2/Insert/+.
+
+
The Linux initial RAM disk detection code has been expanded so that,
+ if two initial RAM disk files are found for a kernel, the one with
+ more characters after the version string that match the equivalent
+ characters in the kernel filename will be used. For instance,
+ suppose the kernel filename is vmlinuz-4.8.0-32-standard,
+ and two initial RAM disk files are
+ initrd-4.8.0-32-standard and
+ initrd-4.8.0-32-debug. The first of those files has nine
+ matching characters after the version string (-standard),
+ vs. just one matching character (-) for the second. Thus,
+ the first file will be used.
+
+
A second change to Linux initial RAM disk detection is that you can
+ now specify the kernel version string with the string %v in
+ the refind_linux.conf file's options field. Thus, if your
+ distribution provides two initial RAM disk files per kernel, and
+ also provides numbered kernels, you can create a
+ refind_linux.conf file that enables you to boot with either
+ (or both) of the initial RAM disk files that match a specific
+ kernel.
+
+
I've done some minor code optimization in the functions that search
+ for boot loaders. This had no noticeable effect on speed for me, and
+ is likely to be more than offset by the more complex initial RAM
+ disk processing noted above; but it might help a little bit on
+ systems with many boot loaders or kernels.
+
+
+
+
+
0.10.4 (10/9/2016)—The number of changes in this
+ version is modest, but some features are important to some people:
+
+
+
+
Thanks to code submitted by an anonymous contributor, rEFInd now
+ supports some touch screens. This feature relies on support
+ in the firmware itself, though, and even some tablets lack this
+ support, so this feature does not work on all tablets.
+
+
Martin Whitaker has contributed updates to the ext4fs driver to make
+ it compatible with filesystems created with 64-bit pointers. As a
+ practical matter, this is important because 64-bit pointers are now
+ being used by default in some distributions. In theory, this feature
+ may enable use on over-16TiB filesystems, but this is untested at
+ the moment.
+
+
GNU-EFI version 3.0.3 or 3.0.4 has made changes that caused rEFInd's
+ drivers to fail to compile. This version addresses those compilation
+ problems.
+
+
A rEFInd coding error manifested with previous versions of rEFInd
+ when compiled with GNU-EFI starting at version 3.0.3 or 3.0.4,
+ causing the main rEFInd binary to crash. This problem has been
+ fixed. To the best of my knowledge, this bug has never manifested
+ with earlier versions of GNU-EFI or Tianocore builds.
+
+
The refind-install script now does a better job of
+ detecting disks that have exotic names—those other than
+ /dev/sd? or /dev/hd?.
+
+
+
+
+
+
0.10.3 (4/24/2016)—This version features mostly modest changes and additions:
+
+
+
+
A new Linux script, refind-mkdefault, simplifies the task of resetting rEFInd as the default boot program. It's documented here. I've also written a new documentation page on the problem generally, which covers how to handle the problem in multiple OSes.
+
+
I've modified the SIP/CSR rotation code so that the SIP/CSR rotation tool will appear more reliably on Apple computers.
+
+
The NTFS driver has been improved to reduce the chances of it hanging randomly.
+
+
The code that excludes shell binaries from appearing in the main boot list has been altered to reduce the odds of an incorrect exclusion from occurring.
+
+
rEFInd now recognizes the fwupx64.efi program as a special case: If detected, this program is presented as a second-row option rather than as a regular boot loader. (This tool is used to update firmware on some computers.)
+
+
BIOS/CSM/legacy-mode OSes all now include the string Legacy in their descriptions on Macs.
+
+
+
+
+
+
0.10.2 (1/26/2016)—Changes to this version are relatively modest and focus on bug fixes:
+
+
+
+
A bug in refind-install under OS X could cause the mountesp script to be installed as a file called /usr/local/bin if that directory was absent. This bug has been fixed.
+
+
Another OS X refind-install bug caused the --usedefault option to not work properly. This has been fixed.
+
+
A Linux refind-install bug caused Secure Boot detection to fail in some cases. This has also been fixed.
+
+
The mvrefind script could fail to move the Windows boot loader file (bootmgfw.efi) under some circumstances. Another bug in the same script caused mvrefind to register rEFInd using its default filename (rEFInd Boot Manager) rather than the name Windows Boot Manager when moving rEFInd to the Windows boot manager's location. Both of these bugs have been squashed.
+
+
A long-standing but obscure bug/quirk affects some EFIs, such as that in the HP ProBook 6470b: These EFIs connect useless drivers to partitions with no known filesystems, before rEFInd can load filesystem drivers. The result is that drivers loaded by rEFInd could not read the partitions in question. This version of rEFInd works around this problem.
+
+
A bug introduced in rEFInd 0.10.1 caused custom volume badge icons (read from an icon directory specified by icons_dir in refind.conf) to be ignored. I've fixed this bug.
+
+
Finally, a small non-bug improvement: I've added centos.crt and centos.cer public-key files for CentOS to the keys directory.
+
+
+
+
+
+
0.10.1 (12/12/2015)—This version of the program features one big change that will affect very few people, another big behind-the-scenes change, and a number of small changes that will affect more people:
+
+
+
+
rEFInd now compiles and runs on ARM64 (aka AARCH64 or AA64) systems. To date, I've tested it only using QEMU, so this support is very preliminary, almost to the point of being theoretical.
+
+
I've made significant changes to the Makefiles used to compile rEFInd. This should have no effect on the way rEFInd functions, or even in how most programming tasks are done; but the changes should help simplify some future changes.
+
+
I've made font changes: I've removed Luxi Sans Mono and changed the default font from Nimbus Mono to Liberation Mono.
+
+
A bug that causes rEFInd to fail to detect boot loaders on removable media when rEFInd itself was launched from the fallback filename is now history.
+
+
Fedora, Red Hat, and CentOS use a special recovery kernel with a name beginning vmlinuz-0-rescue. This kernel could be newer than others, which would make it the default on in a "folded" set of kernels—a highly undesirable situation. I've therefore modified rEFInd's loader-sorting algorithm to move this rescue kernel to the end of the list, no matter what its time stamp reads.
+
+
I've added a workaround to gptsync to fix problems that caused it to skip through its menus using the defaults without taking user input on some Macs. I've also added 53746F72-6167-11AA-AA11-00306543ECAC (Apple Core Storage, gdisk type AF05) to the list of partition types that gptsync recognizes.
+
+
The refind-install script can now be run as a symbolic link in Linux, which means it can be run as a normal command.
+
+
I've fixed bugs in refind-install and in mkrlconf that could cause them to misidentify kernel options. See NEWS.txt for details.
+
+
I've moved the detailed description of refind-install from Installing rEFInd to a man page, and I've created HTML versions of the three man pages that the project now includes.
+
+
I've added kernel* as a pattern for matching Linux kernels, since Gentoo Linux names its kernels by this pattern.
+
+
I've updated LodePNG, which is the PNG graphics library that rEFInd uses, to version 20151024.
+
+
The rEFInd PPA now asks for confirmation before installing to the ESP when the package is first installed. Updates follow the instructions given on first installation. You can modify this setting by typing dpkg-reconfigure refind.
+
+
+
+
+
0.10.0 (11/8/2015)—I've given this version an extra-large version number bump because of some highly user-visible changes, especially for Mac users. Changes include: