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1 0.7.2 (?/??/2013):
2 ------------------
3
4 - Added PreLoader.efi to default dont_scan_files list; it's now "shim.efi,
5 PreLoader.efi, TextMode.efi, ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi,
6 MokManager.efi, HashTool.efi, HashTool-signed.efi".
7
8 - Added icon for Funtoo Linux.
9
10 - Fixed reading of volume icons from user-specified icons directory, which
11 was broken.
12
13 - Fixed handling of /.VolumeBadge.icns (or /.VolumeBadge.png) files, which
14 was broken.
15
16 0.7.1 (7/8/2013):
17 -----------------
18
19 - Fixed build problem with recent development versions of EDK2.
20
21 - Added scan for Boot Repair's backup of the Windows boot loader
22 (bkpbootmgfw.efi). If found, give separate entries for it and for
23 bootmgfw.efi, each with its own descriptive text label.
24
25 - Fixed also_scan_dirs; used to have bug that caused it to ignore
26 volume specification, if present.
27
28 - Fixed bug in driver cache that caused Btrfs driver to hang sometimes.
29
30 0.7.0 (6/27/2013):
31 ------------------
32
33 - Added Btrfs signature to rEFInd, so that it can identify the filesystem
34 type for volumes that lack labels.
35
36 - Changed some critical filesystem driver pointers from 32-bit to 64-bit.
37 This *SHOULD* enable use of over-2TiB filesystems (for those filesystems
38 that support such large volumes). This capability is largely untested,
39 though.
40
41 - Added a cache to the filesystem driver core, and therefore to all the
42 filesystem drivers. This cache greatly improves performance in
43 VirtualBox, and offers modest performance improvements on a few "real"
44 computers. The most dramatic improvement is on ext2/3fs under VirtualBox:
45 Loading a kernel and initrd used to take ~200 seconds on my system, but
46 now takes ~3 seconds! On most "real" hardware, the improvement is much
47 less dramatic -- an improvement of a second or less, presumably because
48 of cacheing within the EFI or on the hard disk itself.
49
50 - Filter boot loaders based on a test of their validity; keeps out Linux
51 kernels without EFI stub loader code, loaders for the wrong architecture,
52 non-EFI loaders, etc.
53
54 - New Btrfs driver, contributed by Samuel Liao based on GRUB 2.00 Btrfs
55 code.
56
57 0.6.12 (6/18/2013):
58 -------------------
59
60 - Changed the 64-bit EFI shell included in the CD-R and USB flash drive
61 images to a version 2 shell that should support the "bcfg" command.
62
63 - Added support for PreBootloader to refind.spec's built-in installation
64 script.
65
66 - Added support for the Linux Foundation's PreLoader to install.sh. It's
67 treated just like shim, including using the --shim option (or, now,
68 --preloader); but it searches for and copies HashTool.efi rather than
69 MokManager.efi, and filenames are adjusted appropriately.
70
71 - Added code to determine Linux root filesystem from /etc/fstab file, if
72 it's on the same partition as the kernel and if the refind_linux.conf
73 file is not available. This enables rEFInd to boot Linux without any
74 rEFInd-specific configuration files on some (but not all) systems.
75
76 0.6.11 (5/13/2013):
77 -------------------
78
79 - New feature: rEFInd now ignores symbolic links to files on filesystems
80 that support them. This prevents the "vmlinuz" symbolic link that some
81 distributions create in the root directory from appearing in the loader
82 list. Note that this does NOT affect symbolic links to directories.
83
84 - Added icons for Lubuntu and Kubuntu.
85
86 - Improved the install.sh script so that it does a better job dealing with
87 directory names that contain spaces.
88
89 - rEFInd now tries to guess the Linux distribution type based on the kernel
90 filename (Fedora and RHEL only) or the "ID" or "NAME" variables in
91 /etc/os-release on the kernel's partition. None of these is guaranteed to
92 work. A fallback of the Tux penguin icon remains in place in case rEFInd
93 can't find anything substantive enough for a guess.
94
95 - Added "EFI\opensuse" to the locations searched for MOK utilities, since
96 OpenSUSE now uses that name.
97
98 - Renamed "Reboot to Firmware User Interface" to "Reboot to Computer Setup
99 Utility" in menu.
100
101 - Fixed bug in gptsync that caused it to hang if the disk had too few GPT
102 partitions to fill the MBR.
103
104 0.6.10 (5/5/2013):
105 ------------------
106
107 - Added support for "screensaver" token. If set to a positive integer, this
108 causes the screen to blank after the specified number of seconds of
109 inactivity. Pressing most keys (unfortunately NOT including Shift, Alt,
110 or Ctrl) will restore the display and restart the screen saver timeout.
111
112 - Added icon for ChromeOS (os_chrome.icns in the icons subdirectory).
113 ChromeBooks reportedly boots using the fallback filename, but if a user
114 wants to install rEFInd on a ChromeBook, renaming the original EFI/BOOT
115 directory to EFI/chrome and then installing rEFInd in the fallback
116 filename will bring up this new icon for ChromeOS.
117
118 - Added new option to reboot the computer into the firmware's user
119 interface. This option is active by default, or can be set via the
120 "firmware" option to the "showtools" token in refind.conf. It works
121 on only some computers, though; older computers lack this feature, and
122 when rEFInd is told to use this feature on such computers, the directive
123 is quietly ignored.
124
125 - Upgraded LodePNG library from version 20121216 to 20130415 and
126 restructured rEFInd-specific modifications to simplify future upgrades.
127
128 - Replaced hexadecimal error code with description if an error is
129 encountered when saving a screen shot.
130
131 - Enable multiple screen shots: Rather than naming all screen shots
132 "screenshot.bmp", the name is now "screenshot_###.bmp", where "###" is a
133 sequence number, starting with "001".
134
135 0.6.9 (4/25/2013):
136 ------------------
137
138 - Modified default banner to include the new rEFInd icon, provided by Erik
139 Kemperman.
140
141 - Worked around a suspected firmware bug that caused rEFInd 0.6.6 to 0.6.8
142 to hang at startup on some systems (DUET and some Macs).
143
144 - Modified rEFInd to search for gptsync under the names gptsync.efi and
145 gptsync_{arch}.efi, where {arch} is ia32 or x64. (Previous versions
146 searched only for gptsync.efi.)
147
148 - Added gptsync program from rEFIt project, but with some changes to
149 improve flexibility and make it less likely that UEFI users will
150 accidentally trash their systems.
151
152 - Changed timeout code so that the timeout continues if the keyboard is
153 disconnected. This can help in booting a headless server or a system with
154 a bluetooth or other keyboard that's not recognized by the EFI.
155
156 0.6.8 (3/18/2013):
157 ------------------
158
159 - Added workaround for presumed EFI bug that was causing "Invalid
160 Parameter" errors when scanning for boot loaders on some computers.
161
162 - Added search for an EFI shell called shell.efi in the root directory
163 (previously this name was only accepted in EFI\tools).
164
165 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail on some systems (Fedora
166 18, for instance) because of a problem identifying the ESP.
167
168 - Fixed bug that caused icons named after boot loaders to not be used.
169
170 0.6.7 (2/3/2013):
171 -----------------
172
173 - Added a more explicit error message summarizing options when a launch of
174 a program results in a Secure Boot failure.
175
176 - Changed MOK tool detection to scan all volumes, not just the rEFInd
177 home volume. This is desirable because the Linux Foundation's HashTool
178 can only scan its own volume, making it desirable to place copies of this
179 program on every volume that holds EFI boot loader binaries.
180
181 - Added support for launching the Linux Foundation HashTool as a means of
182 managing MOKs (or MOK hashes, at any rate).
183
184 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to present an entry for itself as a
185 Microsoft OS if it was launched as EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi.
186
187 - Fixed bug that caused dont_scan_volumes option to be added to
188 also_scan_dirs list.
189
190 - Fixed dont_scan_volumes so that it works with OS X boot loaders.
191
192 - Fixed broken mixing of PNG and ICNS icons when using a user-specified
193 icons directory -- previously, an ICNS file in the default directory
194 would override a PNG file in the user-specified directory.
195
196 0.6.6 (1/26/2013):
197 ------------------
198
199 - rEFInd now ignores the fallback boot loader (EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
200 EFI/BOOT/bootia32.efi) if it's identical to another boot loader on
201 the same volume. This is intended to help unclutter the display on
202 systems that run Windows, since Windows tends to duplicate its own boot
203 loader under the fallback name.
204
205 - Added new "font" token to refind.conf, which enables specifying a font in
206 the form of a PNG file. This file must contain monospace glyphs for the
207 95 characters from ASCII 32 to 126 (space through tilde), inclusive, plus
208 a glyph to be displayed for characters outside of this range, for a total
209 of 96 glyphs.
210
211 - Replaced the old font (inherited from rEFInd) with an anti-aliased
212 version of Luxi Mono Regular 14 point.
213
214 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore manual boot stanzas in files
215 included via the "include" token in refind.conf.
216
217 - Fixed bug that caused ASSERT error on some systems (and conceivably a
218 crash on startup on some) when default_selection line in refind.conf was
219 commented out or empty.
220
221 - Fixed bug that caused "Binary is whitelisted" message to persist on
222 screen after loading MOK-signed drivers in Secure Boot mode.
223
224 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to ignore the "icon" token in refind.conf
225 manual boot stanzas.
226
227 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused the script to fail to update
228 drivers when rEFInd was installed in EFI/BOOT/.
229
230 0.6.5 (1/16/2013):
231 ------------------
232
233 - Improved text color support: rEFInd now uses black text against light
234 backgrounds and white text against dark backgrounds.
235
236 - Added support for PNGs as banners, icons, and selectors.
237
238 - Added icon for ALT Linux.
239
240 - Added "safemode" option to "hideui" token, to hide option to boot into
241 safe mode for OS X ("-v -x" option to boot.efi).
242
243 - Added icon for Haiku (os_haiku.icns).
244
245 - Enable transparency of icons & main-menu text when the banner icon is
246 sized to cover these areas.
247
248 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to crash if fed a banner image that's
249 too big. Note that "too big" can be substantially smaller than the screen
250 resolution!
251
252 0.6.4 (1/8/2013):
253 -----------------
254
255 - Revised install.sh to copy ext2fs driver, rather than ext4fs driver, for
256 ext2/3 filesystems. This can help keep non-functional entries from links
257 from /vmlinuz to /boot/vmlinuz out of the menu if the system uses ext4fs
258 on root and ext2fs or ext3fs on /boot.
259
260 - Fixed a couple of memory management bugs that cause rEFInd to hang at
261 startup on some systems.
262
263 0.6.3 (1/6/2013):
264 -----------------
265
266 - Added the ability to specify a volume name or number in the
267 "dont_scan_dirs" and "also_scan_dirs" tokens.
268
269 - Fixed a bug that caused removable EFI media to not appear in scan lists
270 if rEFInd was installed as EFI/BOOT/boot{arch}.efi on a hard disk.
271
272 - Modified ISO-9660 driver so that it can handle discs with other than
273 2048-byte sectors. This makes it useful for reading "hybrid ISO" images
274 burned to USB flash disks.
275
276 - New mvrefind.sh script to move a rEFInd installation between a standard
277 location (typically EFI/refind) and one of the fallback locations
278 (EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot). It can also do more exotic locations.
279
280 - The install.sh script now installs to EFI/BOOT/bootx64.efi or
281 EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi if it's run in BIOS mode. This is
282 intended to give some chance of producing a bootable installation should
283 a user accidentally install Linux in EFI mode and then install rEFInd
284 from that installation.
285
286 - The install.sh script now tries to find an existing rEFInd installation
287 and upgrade it, even if it's in EFI/BOOT or EFI/Microsoft/Boot rather
288 than in EFI/refind.
289
290 - New "--yes" option to install.sh to help with unattended or automated
291 installations (as from an RPM or Debian package).
292
293 0.6.2 (12/30/2012):
294 -------------------
295
296 - Inclusion of a sample refind.spec file for the benefit of RPM
297 distribution maintainers who might want to include rEFInd. It's a bit
298 rough, but it gets you a good chunk of the way there....
299
300 - The EFI filesystem drivers can now be built with the GNU-EFI toolkit as
301 well as with the TianoCore EDK2. See the BUILDING.txt file for details on
302 how to build them with either toolkit. This improvement doesn't affect
303 users of my binary packages, but it should make it easier for Linux
304 distributions to adopt rEFInd into their package systems.
305
306 - Tweaked refind.inf file for better build results using "native" TianoCore
307 EDK2 build process (vs. the Makefile-based build process that I use under
308 Linux). This won't affect those who use my binary builds or build under
309 Linux with the "make" command.
310
311 - Fixed bug that prevented Secure Boot launches from working when rEFInd
312 was built with GNU-EFI rather than the TianoCore EDK2.
313
314 - Substantial reworking of Secure Boot code, based on James Bottomley's
315 PreLoader program. This new code eliminates the limitation of launching
316 just one driver in Secure Boot mode and is likely to be more reliable
317 with future or obscure boot loaders. It should also work with non-x86-64
318 systems, although this relies on a platform-specific shim program, which
319 to date exists only for x86-64. The basic features are the same as before
320 -- rEFInd relies on shim for authentication functions and will launch
321 programs that are signed by Secure Boot keys, shim keys, or MOKs.
322
323 - Altered default for "textmode" option (when it's commented out) to not
324 adjust the text mode at all. (Prior versions set it to mode 0 by
325 default.)
326
327 0.6.1 (12/21/2012):
328 -------------------
329
330 - Added "--root" option to install.sh, to enable installation of rEFInd
331 to something other than the currently-running OS. This is intended for
332 use on emergency discs.
333
334 - Thanks to Stefan Agner, the ext4fs driver now supports the "meta_bg"
335 filesystem feature, which distributes metadata throughout the disk. This
336 feature isn't used by default, but can be set at filesystem creation time
337 by passing the "-O meta_bg,^resize_inode" option to mke2fs. (Using
338 "^resize_inode" is necessary because meta_bg is incompatible with
339 resize_inode, which IS used by default.) This feature can be used on
340 ext3fs and ext2fs as well as on ext4fs, so the ext4fs driver can now
341 handle some ext3fs and ext2fs partitions that the ext2fs driver can't
342 handle.
343
344 - Fixed some screen resolution-setting bugs.
345
346 - Added the "words" that make up a filesystem's label (delimited by spaces,
347 dashes, or underscores) to the list of bases used to search for OS icons.
348 For instance, if the filesystem's label is "Arch", rEFInd searches for
349 os_Arch.icns; if it's "Fedora 17", it searches for os_Fedora.icns and
350 os_17.icns; and if it's "NEW_GENTOO", it searches for os_NEW.icns and
351 os_GENTOO.icns.
352
353 - Refined hints displays to be more context-sensitive, particularly in text
354 mode.
355
356 - Instead of displaying a blank filesystem label when a filesystem has
357 none, rEFInd now displays the size and/or type of the filesystem, as in
358 "boot EFI\foo\bar.efi from 200 MiB ext3 volume" rather than "boot
359 EFI\foo\bar.efi from".
360
361 - Fixed a bug that caused the screen to clear after displaying an error
362 message but before displaying the "Hit any key to continue" message when
363 a boot loader launch failed.
364
365 0.6.0 (12/16/2012):
366 -------------------
367
368 - Fixed a memory allocation bug that could cause a program crash when
369 specifying certain values with the "also_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_volumes",
370 "dont_scan_dirs", "dont_scan_files", and "scan_driver_dirs" refind.conf
371 options.
372
373 - Modified Linux kernel initrd-finding code so that if an initrd is
374 specified in refind_linux.conf, rEFInd will not add any initrd it finds.
375 This enables an override of the default initrd, and is likely to be
376 particularly helpful to Arch Linux users.
377
378 - Added ext4fs driver!
379
380 - Made "boot" the default value for "also_scan_dirs".
381
382 - Added identifying screen header to line editor.
383
384 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd's display to be mis-sized upon return
385 from a program that set the resolution itself.
386
387 - Adjusted "resolution" refind.conf parameter so that it can accept EITHER
388 a resolution as width and height OR a single digit as a UEFI mode number
389 (which is system-specific). This is done because some systems present the
390 same mode twice in their mode lists, perhaps varying in refresh rate,
391 monitor output, or some other salient characteristics; specifying the
392 mode number enables selecting the higher-numbered mode, whereas using
393 horizontal and vertical resolution values selects the lowest-numbered
394 mode.
395
396 - Added "textmode" refind.conf parameter to set the text mode used in
397 text-only displays, and for the line editor and boot-time handoff
398 display even in graphics mode.
399
400 - Fixed bug that caused tools (shell, etc.) to launch when they were
401 highlighted and F2 or Insert was pressed.
402
403 - Added "editor" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf, which
404 disables the boot options editor.
405
406 - Added hints text to rEFInd main menu and sub-menus. This can be disabled
407 by setting the new "hints" option to the "hideui" token in refind.conf.
408
409 - Added "boot with minimal options" entry to refind_linux.conf file
410 generated by install.sh. This entry boots without the options extracted
411 from the /etc/default/grub file.
412
413 - Added keys subdirectory to main distribution, to hold public Secure
414 Boot/shim keys from known sources.
415
416 - Changed install.sh --drivers option to --alldrivers, added new
417 --nodrivers option, and made the default on Linux to install the one
418 driver that's used on /boot (or the root filesystem if /boot isn't a
419 separate partition). Of course, this won't install a non-existent driver,
420 and it also won't work properly if run from an emergency disk unless you
421 mount a separate /boot partition at that location.
422
423 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented creation of refind_linux.conf file
424 on Linux systems.
425
426 0.5.1.1 (12/12/2012):
427 ---------------------
428
429 - Fixed bug in install.sh that prevented it from working on OS X.
430
431 0.5.1 (12/11/2012):
432 -------------------
433
434 - Added support for "0" options to "textonly" and "scan_all_linux_kernels"
435 to reverse the usual meaning of these tokens. This is useful for
436 including these options in a secondary configuration file called with the
437 new "include" token to override a setting set in the main file.
438
439 - Added "include" token for refind.conf, to enable including a secondary
440 configuration file from a primary one.
441
442 - Modified install.sh so that it creates a simple refind_linux.conf file in
443 /boot, if that file doesn't already exist and if install.sh is run from
444 Linux. If that directory happens to be on a FAT, HFS+, ext2fs, ext3fs, or
445 ReiserFS volume, and if the necessary drivers are installed, the result
446 is that rEFInd will detect the Linux installation with no further
447 configuration on many systems. (Some may still require tweaking of kernel
448 options, though; for instance, adding "dolvm" on Gentoo systems that use
449 LVM.)
450
451 - Added --shim and --localkeys options to install.sh to help simplify setup
452 on systems with Secure Boot active.
453
454 - Fixed (maybe) bug that caused resolution options to not be displayed on
455 recent Macs with GOP graphics when specifying an invalid resolution in
456 refind.conf.
457
458 - Fixed bug that caused some programs (EFI shells, in particular) to hang
459 when launching on some systems (DUET, in particular).
460
461 - Implemented a fix to enable ELILO to launch with Secure Boot active.
462 This fix might help with some other boot loaders in Secure Boot mode,
463 too, but I don't know of any specifics.
464
465 0.5.0 (12/6/2012):
466 ------------------
467
468 - Added the ability to include quote marks ('"') in refind.conf and
469 refind_linux.conf tokens by doubling them up, as in:
470 "ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value=""this is it"""
471 This example results in the following string being passed as an
472 option:
473 ro root=/dev/sda4 some_value="this is it"
474
475 - Changed refind.conf-sample to uncomment the scan_all_linux_kernels
476 option by default. If this option is deleted or commented out, the
477 program default remains to not scan all Linux kernels; but with
478 increasing numbers of distributions shipping with kernels that include
479 EFI stub loader support, setting the configuration file default to scan
480 for them makes sense.
481
482 - Modified the "resolution" token so that it affects text mode as well
483 as graphics mode. On my systems, though, the actual text area is still
484 restricted to an 80x25 area. (This seems to be a firmware limitation; my
485 EFI shells are also so limited.)
486
487 - Fixed a bug that caused the options line editor to blank out lines that
488 were not actually edited.
489
490 - Added support for using Matthew Garrett's Shim program and its Machine
491 Owner Keys (MOKs) to extend Secure Boot capabilities. If rEFInd is
492 launched from Shim on a computer with Secure Boot active, rEFInd will
493 launch programs signed with either a standard UEFI Secure Boot key or a
494 MOK. For the moment, this feature works only on x86-64 systems.
495
496 - Added new "dont_scan_files" (aka "don't_scan_files") token for
497 refind.conf. The effect is similar to dont_scan_dirs, but it creates a
498 blacklist of filenames within directories rather than directory names.
499 I'm initially using it to place shim.efi and MokManager.efi in the
500 blacklist to keep these programs out of the OS list. (MokManager.efi is
501 scanned separately as a tool; see below.) I've moved checks for
502 ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi, and TextMode.efi to this list. (These
503 three had previously been blacklisted by hard-coding in ScanLoaderDir().)
504
505 - Added the directory from which rEFInd launched to dont_scan_dirs. This
506 works around a bug in which rEFInd would show itself as a bogus Windows
507 entry if it's installed as EFI/Microsoft/boot/bootmgfw.efi.
508
509 - Added support for launching MokManager.efi for managing the Machine Owner
510 Keys (MOKs) maintained by the shim boot loader developed by Fedora and
511 SUSE. This program is scanned and presented as a second-row tool.
512
513 - Added support for Apple's Recovery HD partition: If it's detected, a new
514 icon appears on the second row. This icon can be removed by explicitly
515 setting the "showtools" option in refind.conf and excluding the
516 "apple_recovery" option from that line.
517
518 - Fixed bug that caused text-mode ("textonly" refind.conf option enabled)
519 menu entries to be right-aligned rather than left-aligned when rEFInd was
520 compiled with the TianoCore EDK2.
521
522 - Added "--usedefault {devicename}" and "--drivers" options to the
523 install.sh script and changed the "esp" option to "--esp".
524
525 0.4.7 (11/6/2012):
526 ------------------
527
528 - Added an icon for gummiboot.
529
530 - Added a boot option editor: Pressing the Insert or F2 key from a boot
531 tag's options menu opens a simple text-mode line editor on which the boot
532 options may be edited for a one-time boot with altered options.
533
534 - Modified the "scan_delay" feature to delay and then perform a re-scan,
535 which may work better than the first attempt at this feature (which I'm
536 told isn't working as planned).
537
538 - Modified rEFInd to add a space after the command-line options only when
539 launching Mac OS X. On some early Macs, the extra space (which had been
540 present by default, as a carryover from rEFIt) causes problems when
541 booting Linux kernels from FAT partitions.
542
543 0.4.6 (10/6/2012):
544 ------------------
545
546 - Fixed some minor memory management issues.
547
548 - Added new "scan_delay" feature to impose a delay before scanning
549 for disks.
550
551 - Changed default "scanfor" option from internal-external-optical to either
552 internal-external-optical-manual (for non-Macs) or
553 internal-hdbios-external-biosexternal-optical-cd-manual (for Macs). I've
554 done this for two reasons:
555 - Many Mac users have been confused by the fact that rEFInd needs
556 reconfiguration to detect Windows (or Linux installed in BIOS mode),
557 since rEFIt scans BIOS devices by default. Adding the BIOS options as
558 default for them should help them.
559 - Adding the "manual" option enables users to simply add manual boot
560 stanzas and have them work, which is more intuitive. Adding the
561 "manual" option will have no effect unless manual stanzas are created
562 or uncommented, so this part of the change won't affect users' working
563 default configurations.
564
565 - Added new legacy (BIOS) boot support for UEFI-based PCs.
566
567 0.4.5 (8/12/2012):
568 ------------------
569
570 - Fixed bug that caused a failure to boot BIOS-based OSes on Macs.
571
572 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail to detect rEFItBlesser.
573
574 0.4.4 (6/23/2012):
575 ------------------
576
577 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be corrupted by rEFInd on
578 32-bit systems.
579
580 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be truncated in the drivers
581 on 32-bit systems.
582
583 - Fixed bug in use_graphics_for option parsing that caused most options
584 to set graphics mode for OS X and/or Linux but not other boot
585 loaders/OSes.
586
587 - Tweaked install script to better isolate the ESP under OS X.
588
589 0.4.3 (6/21/2012):
590 ------------------
591
592 - rEFInd now supports compilation using the TianoCore UDK2010/EDK2
593 development kit in addition to GNU-EFI.
594
595 - Added new "use_graphics_for" option to control which OSes to boot in
596 graphics mode. (This effect lasts for a fraction of a second on most
597 systems, since the boot loader that rEFInd launches is likely to set
598 graphics or text mode itself.)
599
600 - Graphics-mode booting now clears the screen to the current rEFInd
601 background color (rather than black) and does NOT display boot messages.
602 The intent is for a smoother transition when booting OS X, or perhaps
603 other OSes that don't display boot loader messages. In practice, this
604 effect will be tiny for many OSes, since the boot loader generally clears
605 the screen within a fraction of a second of being launched; but the
606 "flicker" of a rEFInd message in that time can sometimes be distracting.
607
608 - Filesystem drivers now work on EFI 1.x systems, such as Macs.
609
610 - Removed "linux.conf" as a valid alternative name for "refind_linux.conf"
611 for holding Linux kernel options. The kernel developers plan to use
612 "linux.conf" themselves.
613
614 0.4.2 (6/3/2012):
615 -----------------
616
617 - Added a message to install.sh when run on Macs to remind users to update
618 the "scanfor" line in refind.conf if they need to boot BIOS-based OSes
619 via rEFInd.
620
621 - Modified install.sh script to be smarter about running efibootmgr on
622 Linux. It now uses the whole path to the rEFInd binary as a key to
623 determine whether an existing entry exists, rather than just the filename
624 portion. If an entry exists and is the first entry in the boot order, the
625 script does nothing to the NVRAM entries. If such an entry exists but is
626 not the default, the script deletes that entry and creates a new one
627 (implicitly making it the first in the boot order). If such an entry does
628 not exist, the script creates a new one (again, making it the first in
629 the boot order).
630
631 - Added "dont_scan_dirs" configuration file option, which adds directories
632 to a "blacklist" of directories that are NOT scanned for boot loaders.
633
634 0.4.1 (5/25/2012):
635 ------------------
636
637 - Added "scanning for new boot loaders" message to the re-scan function
638 (hitting Esc at the main menu). It usually flashes up too quickly to
639 be of importance, but if the scan function takes a while because of
640 access to a CD that must be spun up, it should make it clear that the
641 system hasn't hung.
642
643 - Modified install.sh script to detect rEFItBlesser on Macs, and if
644 present, to ask the user if it should be removed.
645
646 - Cleaned up the Make.common file for the filesystem drivers.
647
648 - Changed HFS+ driver to return volume label of "HFS+ volume" rather than
649 an empty label. (The driver doesn't currently read the real volume
650 label.)
651
652 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to appear in its own menu after
653 running a shell and then re-scanning for boot loaders.
654
655 0.4.0 (5/20/2012):
656 ------------------
657
658 - Inclusion of drivers for ISO-9660, HFS+, ReiserFS, and ext2fs. Most of
659 these drivers originated with rEFIt, although the HFS+ driver seems to
660 have come from Oracle's VirtualBox, with some files from Apple. I hadn't
661 included these drivers previously because the build process proved
662 challenging. As it is, they don't work on my Mac Mini, I suspect because
663 the build process with the UDK2010 development kit may not work with the
664 EFI 1.x that Apple uses.
665
666 - Addition of support for drivers in the "drivers_{arch}" subdirectory of
667 the main rEFInd binary directory (e.g., "drivers_x64" or "drivers_ia32").
668 Drivers may continue to be placed in the "drivers" subdirectory.
669
670 - Added new feature to eject CDs (and other removable media): Press F12 to
671 eject all such media. This function works only on some Macs, though (it
672 relies on an Apple-specific EFI extension, and this extension isn't even
673 implemented on all Macs, much less on UEFI-based PCs).
674
675 - Fixed a problem that could cause GRUB 2 to fail to read its configuration
676 file when launched from rEFInd.
677
678 0.3.5 (5/15/2012):
679 ------------------
680
681 - Removed the GRUB 2 detection "reciped" added with 0.3.2, since I've
682 received reports that it's not working as intended.
683
684 - Added re-scan feature: Press the Esc key to have rEFInd re-read its
685 configuration file, tell the EFI to scan for new filesystems, and re-scan
686 those filesystems for boot loaders. The main purpose is to enable
687 scanning a new removable medium that you insert after launching rEFInd;
688 however, it can also be used to immediately implement changes to the
689 configuration file or new drivers you load from an EFI shell.
690
691 - Fixed a bug that could cause the scroll-right arrow to be replaced by the
692 scroll-left arrow under some circumstances.
693
694 0.3.4 (5/9/2012):
695 -----------------
696
697 - Added new configuration file option: "icons_dir", which sets the name
698 of the subdirectory in which icons are found. See the documentation or
699 sample configuration file for a full description.
700
701 - Modified Makefile to generate rEFInd binary that includes architecture
702 code -- refind_ia32.efi or refind_x64.efi, rather than the generic
703 refind.efi. This is done mainly to help the install.sh script. The
704 program can be named anything you like on the disk. (The generic name
705 refind.efi is used on unknown architectures.)
706
707 - Improved install.sh script: Fixed bug on OS X 10.7 and enable it to be
708 used after building from source code (or via new "make install" Makefile
709 target).
710
711 - Improved screen redraws to produce less flicker when moving among the
712 second-row tags or to the last tag on the first row.
713
714 0.3.3 (5/6/2012):
715 -----------------
716
717 - Improved menu navigation:
718 - In graphics mode, left & right arrow keys move left & right, while up &
719 down arrows move between rows.
720 - Page Up and Page Down now move through chunks of visible tags (in both
721 text & graphics modes), jumping from one row to another only when at
722 the edge of the row. In text mode, the "rows" are broken down as in
723 graphics mode, but they aren't visibly distinguished on the screen.
724
725 - Improved text-mode use: rEFInd now displays the proper number of entries
726 when first started in text mode and scrolling is done sensibly when too
727 many entries exist to fit on the screen.
728
729 0.3.2 (5/4/2012):
730 -----------------
731
732 - Added the install.sh script to install rEFInd on Linux and Mac OS X
733 systems. This script must be run as root (or via sudo). It requires
734 no options, but on Mac OS X, passing it the "esp" option causes it
735 to install rEFInd on the computer's ESP rather than the default of the
736 currently OS X boot partition. (Under Linux, the default is to install to
737 the ESP.) Note that there may be some unusual cases in which this script
738 will fail to work.
739
740 - Does a better job of clearing the screen when launching OSes in text
741 mode.
742
743 - Added detection "recipe" for GRUB 2's BIOS Boot Partition.
744
745 - Fixed bogus detection of ESPs created by Linux's mkdosfs utility or
746 Windows as bootable partitions when "scanfor" includes BIOS scanning
747 options.
748
749
750 0.3.1 (4/27/2012):
751 ------------------
752
753 - Fixed bug that caused spurious "Unsupported while scanning the root
754 directory" messages under some conitions on Macs.
755
756 - Modified loader scanning code to sort boot loader entries within a
757 directory by modification time, so that the most recently-modified loader
758 is first among those in a given directory. Thus, if you specify a
759 directory name (or volume name, for loaders stored in the root directory
760 of a volume) as the default_selection, the most recent of those loaders
761 will be the default. This is intended to help with Linux kernel
762 maintenance when using the EFI stub loader; set up this way, the most
763 recent kernel copied to your kernel directory will be the default,
764 obviating the need to adjust the refind.conf file when adding a new
765 kernel. If you want to change the default among those in the default
766 directory, you can use "touch" to adjust the modification timestamp.
767
768 - Tweaked code to find loader-specific .icns file so that it finds files
769 for Linux kernels without .efi extensions. In this case, files should be
770 named the same as the kernels they match, but with .icns extensions. For
771 instance, bzImage-3.3.2 should have an icon called bzImage-3.3.2.icns.
772 (The old code would have looked for an icon called bzImage-3.3.icns.)
773
774 - Eliminated bogus OS loader tags for filenames that end in ".icns" when
775 the scan_all_linux_kernels option is set.
776
777 0.3.0 (4/22/2012):
778 ------------------
779
780 - I'm officially upgrading this project's status from "alpha" to "beta" and
781 giving it a bump from 0.2.x to 0.3.0. This doesn't reflect any major
782 milestone with this version; rather, it reflects my sense that rEFInd has
783 been "out there" for a while, and although I've gotten bug reports,
784 they've been minor and/or have been fixed. The program still has known
785 bugs, but my impression is that it is, overall, usable by ordinary users.
786
787 - Added "resolution" option to refind.conf, which enables setting the video
788 resolution. To use it, pass two numeric values, as in "resolution 1024
789 768" to use a 1024x768 video mode. Note that not all modes are supported.
790 If you specify a non-supported video mode on a UEFI system, a message
791 appears listing the supported video modes and you must then press a key
792 to continue, using the default video mode (usually 800x600).
793 Unfortunately, I don't know the calls to get a list of supported video
794 modes on older EFI 1.x systems (including Macs), so on Macs setting an
795 incorrect video mode silently fails (you keep using the default mode).
796 This makes changing your video mode a hit-or-miss proposition on Macs.
797 CAUTION: It's possible to set a legal video mode that your monitor can't
798 handle, in which case you'll get a blank display until you boot an OS
799 that resets the video mode.
800
801 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused rEFInd to crash when returning from an
802 EFI shell or other programs on Macs, particularly when rEFInd used
803 graphical mode. I'm not 100% sure this bug is squashed because I still
804 don't understand the cause and I only have one Mac for testing. See
805 comments in the ReinitRefitLib() function in refit/lib.c for more
806 details.
807
808 - Added new refind.conf option: scan_all_linux_kernels, which causes Linux
809 kernels that lack ".efi" extensions to be included in scans for EFI boot
810 loaders. This may help integration with Linux distributions that don't
811 give their kernels such names by default. Beware, though: It can detect
812 unwanted files, such as older non-stub-loader kernels or .icns files used
813 to give kernels with .efi extensions custom icons.
814
815 - Improved EFI boot loader detection on boards with Gigabyte's Hybrid EFI,
816 and perhaps other EFIs with a buggy StriCmp() function. Files with both
817 ".efi" and ".EFI" extensions should now be detected as boot loaders.
818
819 - Fixed a bug that caused rEFInd to fail to scan for drivers if the
820 filesystem driver didn't set a volume name (that is, if the relevant
821 field was set to NULL rather than even an empty string). In such
822 situations, rEFInd now reports the volume name as "Unknown".
823
824 0.2.7 (4/19/2012):
825 ------------------
826
827 - After much trial and tribulation, I've overcome a GNU-EFI limitation and
828 enabled rEFInd to load EFI drivers. This feature was present in the
829 original build of rEFIt but was removed in the versions that could
830 compile under Linux, but now it's back -- and still being compiled under
831 Linux! To use it, you should place your drivers in a convenient directory
832 on the ESP (or whatever partition you use to launch rEFInd) and add a
833 "scan_driver_dirs" entry to refind.conf to tell rEFInd where to look. (As
834 always, you should specify the driver directory relative to the root of
835 the filesystem.) Note that you can't launch drivers from another
836 filesystem; they must be on the same volume that holds rEFInd. Those who
837 compile from source code should note that implementing this feature
838 necessitated using a more recent version of the GNU-EFI library. I'm
839 currently using version 3.0p, and version 3.0i does NOT work. I don't
840 know where the change occurred, but you may need to upgrade your GNU-EFI
841 installation.
842
843 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to show up in its own menu sometimes.
844
845 - Added new refind.conf token: also_scan_dirs. When scanning volumes for
846 EFI boot loaders, rEFInd always scans the root directory and every
847 subdirectory of the /EFI directory, but it doesn't recurse into these
848 directories. The also_scan_dirs token adds more directories to the scan
849 list. It defaults to "elilo,boot", but you can set it to any directory or
850 directories you like.
851
852 0.2.6 (4/14/2012):
853 ------------------
854
855 - Added "volume" keyword to configuration file's stanza options. This
856 option changes the volume from which subsequent files (specified by
857 "loader" and "icon") are loaded. You pass "volume" the name/label of the
858 FILESYSTEM you want to use (not the GPT partition name), or a number
859 followed by a colon (e.g., "1:"). The former should reliably identify a
860 filesystem, assuming the name is unique. The latter assigns numbers based
861 on the order in which they're scanned, which may not be as reliable but
862 should work when a volume is unnamed.
863
864 - Fixed bug in 0.2.5 that caused failure of Linux initial RAM disk
865 mapping on some (but not all) systems. Affected computers include at
866 least some Intel motherboards, maybe others.
867
868 0.2.5 (4/9/2012):
869 -----------------
870
871 - Fixed bug that caused an inability to associate initial RAM disks with
872 Linux kernels stored in a volume's root directory.
873
874 - Volume badges (that override default badges) are now stored in
875 .VolumeBadge.icns. Although undocumented, rEFInd formerly loaded custom
876 volume badges from .VolumeIcon.icns. This carryover from rEFIt was a
877 confusing name, given the next (new) feature, so I've changed and
878 documented the name....
879
880 - Added ability to set a default icon for a loader stored in the root
881 directory of a volume: The icon is stored in .VolumeIcon.icns. This icon
882 is also used for Mac OS X volumes booted from the standard location.
883
884 - Fixed bug that caused icons to drop back to generic icons when rEFInd
885 was launched in certain ways (such as from an EFI shell in rEFInd's
886 directory) on certain systems.
887
888 - Fixed bug that caused "unknown disable flag" to be shown (very briefly)
889 instead of "unknown hideui flag" when an improper hideui flag was set.
890
891 0.2.4 (4/5/2012):
892 -----------------
893
894 - Created new refind.conf entry: "showtools". This entry takes options of
895 "shell", "gptsync", "about", "exit", "reboot", and "shutdown". This
896 option is in some respects an affirmative version of portions of the old
897 "disable" and "hideui" options; however, it enables users to specify the
898 order in which these options appear on the screen. Also, the "exit"
899 option is new; it terminates the program. The effect is usually to return
900 to whatever tool launched it or to launch a default OS; however, this is
901 somewhat unpredictable. The default therefore omits the "exit" option, as
902 well as "gptsync", which has always been dangerous (but necessary on most
903 MacOS/Windows dual-boot setups on Macs). As part of this reconfiguration,
904 I've eliminated the "rescue Linux" option, which always seemed pointless
905 to me.
906
907 - Folded "disable" and "hideui" refind.conf entries into one ("disable"),
908 and reduced the number of options to six: "banner", "label",
909 "singleuser", "hwtest", "arrows", and "all". ("arrows" is new and
910 disables the scroll arrows when a system has too many tags to display
911 simultaneously.)
912
913 - Added max_tags option to the refind.conf file, enabling users to reduce
914 the maximum number of OS loader tags that can be displayed at once.
915
916 - Updated rEFIt icon, based on the 128x128 volume label from the rEFIt CD
917 image.
918
919 - Added x86 and x86-64 EFI shells to the CD image version of the binary,
920 but NOT to the binary zip file. The logic is that the CD image is more
921 likely to be used directly as an emergency disc and so may need this
922 feature, even though the source isn't part of the rEFInd project. (The
923 source is readily available from the TianoCore project.)
924
925 - EFI shells may now be stored at /shellx64.efi for x86-64 systems or at
926 /shellia32.efi for x86 systems. The /EFI/tools/shell.efi name is also
927 recognized; however, if both files are present, two EFI shell icons will
928 appear on the main menu. The /efi/{refind-path/apps/shell.efi filename,
929 which was never officially documented but worked as a carryover from
930 rEFIt, is no longer valid.
931
932 0.2.3 (3/26/2012):
933 ------------------
934
935 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused hangs when launching a second program
936 after returning from a first. There are some weird system-to-system
937 differences, though, and this fix causes (apparently harmless) error
938 messages about "(re)opening our installation volume" on at least one
939 system (a 32-bit Mac Mini). I'm committing this change because, imperfect
940 though it is, it's preferable to the earlier version, at least on my
941 small sample of computers.
942
943 - Because of news that the Linux kernel developers are planning to use the
944 filename linux.conf to hold Linux kernel configuration data for EFI
945 booting, I'm transitioning rEFInd away from that name and to
946 refind_linux.conf to avoid a conflict. This version can use either name,
947 with refind_linux.conf taking precedence if both are present.
948
949 - Added logo for Arch Linux.
950
951 0.2.2 (3/23/2012):
952 ------------------
953
954 - Fixed bug that caused program failure when Linux kernels with EFI stub
955 support were detected with no associated version numbers. rEFInd now
956 permits automatic linking of *ONE* versionless kernel to *ONE*
957 versionless initrd file.
958
959 - Fixed bug that caused program hangs when a boot loader filename or label
960 was too long. Such names are now properly truncated and program execution
961 continues.
962
963 - Fixed bug that caused no text to appear in submenus on UEFI systems with
964 small screens (800x600). NOTE: Problem still occurs on screens smaller
965 than this, but such systems are very rare.
966
967 0.2.1 (3/19/2012):
968 ------------------
969
970 - Added ability to set a "default_selection" that's a title or a substring
971 of one -- the name given to a stanza in a "menuentry" or the boot
972 loader's filename, in most cases, although "Mac OS X", "Windows XP
973 (XoM)", and "Microsoft EFI boot" are also titles.
974
975 - Added support for semi-automatic scans of Linux kernels with EFI stub
976 loader support. The program auto-detects matching initial RAM disk files
977 and loads additional options from the "linux.conf" file in the same
978 directory as the kernel.
979
980 - Added support for "submenuentry" keyword and associated sub-stanza
981 entries in refind.conf file.
982
983 - Renamed icons/os_mint.icns to icons/os_linuxmint.icns to match the
984 filename Linux Mint ACTUALLY uses for its ESP boot loader directory.
985
986
987 0.2.0 (3/14/2012):
988 ------------------
989
990 - Initial public release