]> code.delx.au - refind/blob - NEWS.txt
Fixed bug in options line editor that caused unedited lines to be returned as
[refind] / NEWS.txt
1 0.5.0 (??/??/2012):
2 -------------------
3
4 - Fixed a bug that caused the options line editor to blank out lines that
5 were not actually edited.
6
7 - Added support for using Matthew Garrett's Shim program and its Machine
8 Owner Keys (MOKs) to extend Secure Boot capabilities. If rEFInd is
9 launched from Shim on a computer with Secure Boot active, rEFInd will
10 launch programs signed with either a standard UEFI Secure Boot key or a
11 MOK. For the moment, this feature works only on x86-64 systems.
12
13 - Added new "dont_scan_files" (aka "don't_scan_files") token for
14 refind.conf. The effect is similar to dont_scan_dirs, but it creates a
15 blacklist of filenames within directories rather than directory names.
16 I'm initially using it to place shim.efi and MokManager.efi in the
17 blacklist to keep these programs out of the OS list. (MokManager.efi is
18 scanned separately as a tool; see below.) I've moved checks for
19 ebounce.efi, GraphicsConsole.efi, and TextMode.efi to this list. (These
20 three had previously been blacklisted by hard-coding in ScanLoaderDir().)
21
22 - Added the directory from which rEFInd launched to dont_scan_dirs. This
23 works around a bug in which rEFInd would show itself as a bogus Windows
24 entry if it's installed as EFI/Microsoft/boot/bootmgfw.efi.
25
26 - Added support for launching MokManager.efi for managing the Machine Owner
27 Keys (MOKs) maintained by the shim boot loader developed by Fedora and
28 SUSE. This program is scanned and presented as a second-row tool.
29
30 - Added support for Apple's Recovery HD partition: If it's detected, a new
31 icon appears on the second row. This icon can be removed by explicitly
32 setting the "showtools" option in refind.conf and excluding the
33 "apple_recovery" option from that line.
34
35 - Fixed bug that caused text-mode ("textonly" refind.conf option enabled)
36 menu entries to be right-aligned rather than left-aligned when rEFInd was
37 compiled with the TianoCore EDK2.
38
39 - Added "--usedefault {devicename}" and "--drivers" options to the
40 install.sh script and changed the "esp" option to "--esp".
41
42 0.4.7 (11/6/2012):
43 ------------------
44
45 - Added an icon for gummiboot.
46
47 - Added a boot option editor: Pressing the Insert or F2 key from a boot
48 tag's options menu opens a simple text-mode line editor on which the boot
49 options may be edited for a one-time boot with altered options.
50
51 - Modified the "scan_delay" feature to delay and then perform a re-scan,
52 which may work better than the first attempt at this feature (which I'm
53 told isn't working as planned).
54
55 - Modified rEFInd to add a space after the command-line options only when
56 launching Mac OS X. On some early Macs, the extra space (which had been
57 present by default, as a carryover from rEFIt) causes problems when
58 booting Linux kernels from FAT partitions.
59
60 0.4.6 (10/6/2012):
61 ------------------
62
63 - Fixed some minor memory management issues.
64
65 - Added new "scan_delay" feature to impose a delay before scanning
66 for disks.
67
68 - Changed default "scanfor" option from internal-external-optical to either
69 internal-external-optical-manual (for non-Macs) or
70 internal-hdbios-external-biosexternal-optical-cd-manual (for Macs). I've
71 done this for two reasons:
72 - Many Mac users have been confused by the fact that rEFInd needs
73 reconfiguration to detect Windows (or Linux installed in BIOS mode),
74 since rEFIt scans BIOS devices by default. Adding the BIOS options as
75 default for them should help them.
76 - Adding the "manual" option enables users to simply add manual boot
77 stanzas and have them work, which is more intuitive. Adding the
78 "manual" option will have no effect unless manual stanzas are created
79 or uncommented, so this part of the change won't affect users' working
80 default configurations.
81
82 - Added new legacy (BIOS) boot support for UEFI-based PCs.
83
84 0.4.5 (8/12/2012):
85 ------------------
86
87 - Fixed bug that caused a failure to boot BIOS-based OSes on Macs.
88
89 - Fixed bug in install.sh that caused it to fail to detect rEFItBlesser.
90
91 0.4.4 (6/23/2012):
92 ------------------
93
94 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be corrupted by rEFInd on
95 32-bit systems.
96
97 - Fixed bug that caused filesystem labels to be truncated in the drivers
98 on 32-bit systems.
99
100 - Fixed bug in use_graphics_for option parsing that caused most options
101 to set graphics mode for OS X and/or Linux but not other boot
102 loaders/OSes.
103
104 - Tweaked install script to better isolate the ESP under OS X.
105
106 0.4.3 (6/21/2012):
107 ------------------
108
109 - rEFInd now supports compilation using the TianoCore UDK2010/EDK2
110 development kit in addition to GNU-EFI.
111
112 - Added new "use_graphics_for" option to control which OSes to boot in
113 graphics mode. (This effect lasts for a fraction of a second on most
114 systems, since the boot loader that rEFInd launches is likely to set
115 graphics or text mode itself.)
116
117 - Graphics-mode booting now clears the screen to the current rEFInd
118 background color (rather than black) and does NOT display boot messages.
119 The intent is for a smoother transition when booting OS X, or perhaps
120 other OSes that don't display boot loader messages. In practice, this
121 effect will be tiny for many OSes, since the boot loader generally clears
122 the screen within a fraction of a second of being launched; but the
123 "flicker" of a rEFInd message in that time can sometimes be distracting.
124
125 - Filesystem drivers now work on EFI 1.x systems, such as Macs.
126
127 - Removed "linux.conf" as a valid alternative name for "refind_linux.conf"
128 for holding Linux kernel options. The kernel developers plan to use
129 "linux.conf" themselves.
130
131 0.4.2 (6/3/2012):
132 -----------------
133
134 - Added a message to install.sh when run on Macs to remind users to update
135 the "scanfor" line in refind.conf if they need to boot BIOS-based OSes
136 via rEFInd.
137
138 - Modified install.sh script to be smarter about running efibootmgr on
139 Linux. It now uses the whole path to the rEFInd binary as a key to
140 determine whether an existing entry exists, rather than just the filename
141 portion. If an entry exists and is the first entry in the boot order, the
142 script does nothing to the NVRAM entries. If such an entry exists but is
143 not the default, the script deletes that entry and creates a new one
144 (implicitly making it the first in the boot order). If such an entry does
145 not exist, the script creates a new one (again, making it the first in
146 the boot order).
147
148 - Added "dont_scan_dirs" configuration file option, which adds directories
149 to a "blacklist" of directories that are NOT scanned for boot loaders.
150
151 0.4.1 (5/25/2012):
152 ------------------
153
154 - Added "scanning for new boot loaders" message to the re-scan function
155 (hitting Esc at the main menu). It usually flashes up too quickly to
156 be of importance, but if the scan function takes a while because of
157 access to a CD that must be spun up, it should make it clear that the
158 system hasn't hung.
159
160 - Modified install.sh script to detect rEFItBlesser on Macs, and if
161 present, to ask the user if it should be removed.
162
163 - Cleaned up the Make.common file for the filesystem drivers.
164
165 - Changed HFS+ driver to return volume label of "HFS+ volume" rather than
166 an empty label. (The driver doesn't currently read the real volume
167 label.)
168
169 - Fixed bug that could cause rEFInd to appear in its own menu after
170 running a shell and then re-scanning for boot loaders.
171
172 0.4.0 (5/20/2012):
173 ------------------
174
175 - Inclusion of drivers for ISO-9660, HFS+, ReiserFS, and ext2fs. Most of
176 these drivers originated with rEFIt, although the HFS+ driver seems to
177 have come from Oracle's VirtualBox, with some files from Apple. I hadn't
178 included these drivers previously because the build process proved
179 challenging. As it is, they don't work on my Mac Mini, I suspect because
180 the build process with the UDK2010 development kit may not work with the
181 EFI 1.x that Apple uses.
182
183 - Addition of support for drivers in the "drivers_{arch}" subdirectory of
184 the main rEFInd binary directory (e.g., "drivers_x64" or "drivers_ia32").
185 Drivers may continue to be placed in the "drivers" subdirectory.
186
187 - Added new feature to eject CDs (and other removable media): Press F12 to
188 eject all such media. This function works only on some Macs, though (it
189 relies on an Apple-specific EFI extension, and this extension isn't even
190 implemented on all Macs, much less on UEFI-based PCs).
191
192 - Fixed a problem that could cause GRUB 2 to fail to read its configuration
193 file when launched from rEFInd.
194
195 0.3.5 (5/15/2012):
196 ------------------
197
198 - Removed the GRUB 2 detection "reciped" added with 0.3.2, since I've
199 received reports that it's not working as intended.
200
201 - Added re-scan feature: Press the Esc key to have rEFInd re-read its
202 configuration file, tell the EFI to scan for new filesystems, and re-scan
203 those filesystems for boot loaders. The main purpose is to enable
204 scanning a new removable medium that you insert after launching rEFInd;
205 however, it can also be used to immediately implement changes to the
206 configuration file or new drivers you load from an EFI shell.
207
208 - Fixed a bug that could cause the scroll-right arrow to be replaced by the
209 scroll-left arrow under some circumstances.
210
211 0.3.4 (5/9/2012):
212 -----------------
213
214 - Added new configuration file option: "icons_dir", which sets the name
215 of the subdirectory in which icons are found. See the documentation or
216 sample configuration file for a full description.
217
218 - Modified Makefile to generate rEFInd binary that includes architecture
219 code -- refind_ia32.efi or refind_x64.efi, rather than the generic
220 refind.efi. This is done mainly to help the install.sh script. The
221 program can be named anything you like on the disk. (The generic name
222 refind.efi is used on unknown architectures.)
223
224 - Improved install.sh script: Fixed bug on OS X 10.7 and enable it to be
225 used after building from source code (or via new "make install" Makefile
226 target).
227
228 - Improved screen redraws to produce less flicker when moving among the
229 second-row tags or to the last tag on the first row.
230
231 0.3.3 (5/6/2012):
232 -----------------
233
234 - Improved menu navigation:
235 - In graphics mode, left & right arrow keys move left & right, while up &
236 down arrows move between rows.
237 - Page Up and Page Down now move through chunks of visible tags (in both
238 text & graphics modes), jumping from one row to another only when at
239 the edge of the row. In text mode, the "rows" are broken down as in
240 graphics mode, but they aren't visibly distinguished on the screen.
241
242 - Improved text-mode use: rEFInd now displays the proper number of entries
243 when first started in text mode and scrolling is done sensibly when too
244 many entries exist to fit on the screen.
245
246 0.3.2 (5/4/2012):
247 -----------------
248
249 - Added the install.sh script to install rEFInd on Linux and Mac OS X
250 systems. This script must be run as root (or via sudo). It requires
251 no options, but on Mac OS X, passing it the "esp" option causes it
252 to install rEFInd on the computer's ESP rather than the default of the
253 currently OS X boot partition. (Under Linux, the default is to install to
254 the ESP.) Note that there may be some unusual cases in which this script
255 will fail to work.
256
257 - Does a better job of clearing the screen when launching OSes in text
258 mode.
259
260 - Added detection "recipe" for GRUB 2's BIOS Boot Partition.
261
262 - Fixed bogus detection of ESPs created by Linux's mkdosfs utility or
263 Windows as bootable partitions when "scanfor" includes BIOS scanning
264 options.
265
266
267 0.3.1 (4/27/2012):
268 ------------------
269
270 - Fixed bug that caused spurious "Unsupported while scanning the root
271 directory" messages under some conitions on Macs.
272
273 - Modified loader scanning code to sort boot loader entries within a
274 directory by modification time, so that the most recently-modified loader
275 is first among those in a given directory. Thus, if you specify a
276 directory name (or volume name, for loaders stored in the root directory
277 of a volume) as the default_selection, the most recent of those loaders
278 will be the default. This is intended to help with Linux kernel
279 maintenance when using the EFI stub loader; set up this way, the most
280 recent kernel copied to your kernel directory will be the default,
281 obviating the need to adjust the refind.conf file when adding a new
282 kernel. If you want to change the default among those in the default
283 directory, you can use "touch" to adjust the modification timestamp.
284
285 - Tweaked code to find loader-specific .icns file so that it finds files
286 for Linux kernels without .efi extensions. In this case, files should be
287 named the same as the kernels they match, but with .icns extensions. For
288 instance, bzImage-3.3.2 should have an icon called bzImage-3.3.2.icns.
289 (The old code would have looked for an icon called bzImage-3.3.icns.)
290
291 - Eliminated bogus OS loader tags for filenames that end in ".icns" when
292 the scan_all_linux_kernels option is set.
293
294 0.3.0 (4/22/2012):
295 ------------------
296
297 - I'm officially upgrading this project's status from "alpha" to "beta" and
298 giving it a bump from 0.2.x to 0.3.0. This doesn't reflect any major
299 milestone with this version; rather, it reflects my sense that rEFInd has
300 been "out there" for a while, and although I've gotten bug reports,
301 they've been minor and/or have been fixed. The program still has known
302 bugs, but my impression is that it is, overall, usable by ordinary users.
303
304 - Added "resolution" option to refind.conf, which enables setting the video
305 resolution. To use it, pass two numeric values, as in "resolution 1024
306 768" to use a 1024x768 video mode. Note that not all modes are supported.
307 If you specify a non-supported video mode on a UEFI system, a message
308 appears listing the supported video modes and you must then press a key
309 to continue, using the default video mode (usually 800x600).
310 Unfortunately, I don't know the calls to get a list of supported video
311 modes on older EFI 1.x systems (including Macs), so on Macs setting an
312 incorrect video mode silently fails (you keep using the default mode).
313 This makes changing your video mode a hit-or-miss proposition on Macs.
314 CAUTION: It's possible to set a legal video mode that your monitor can't
315 handle, in which case you'll get a blank display until you boot an OS
316 that resets the video mode.
317
318 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused rEFInd to crash when returning from an
319 EFI shell or other programs on Macs, particularly when rEFInd used
320 graphical mode. I'm not 100% sure this bug is squashed because I still
321 don't understand the cause and I only have one Mac for testing. See
322 comments in the ReinitRefitLib() function in refit/lib.c for more
323 details.
324
325 - Added new refind.conf option: scan_all_linux_kernels, which causes Linux
326 kernels that lack ".efi" extensions to be included in scans for EFI boot
327 loaders. This may help integration with Linux distributions that don't
328 give their kernels such names by default. Beware, though: It can detect
329 unwanted files, such as older non-stub-loader kernels or .icns files used
330 to give kernels with .efi extensions custom icons.
331
332 - Improved EFI boot loader detection on boards with Gigabyte's Hybrid EFI,
333 and perhaps other EFIs with a buggy StriCmp() function. Files with both
334 ".efi" and ".EFI" extensions should now be detected as boot loaders.
335
336 - Fixed a bug that caused rEFInd to fail to scan for drivers if the
337 filesystem driver didn't set a volume name (that is, if the relevant
338 field was set to NULL rather than even an empty string). In such
339 situations, rEFInd now reports the volume name as "Unknown".
340
341 0.2.7 (4/19/2012):
342 ------------------
343
344 - After much trial and tribulation, I've overcome a GNU-EFI limitation and
345 enabled rEFInd to load EFI drivers. This feature was present in the
346 original build of rEFIt but was removed in the versions that could
347 compile under Linux, but now it's back -- and still being compiled under
348 Linux! To use it, you should place your drivers in a convenient directory
349 on the ESP (or whatever partition you use to launch rEFInd) and add a
350 "scan_driver_dirs" entry to refind.conf to tell rEFInd where to look. (As
351 always, you should specify the driver directory relative to the root of
352 the filesystem.) Note that you can't launch drivers from another
353 filesystem; they must be on the same volume that holds rEFInd. Those who
354 compile from source code should note that implementing this feature
355 necessitated using a more recent version of the GNU-EFI library. I'm
356 currently using version 3.0p, and version 3.0i does NOT work. I don't
357 know where the change occurred, but you may need to upgrade your GNU-EFI
358 installation.
359
360 - Fixed bug that caused rEFInd to show up in its own menu sometimes.
361
362 - Added new refind.conf token: also_scan_dirs. When scanning volumes for
363 EFI boot loaders, rEFInd always scans the root directory and every
364 subdirectory of the /EFI directory, but it doesn't recurse into these
365 directories. The also_scan_dirs token adds more directories to the scan
366 list. It defaults to "elilo,boot", but you can set it to any directory or
367 directories you like.
368
369 0.2.6 (4/14/2012):
370 ------------------
371
372 - Added "volume" keyword to configuration file's stanza options. This
373 option changes the volume from which subsequent files (specified by
374 "loader" and "icon") are loaded. You pass "volume" the name/label of the
375 FILESYSTEM you want to use (not the GPT partition name), or a number
376 followed by a colon (e.g., "1:"). The former should reliably identify a
377 filesystem, assuming the name is unique. The latter assigns numbers based
378 on the order in which they're scanned, which may not be as reliable but
379 should work when a volume is unnamed.
380
381 - Fixed bug in 0.2.5 that caused failure of Linux initial RAM disk
382 mapping on some (but not all) systems. Affected computers include at
383 least some Intel motherboards, maybe others.
384
385 0.2.5 (4/9/2012):
386 -----------------
387
388 - Fixed bug that caused an inability to associate initial RAM disks with
389 Linux kernels stored in a volume's root directory.
390
391 - Volume badges (that override default badges) are now stored in
392 .VolumeBadge.icns. Although undocumented, rEFInd formerly loaded custom
393 volume badges from .VolumeIcon.icns. This carryover from rEFIt was a
394 confusing name, given the next (new) feature, so I've changed and
395 documented the name....
396
397 - Added ability to set a default icon for a loader stored in the root
398 directory of a volume: The icon is stored in .VolumeIcon.icns. This icon
399 is also used for Mac OS X volumes booted from the standard location.
400
401 - Fixed bug that caused icons to drop back to generic icons when rEFInd
402 was launched in certain ways (such as from an EFI shell in rEFInd's
403 directory) on certain systems.
404
405 - Fixed bug that caused "unknown disable flag" to be shown (very briefly)
406 instead of "unknown hideui flag" when an improper hideui flag was set.
407
408 0.2.4 (4/5/2012):
409 -----------------
410
411 - Created new refind.conf entry: "showtools". This entry takes options of
412 "shell", "gptsync", "about", "exit", "reboot", and "shutdown". This
413 option is in some respects an affirmative version of portions of the old
414 "disable" and "hideui" options; however, it enables users to specify the
415 order in which these options appear on the screen. Also, the "exit"
416 option is new; it terminates the program. The effect is usually to return
417 to whatever tool launched it or to launch a default OS; however, this is
418 somewhat unpredictable. The default therefore omits the "exit" option, as
419 well as "gptsync", which has always been dangerous (but necessary on most
420 MacOS/Windows dual-boot setups on Macs). As part of this reconfiguration,
421 I've eliminated the "rescue Linux" option, which always seemed pointless
422 to me.
423
424 - Folded "disable" and "hideui" refind.conf entries into one ("disable"),
425 and reduced the number of options to six: "banner", "label",
426 "singleuser", "hwtest", "arrows", and "all". ("arrows" is new and
427 disables the scroll arrows when a system has too many tags to display
428 simultaneously.)
429
430 - Added max_tags option to the refind.conf file, enabling users to reduce
431 the maximum number of OS loader tags that can be displayed at once.
432
433 - Updated rEFIt icon, based on the 128x128 volume label from the rEFIt CD
434 image.
435
436 - Added x86 and x86-64 EFI shells to the CD image version of the binary,
437 but NOT to the binary zip file. The logic is that the CD image is more
438 likely to be used directly as an emergency disc and so may need this
439 feature, even though the source isn't part of the rEFInd project. (The
440 source is readily available from the TianoCore project.)
441
442 - EFI shells may now be stored at /shellx64.efi for x86-64 systems or at
443 /shellia32.efi for x86 systems. The /EFI/tools/shell.efi name is also
444 recognized; however, if both files are present, two EFI shell icons will
445 appear on the main menu. The /efi/{refind-path/apps/shell.efi filename,
446 which was never officially documented but worked as a carryover from
447 rEFIt, is no longer valid.
448
449 0.2.3 (3/26/2012):
450 ------------------
451
452 - Fixed (maybe) a bug that caused hangs when launching a second program
453 after returning from a first. There are some weird system-to-system
454 differences, though, and this fix causes (apparently harmless) error
455 messages about "(re)opening our installation volume" on at least one
456 system (a 32-bit Mac Mini). I'm committing this change because, imperfect
457 though it is, it's preferable to the earlier version, at least on my
458 small sample of computers.
459
460 - Because of news that the Linux kernel developers are planning to use the
461 filename linux.conf to hold Linux kernel configuration data for EFI
462 booting, I'm transitioning rEFInd away from that name and to
463 refind_linux.conf to avoid a conflict. This version can use either name,
464 with refind_linux.conf taking precedence if both are present.
465
466 - Added logo for Arch Linux.
467
468 0.2.2 (3/23/2012):
469 ------------------
470
471 - Fixed bug that caused program failure when Linux kernels with EFI stub
472 support were detected with no associated version numbers. rEFInd now
473 permits automatic linking of *ONE* versionless kernel to *ONE*
474 versionless initrd file.
475
476 - Fixed bug that caused program hangs when a boot loader filename or label
477 was too long. Such names are now properly truncated and program execution
478 continues.
479
480 - Fixed bug that caused no text to appear in submenus on UEFI systems with
481 small screens (800x600). NOTE: Problem still occurs on screens smaller
482 than this, but such systems are very rare.
483
484 0.2.1 (3/19/2012):
485 ------------------
486
487 - Added ability to set a "default_selection" that's a title or a substring
488 of one -- the name given to a stanza in a "menuentry" or the boot
489 loader's filename, in most cases, although "Mac OS X", "Windows XP
490 (XoM)", and "Microsoft EFI boot" are also titles.
491
492 - Added support for semi-automatic scans of Linux kernels with EFI stub
493 loader support. The program auto-detects matching initial RAM disk files
494 and loads additional options from the "linux.conf" file in the same
495 directory as the kernel.
496
497 - Added support for "submenuentry" keyword and associated sub-stanza
498 entries in refind.conf file.
499
500 - Renamed icons/os_mint.icns to icons/os_linuxmint.icns to match the
501 filename Linux Mint ACTUALLY uses for its ESP boot loader directory.
502
503
504 0.2.0 (3/14/2012):
505 ------------------
506
507 - Initial public release