[Mageia-dev] Syslinux integration roadmap

Thu Oct 6 21:06:35 CEST 2011

Op donderdag 06 oktober 2011 20:18:30 schreef Erwan Velu:
+> Hi fellows,
+> 
+> I should have started by writting this email, but later is better that
+> never.
+> I'd like to share  with you the work I started on syslinux : I
+> registered myself of maintainer of it.
+> 
+> Under Mandriva, we were running Syslinux 3.8x with the following
+> configuration
+> - gfxboot patch (unsupported upstream as very intrusive)
+> - isohybrid patch from pterjan
+> - a remplacement of the built-in pnglib
+> - a packaging with 3 versions of isolinux to load a different
+> configuration file regarding the processor capabilities (x86/x64)
+> 
+> I did upgrade to 4.04 for
+> - using the gfxboot com32 module which is now upsteam
+> - using a single version of isolinux
+> - simplifying the integration of upstream releases into mga
+> - an up to date version of HDT
+> 
+> Gfxboot module requested an update of the gfxboot tools & theme. This
+> work is already done and works properly.
+> 
+> The pnglib patch management is under discussions in another thread.
+> 
+> The isohybrid patch have to be reworked as isohybrid is now named
+> isohybrid.pl, a C version of isohybrid now exists also. Rework of this
+> patch should be quite easy to do once we'll have understood all the
+> tricks inside ;) That's shouldn't be a big deal though.
+> 
+> My plan for using a single version of isolinux is the following :
+> Using syslinux's capability to load various kernel & configuration files
+> regarding some hw capabilites (the cpu in this case). I'm ending a
+> prototype that will simulate the loading of different entries regarding
+> the cpu arch. This will greatly simplify the management of the boot
+> procedure and especially for the dual arch isos.
+> 
+> I'm also working for having some specific entries for the virtualized
+> world like kvm or virtualbox (cf bug 44).
+> 
+> 4.04 is also now providing a new package called extlinux which provides
+> extlinux & the mbr file needed to make a very powerful bootloader for
+> ext* & btrfs filesystems (more to come).
+> 
+> Switching to this new scheme will ease updates by using upstream's
+> version of syslinux.
+> This will also require working on BCD to integrate this new
+> configuration files. That shouldn't be hard neither.
+> 
+> I'm part of the upstream project, so if some more features/ideas are
+> coming, I'll be more than happy to help you.
+> 
+> Cheers,
+> Erwan
+
+nice work!
+