From owner-freebsd-arch@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Mar 24 07:57:43 2011 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 547AC106566B; Thu, 24 Mar 2011 07:57:43 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from gljennjohn@googlemail.com) Received: from mail-wy0-f182.google.com (mail-wy0-f182.google.com [74.125.82.182]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id B3CF88FC16; Thu, 24 Mar 2011 07:57:42 +0000 (UTC) Received: by wyf23 with SMTP id 23so9409661wyf.13 for ; Thu, 24 Mar 2011 00:57:41 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=googlemail.com; s=gamma; h=domainkey-signature:date:from:to:cc:subject:message-id:in-reply-to :references:reply-to:x-mailer:mime-version:content-type :content-transfer-encoding; bh=223joyrrZMz107g2FkKfQHwyAKE0E/b5ByZRIkJJx20=; b=vXOfsNc9YQPONhK/sJIh+6TXKFpmRu1AtXO1Sc1jN9Ly3EaCbb9nLUXdGznUPCPHU7 2qKTtzfxu2O+JHno2jFf8sxsQR7DX5foye5qiRwA1C/3sgeVPWYyLVGJ9TlUGexbkbMW YWQLDY7jp3wcmWbxvADU885TU6w6Ek6svGDd0= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=googlemail.com; s=gamma; h=date:from:to:cc:subject:message-id:in-reply-to:references:reply-to :x-mailer:mime-version:content-type:content-transfer-encoding; b=mTBNKh/5a5CZxSFCKyaLbNGqdv6CyjkXdRQnWUjbUsyhh//QJNrXZOD/+TFfDAWoVz qIZ+KjC/97ASKQ33r/GPzj20hijjwdoQKSMMf3p6q/u0tByR7eYfmnMhIsvsSVXWkF3h SRH1pRe5jvbz80clvHuc+qGj/Sz/piL2CknE8= Received: by 10.227.147.198 with SMTP id m6mr7377611wbv.78.1300951851543; Thu, 24 Mar 2011 00:30:51 -0700 (PDT) Received: from ernst.jennejohn.org (p578E31D4.dip.t-dialin.net [87.142.49.212]) by mx.google.com with ESMTPS id u9sm5370179wbg.0.2011.03.24.00.30.50 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=OTHER); Thu, 24 Mar 2011 00:30:51 -0700 (PDT) Date: Thu, 24 Mar 2011 08:30:48 +0100 From: Gary Jennejohn To: Alexander Best Message-ID: <20110324083048.60862a0f@ernst.jennejohn.org> In-Reply-To: <20110323232209.GA15486@freebsd.org> References: <20110323200200.GA85810@freebsd.org> <201103232050.p2NKov4g017463@lurza.secnetix.de> <4D8A7976.5090103@freebsd.org> <20110323232209.GA15486@freebsd.org> X-Mailer: Claws Mail 3.7.8 (GTK+ 2.18.7; amd64-portbld-freebsd9.0) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Cc: Oliver Fromme , Andriy Gapon , freebsd-arch@freebsd.org Subject: Re: kernel memory checks on boot vs. boot time X-BeenThere: freebsd-arch@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list Reply-To: gljennjohn@googlemail.com List-Id: Discussion related to FreeBSD architecture List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 24 Mar 2011 07:57:43 -0000 On Wed, 23 Mar 2011 23:22:09 +0000 Alexander Best wrote: > On Thu Mar 24 11, Andriy Gapon wrote: > > on 23/03/2011 22:50 Oliver Fromme said the following: > > > Beware, I don't know if this is the *only* thing preventing > > > boot2 from booting an amd64 kernel. There might be more. > > > I haven't tried booting FreeBSD without the boot loader in > > > a long time. Probably not in this century. > > > > Kind of hijacking the thread - while we are gradually moving from mbr+bsdlabel > > to gpt and more, we are also moving from away from size-constrained boot2. > > My vision is that boot2 and loader should fuse into something more powerful that > > would reside in a boot partition, but with its config files on a "regular" > > filesystem. > > +1. being able to control the whole boot process by /etc/boot.conf would be > great. there are defenately too many files in /boot. new users have no clue > what boot, boot0, boot1, boot2, cdboot, gptboot, etc. are all about. > > merging /boot/loader, /boot/gptboot and /boot/zfsgptboot would be really nice. > building/installing all the mbr+bsdlabel boot files could be made dependable > upon some variable (WITH_MBR_BOOT=), which could be disabled by default. > > also moving away from forth to something more modern might be thinkable. having > support for a modern scripting language might make it easier to come up with a > nice graphical bootloader e.g. there're probably more advantages. > > problem might be that the current gpart(8) manual recommends using 64k for the > boot partition. that might not be enough, if ada0p1 should contain the > functionality of all boot stages (including the loader), support for a modern > scripting language and support for graphical menues (including a rudimentary > vga/vesa driver for high res). > I have no problem with any of these ideas as long as well-documented knobs are provided to turn these "features" off and maintain "legacy" functionality. I'm running off disks where FreeBSD was installed 8 years ago and I have no intention of using gpart(8) on any of them. The same goes for graphical bootloaders - I can't stand them. -- Gary Jennejohn