Re: Testing on PowerMac G4

[Robert Millan <rmh@aybabtu.com>]

On Sat, Jan 05, 2008 at 02:45:41AM +0100, Yoshinori K. Okuji wrote:
> On Friday 04 January 2008 21:37, Robert Millan wrote:
> > > A quick look into util/elf/grub-mkimage.c finds "Don't bother preserving
> > > the section headers".  I don't even know if the problem is specifically
> > > with the section headers or with something else.  Perhaps
> > > util/elf/grub-mkimage.c should be rewritten as a linker script, or maybe
> > > it should use the BFD library that comes with binutils.  I'm optimistic
> > > about the linker script, since all we need is essentially linking.
> >
> > There's another [1] outstanding problem with elf/grub-mkimage.c:
> >
> >   http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/grub-devel/2007-10/msg00056.html
> >
> > I think what you propose is a good idea.  It sounds odd that we have to
> > reimplement ELF handling when another GNU project already has.  But I don't
> > know how the GRUB maintainers think about it.
> >
> > [1] or, perhaps, it's the same problem?
> 
> I object to using a linker, since it is more odd that the user must install 
> development tools to just install GRUB.

Distributors could push GNU ld from development binutils package to a separate
one that is part of their base system.  This happened already in Debian (and
derivatives, gee) for gnupg and gpgv (since apt-get started using them for
archive verification).

> About BFD, the old discussion was that it made the binary size bloated, thus 
> didn't fit into a small disk or initrd or whatever, so it was not convenient 
> for installers. I don't know if the same discussion can apply nowadays, since 
> most people install operating systems by CD or DVD, memory size is plenty, 
> etc.

I don't know about others, but Debian (and, yes, derivatives..) doesn't put
grub-mkimage in the initrd.  What is put is a script that will install
standard GRUB package in the target chroot, and use that directly.

I think using BFD is a good idea.

> Especially if this is only for OpenFirmware platforms, I don't believe 
> that anybody cares.

And LinuxBIOS !  And Xbox if we ever support it (I haven't managed to boot
code in it yet, but it works with ELF).

-- 
Robert Millan

<GPLv2> I know my rights; I want my phone call!
<DRM> What use is a phone call, if you are unable to speak?
(as seen on /.)