From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with archive (Exim 4.43) id 1MWtNb-0004Um-40 for mharc-grub-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 31 Jul 2009 10:46:43 -0400 Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1MWtNY-0004Ti-Nv for grub-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 31 Jul 2009 10:46:40 -0400 Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1MWtNU-0004Sv-B5 for grub-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 31 Jul 2009 10:46:40 -0400 Received: from [199.232.76.173] (port=59866 helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1MWtNU-0004Ss-6p for grub-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 31 Jul 2009 10:46:36 -0400 Received: from xvm-190-8.ghst.net ([217.70.190.8]:51907 helo=aybabtu.com) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS-1.0:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:32) (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1MWtNT-0007QQ-P3 for grub-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 31 Jul 2009 10:46:35 -0400 Received: from [192.168.10.10] (helo=thorin) by aybabtu.com with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1MWtNR-0000L9-6K for grub-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 31 Jul 2009 14:46:33 +0000 Received: from rmh by thorin with local (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1MWtNQ-0003hK-Jo for grub-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 31 Jul 2009 16:46:32 +0200 Date: Fri, 31 Jul 2009 16:46:32 +0200 From: Robert Millan To: grub-devel@gnu.org Message-ID: <20090731144632.GA14036@thorin> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Organization: free as in freedom X-Message-Flag: Worried about Outlook viruses? Switch to Thunderbird! www.mozilla.com/thunderbird X-Debbugs-No-Ack: true User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.18 (2008-05-17) X-detected-operating-system: by monty-python.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.6 (newer, 3) Subject: grub-pe2elf X-BeenThere: grub-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list Reply-To: The development of GRUB 2 List-Id: The development of GRUB 2 List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 31 Jul 2009 14:46:41 -0000 Hi, On a recent discussion on IRC, Bean pointed out that grub-pe2elf is essentially a workaround for a bug in objcopy. Bean explained that this bug is quite obvious. It seems Christian sent them a patch, but it hasn't been applied (I don't know if it was rejected, or just ignored, Christian could you explain?). Back in 2007, Christian proposed an ad-hoc solution for converting from PE to ELF: http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/grub-devel/2007-11/msg00174.html which was rejected (see my comment and Marco's reply). Later in July 2008, Bean added grub-pe2elf to the repository. I keep thinking the same I thought in 2007. I don't agree that we should add such workarounds just because objcopy has a bug. binutils is a GNU program. It is free software and community-maintained. If it has bugs, we should be working with them instead of reimplementing their work. First of all, I'm worried that we have discussions to decide things and they are later forgotten or ignored. Bean, please can you provide some explanation on what happened? Also, I think this commit should be reverted (at least the part that adds grub-pe2elf). Also, I'd like to hear input on what happened with Christian's binutils patch, why it wasn't applied, etc. Nevertheless, it's not an obligation for us to support win32. As long as we can do it sanely, I'm fine with it, but I don't want to see GRUB dragged into a situation in which we need to preserve win32 support at all costs. Our primary target are GNU-based systems, as well as other free software systems, specially those that rely on GRUB as their default bootloader. -- Robert Millan The DRM opt-in fallacy: "Your data belongs to us. We will decide when (and how) you may access your data; but nobody's threatening your freedom: we still allow you to remove your data and not access it at all."