grub2 file browser draft

grub2 file browser draft

[adrian15]

Marco Gerards you asked me the other day about scripting. If there was 
something missing or any other thing that he could do.

This draft about a grub2 file draft can help him thinking about how 
powerful is his scripting or not.


The user sees inside a menu:
Floppy1
Floppy2
HardDisk1
HardDisk2

He selects HardDisk1. He sees another menu:
	View
	Save as Argument 1
	Save as Argument 2
	Setup Grub Here
	This is Grub Root (Only if the hard disk/device has no partitions)
He selects View. He sees another menu:
	hda1
	hda2
	hda3
	hda4
	hda5
He selects hda1. He sees another menu:
	View
	Save as Argument 1
	Save as Argument 2
	Setup Grub Here
	This is Grub Root (Only if partition filesystem is grub readable)
He selects View. He sees another menu:
	/boot
	/etc
	/var
He selects /etc. He sees another menu:
	View
	Save as Argument 1
	Save as Argument 2
He selects View. He sees another menu:
	fstab
	config1
	config2
He select fstab. He sees another menu:
	View
	Save as Argument 1
	Save as Argument 2
Let's say he returns to previous menu where he is seeing /etc folder.
He select my_index.html. He sees another menu:
	View inside a web browser (GRUB2 will have a module with basic html 
reading I suppose)
	View
	Save as Argument 1
	Save as Argument 2
	
So Marco Gerards....
Do you think that this can be done with your grub scripting? Or the 
grub2 scripting needs more hacking?

adrian15

Re: grub2 file browser draft

[Marco Gerards]

adrian15 <adrian15@raulete.net> writes:

Hi Adrian,

> Marco Gerards you asked me the other day about scripting. If there was
> something missing or any other thing that he could do.
>
> This draft about a grub2 file draft can help him thinking about how
> powerful is his scripting or not.

Some of these things are possible (like using variables, etc).  Other
things are not possible yet.  One of the most import (at least for
you!) missing constructs is the `for' which can be used to iterate
over files in bash.

I noticed you mention hda1 here, which is a Linux device name.  I have
explained you before it is technically not possible to translate GRUB
device names to Linux device names.  I wish it was possible, but
unfortunately it currently isn't because the BIOS is used to access
harddisks.

Here are some things I would like to work on:

- Error handling.  It should become very clear how errors are dealt
  with from scripts.

- The `for' loop.  This is useful in some cases, for example to
  automatically include files, to generate menu entries, etc, etc.

- Generating menu entries.  My plan is to make it possible to create
  templates over which you can iterate.  I will explain this another
  time in detail.

- Completing/rewriting the test command (which I almost finished, btw).

- Documentation.  This is the most important thing that is currently
  lacking.  I will soon write a document that describes the current
  functionality and the functionality I plan to implement.  This is
  important for people who like to test all this, but more
  importantly: it gives fellow developers the chance to influence what
  I am doing, criticize it and to take part in the discussion about
  the syntax.

- Adding random features and bug fixing.

The documentation will come within a few weeks (or days, who
knows...).  It's important to me and other people that these features
can and will be discussed.

--
Marco

Re: grub2 file browser draft

[adrian15]

> I noticed you mention hda1 here, which is a Linux device name.  I have
> explained you before it is technically not possible to translate GRUB
> device names to Linux device names.  I wish it was possible, but
> unfortunately it currently isn't because the BIOS is used to access
> harddisks.

I am sorry, I did not want to start over the discussion. I just wanted 
to know if given a hard disk device we could iterate over its partitions 
or at least generate a menu from them.

I've seen that you say we cannot iterate over files so I supose that it 
also means that we cannot iterate over partitions yet.

adrian15

Re: grub2 file browser draft

[Marco Gerards]

adrian15 <adrian15@raulete.net> writes:

>> I noticed you mention hda1 here, which is a Linux device name.  I have
>> explained you before it is technically not possible to translate GRUB
>> device names to Linux device names.  I wish it was possible, but
>> unfortunately it currently isn't because the BIOS is used to access
>> harddisks.
>
> I am sorry, I did not want to start over the discussion. I just wanted
> to know if given a hard disk device we could iterate over its
> partitions or at least generate a menu from them.
>
> I've seen that you say we cannot iterate over files so I supose that
> it also means that we cannot iterate over partitions yet.

Please read my other email about scripting.  I assume all your
possible questions are answered there, otherwise please ask.

--
Marco