From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with archive (Exim 4.43) id 1NwNch-0004Ly-1X for mharc-grub-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:39:55 -0400 Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1NwNcd-0004LY-My for grub-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:39:51 -0400 Received: from [140.186.70.92] (port=51459 helo=eggs.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1NwNca-0004LQ-P2 for grub-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:39:50 -0400 Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1NwNcY-0004Ks-NP for grub-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:39:48 -0400 Received: from mail-bw0-f219.google.com ([209.85.218.219]:32879) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1NwNcY-0004Kl-Eq for grub-devel@gnu.org; Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:39:46 -0400 Received: by bwz19 with SMTP id 19so123128bwz.26 for ; Mon, 29 Mar 2010 15:39:45 -0700 (PDT) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=domainkey-signature:received:received:message-id:date:from :user-agent:mime-version:to:subject:x-enigmail-version:content-type; bh=MEknjcFMZnlBpbrd9RojbsHL4ETMxyVTyaQCrOOaT5w=; b=oNN1o3SBotQabBKEwVnXOjhH4xvYkQYWw3angoHG3KMHASGCbq/vgd9VSo+XTaYu5P 3kS8yLoHYTJuLgupLCQb5njZtNV1puDk+E+CHAMp4HA54L9kTNE6TFKJT/WumH216N4j dQi/kJjg0BEk7nuIdl/saccwF8gGEz1kTkTrw= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=message-id:date:from:user-agent:mime-version:to:subject :x-enigmail-version:content-type; b=rOsbTOeGOojoPOxwUPLeUKKlA8ShY/vcsRZ4rEoL+A+exnxBKP4wejatSaKdWDsS89 Xu7vd6lx9GQXSb5DzfA/rcJ02dY0jURLDvsvCj3Plyk1TtMaJcPEyoRCTs34mQnUFNwc rCi6o+A3bz20bW8vmXZO/tz7QW0VxBc1Xg1h4= Received: by 10.204.33.194 with SMTP id i2mr1811281bkd.140.1269902385298; Mon, 29 Mar 2010 15:39:45 -0700 (PDT) Received: from debian.bg45.phnet (gprs57.swisscom-mobile.ch [193.247.250.57]) by mx.google.com with ESMTPS id 15sm2545066bwz.0.2010.03.29.15.39.43 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=RC4-MD5); Mon, 29 Mar 2010 15:39:44 -0700 (PDT) Message-ID: <4BB12C23.6020300@gmail.com> Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 00:39:31 +0200 From: =?UTF-8?B?VmxhZGltaXIgJ8+GLWNvZGVyL3BoY29kZXInIFNlcmJpbmVua28=?= User-Agent: Mozilla-Thunderbird 2.0.0.22 (X11/20091109) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: The development of GRUB 2 X-Enigmail-Version: 0.95.0 Content-Type: multipart/signed; micalg=pgp-sha512; protocol="application/pgp-signature"; boundary="------------enig02FF7807F2B73D517A7AE932" X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.6 (newer, 2) Subject: Possible ports X-BeenThere: grub-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list Reply-To: The development of GNU GRUB List-Id: The development of GNU GRUB List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 22:39:52 -0000 This is an OpenPGP/MIME signed message (RFC 2440 and 3156) --------------enig02FF7807F2B73D517A7AE932 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Hello, I would like to outline the usefulness of possible ports. It's not exhaustive it's more like list of remarks. 1) the smallest embedded systems and microcontrollers. These ones simply don't have any space to store multiple kernels or any interactivity whatsoever. On such platforms the only grub usefulness remaining will probably be supplying an upcoming multiboot2 protocol and perhaps disaster recovery but on such systems one usually wants to shave off every possible byte and they often use specialised ISA so basically everything needs to be rewritten or heavily ported so even this usefullness is reduced. 2) Bigger embedded systems. Those may have enough space for multiple kernels and grub as well as some means to communicate. This would allow a disaster recovery by choosing another kernel or changing kernel parameters. Additionally these systems are likely to pick a more standard ISA so it will allow more easy porting of payloads to this platforms by using multiboot2 Intresting platforms: too many to list. 3) Handhelds and game consoles. These ones are pretty much like normal desktop computer except having less power and a different communication system. So additionally to normal port interface features would have to be adapted but then all usual grub advantages kick in. Intresting ISAs: ARM, SuperH, PowerPC (+Cell). Interesting platforms: too many to list. 4) Standrard desktops and laptops. It's the most interesting target, doesn't even need to be discussed. The only systems I'm aware of in this category and not yet implemented are Fuloong mini and ARM based systems 5a) Deprecated hardware. Not first target but is acceptable if doesn't put too much problems for other ports. The pre-PCI systems are 12+ years old and while some of them will live for at least another 15 years they run out of parts which are even just electrically compatible. Taking this road may leave us with a situation when only about 10 working machines exist in the world, 2 users interested, 0 developpers and huge effort spent. Example ISAs: m68k, vax, sparc32 5b) PCI systems are another story. With GRUB having always more native drivers these systems can use commodity PCI parts even if they aren't supported by normal firmware as long as fimware is able to locate grub. If e.g. a keyboard controller is burned Interesting ISAs: Alpha. Interesting platforms: Alphas, Old world macintoshes, SGI mips. 6) Paravirtualized environments are often used for security reasons. In this context it's preferable to have a bootloader inside virtual machine rather than outside. Some paravirtualized environments are carbon copy of some real machines. Those need no special support but other platforms = do Interesting platforms: xen Interesting ISAs: i386, x86_64, ppc, ia64 7) Servers have quite a special requirement and usually aren't rebooted often yet alone changing of bootloaders. But it's a worthy target as it often facilitates reusing kernels from desktop class. The problem is to get such machine for testing. They often cost a lot and usually used with thousand of simultaneous users logged i so you can't really ask someone to have 10 reboots in one day to test new grub Interesting architectures: ia64, system z. I'm not aware of any other architecture in this category not currently supported since we have support for i386 BIOS and EFI, PPC OFW and sparc OFW. --=20 Regards Vladimir '=CF=86-coder/phcoder' Serbinenko --------------enig02FF7807F2B73D517A7AE932 Content-Type: application/pgp-signature; name="signature.asc" Content-Description: OpenPGP digital signature Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="signature.asc" -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.10 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iF4EAREKAAYFAkuxLCwACgkQNak7dOguQglllwEAnG/7+lcY5HosE5HHqLMSU7H7 4oKXGvacvNTk3DJHtHYA/2cGYXDCrtqmnSBz1JVSxokDKvCEBu4CCt8/o7Q6E3dj =SWdu -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --------------enig02FF7807F2B73D517A7AE932--