[Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?

[Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?

[Daniel Price]

Hi folks,

I was wondering if there is interest in having the syslinux bootloader
upgraded to the 5.x series.  Right now in buildroot we have 4.05.

I have a 64-bit x86 system wherein there is a requirement that I
deliver syslinux's utilities and the mbr.bin to the target, and what I
have found after some experimentation is that syslinux 5.x seems
better suited to this, and is more amenable to running on a 64-bit x86
system.

I have a private recipe I'm calling 'syslinux-tgt' which accomplishes
this for myself, but I was wondering if it makes sense to drive (a) an
upgrade to 5.x and (b) additional changes to make it possible
(optionally) to deliver syslinux onto the target system.  Thoughts?
I'm willing to at least take a first pass at it.

       -dp

--
Daniel.Price at gmail.com; Twitter: @danielbprice

[Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?

[Daniel Price]

Sorry: I guess I should have said " additional changes to make it possible
(optionally) to deliver **more of** syslinux onto the target system".

     -dp

On Tue, Mar 19, 2013 at 1:43 PM, Daniel Price <daniel.price@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi folks,
>
> I was wondering if there is interest in having the syslinux bootloader
> upgraded to the 5.x series.  Right now in buildroot we have 4.05.
>
> I have a 64-bit x86 system wherein there is a requirement that I
> deliver syslinux's utilities and the mbr.bin to the target, and what I
> have found after some experimentation is that syslinux 5.x seems
> better suited to this, and is more amenable to running on a 64-bit x86
> system.
>
> I have a private recipe I'm calling 'syslinux-tgt' which accomplishes
> this for myself, but I was wondering if it makes sense to drive (a) an
> upgrade to 5.x and (b) additional changes to make it possible
> (optionally) to deliver syslinux onto the target system.  Thoughts?
> I'm willing to at least take a first pass at it.
>
>        -dp
>
> --
> Daniel.Price at gmail.com; Twitter: @danielbprice



-- 
Daniel.Price at gmail.com; Twitter: @danielbprice

[Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?

[Will Moore]

Hi Daniel,

> -----Original Message-----
> From: buildroot-bounces at busybox.net [mailto:buildroot-bounces at busybox.net] On
> Behalf Of Daniel Price
> Sent: 19 March 2013 20:43
> To: buildroot at busybox.net
> Subject: [Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?
> 
> Hi folks,
> 
> I was wondering if there is interest in having the syslinux bootloader
> upgraded to the 5.x series.  Right now in buildroot we have 4.05.

I too use buildroot to build syslinux.  Unless there is something odd about 5.x
then yes, I'm interested!
 
> 
> I have a 64-bit x86 system wherein there is a requirement that I
> deliver syslinux's utilities and the mbr.bin to the target, and what I
> have found after some experimentation is that syslinux 5.x seems
> better suited to this, and is more amenable to running on a 64-bit x86
> system.

I have a 32 bit x86 target.  If I understand correctly, you are not only looking
at building syslinux as a host tool for generating a bootable target, but you
want syslinux as a target tool so the target can generate bootable somethings?
In my case I have a target that generates bootable flash drives using syslinux
to assist in target installation during development.
 
> 
> I have a private recipe I'm calling 'syslinux-tgt' which accomplishes
> this for myself, but I was wondering if it makes sense to drive (a) an
> upgrade to 5.x and (b) additional changes to make it possible
> (optionally) to deliver syslinux onto the target system.  Thoughts?
> I'm willing to at least take a first pass at it.

I have built syslinux for the target using a script external to buildroot, using
the buildroot built toolchain, because I didn't think anybody else would want to
do this in buildroot ... shows what I know.

FWIW I say:
(a) yes please
(b) yes please

I am not in a position to provide good advice on how to implement this but I
would be happy to test your efforts.

I note the syslinux /doc/distrib.txt says:

"For creators of Linux distributions:

Syslinux is a notoriously hard program to debug, since it runs outside
of any operating system, and has a tendency to expose BIOS and
hardware bugs on various systems.  Therefore, I would appreciate if
you would resist the temptation of recompiling the Syslinux bootloader
itself (ldlinux.asm) if at all possible.  If you do that, I will have
to refer any bug reports I receive back to the respective distributor.

However, I have no such concerns about recompiling the installer
programs, and in fact, with both libc 5 and libc 6 in common use in
the Linux world today I understand if you wish to relink the
Linux-based installer against your system version of libc.  Therefore
a special makefile targets "make installer" has been included with the
Syslinux distribution, starting with version 1.42.

To rebuild the installer programs *only*, starting from a freshly
untarred distribution copy of Syslinux, do:

	make clean
	make installer

If you want to remove all intermediate files, including the ones
obtained from assembling ldlinux.asm and which are included in the
distribution, do "make spotless".

I appreciate your assistance in this matter.

	H. Peter Anvin"

> 
>        -dp
> 
> --
> Daniel.Price at gmail.com; Twitter: @danielbprice
> _______________________________________________
> buildroot mailing list
> buildroot at busybox.net
> http://lists.busybox.net/mailman/listinfo/buildroot

[Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?

[Daniel Price]

Thanks Will, this is very helpful.  And the document you mentioned is
a good reference, especially the background about 'make installer'--
while I've been building the whole thing from source, I had been
wondering what that was about.  I have a working syslinux-5.01 build
which seems to solve my problems, but I am by no means an expert.  To
answer your other question: yes, I think we have similar problems-- I
need to support install from media and install from pxe, in a
development environment.

Today I posted a small patch to upgrade syslinux to 4.06.  You could
test that if you like.  It seems like 4.06 cleaned up some rough edges
when compiling 4.05-- or at least for me it did.

I guess we could add to buildroot a 'boot/syslinux5' recipe as a peer
to 'boot/syslinux,' to provide some time for people to transition over
(if the project heads were OK with that).  It has seemed to me by
reading various forums that there are some transition headaches.

         -dp

On Wed, Mar 20, 2013 at 1:50 AM, Will Moore
<will.moore@beraninstruments.com> wrote:
> Hi Daniel,
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: buildroot-bounces at busybox.net [mailto:buildroot-bounces at busybox.net] On
>> Behalf Of Daniel Price
>> Sent: 19 March 2013 20:43
>> To: buildroot at busybox.net
>> Subject: [Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?
>>
>> Hi folks,
>>
>> I was wondering if there is interest in having the syslinux bootloader
>> upgraded to the 5.x series.  Right now in buildroot we have 4.05.
>
> I too use buildroot to build syslinux.  Unless there is something odd about 5.x
> then yes, I'm interested!
>
>>
>> I have a 64-bit x86 system wherein there is a requirement that I
>> deliver syslinux's utilities and the mbr.bin to the target, and what I
>> have found after some experimentation is that syslinux 5.x seems
>> better suited to this, and is more amenable to running on a 64-bit x86
>> system.
>
> I have a 32 bit x86 target.  If I understand correctly, you are not only looking
> at building syslinux as a host tool for generating a bootable target, but you
> want syslinux as a target tool so the target can generate bootable somethings?
> In my case I have a target that generates bootable flash drives using syslinux
> to assist in target installation during development.
>
>>
>> I have a private recipe I'm calling 'syslinux-tgt' which accomplishes
>> this for myself, but I was wondering if it makes sense to drive (a) an
>> upgrade to 5.x and (b) additional changes to make it possible
>> (optionally) to deliver syslinux onto the target system.  Thoughts?
>> I'm willing to at least take a first pass at it.
>
> I have built syslinux for the target using a script external to buildroot, using
> the buildroot built toolchain, because I didn't think anybody else would want to
> do this in buildroot ... shows what I know.
>
> FWIW I say:
> (a) yes please
> (b) yes please
>
> I am not in a position to provide good advice on how to implement this but I
> would be happy to test your efforts.
>
> I note the syslinux /doc/distrib.txt says:
>
> "For creators of Linux distributions:
>
> Syslinux is a notoriously hard program to debug, since it runs outside
> of any operating system, and has a tendency to expose BIOS and
> hardware bugs on various systems.  Therefore, I would appreciate if
> you would resist the temptation of recompiling the Syslinux bootloader
> itself (ldlinux.asm) if at all possible.  If you do that, I will have
> to refer any bug reports I receive back to the respective distributor.
>
> However, I have no such concerns about recompiling the installer
> programs, and in fact, with both libc 5 and libc 6 in common use in
> the Linux world today I understand if you wish to relink the
> Linux-based installer against your system version of libc.  Therefore
> a special makefile targets "make installer" has been included with the
> Syslinux distribution, starting with version 1.42.
>
> To rebuild the installer programs *only*, starting from a freshly
> untarred distribution copy of Syslinux, do:
>
>         make clean
>         make installer
>
> If you want to remove all intermediate files, including the ones
> obtained from assembling ldlinux.asm and which are included in the
> distribution, do "make spotless".
>
> I appreciate your assistance in this matter.
>
>         H. Peter Anvin"
>
>>
>>        -dp
>>
>> --
>> Daniel.Price at gmail.com; Twitter: @danielbprice
>> _______________________________________________
>> buildroot mailing list
>> buildroot at busybox.net
>> http://lists.busybox.net/mailman/listinfo/buildroot
>
>



-- 
Daniel.Price at gmail.com; Twitter: @danielbprice

[Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?

[Will Moore]

Hi Daniel, please bottom post, I've killed off the old part of the thread to
hide the sin ;-)

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Daniel Price [mailto:daniel.price at gmail.com]
> Sent: 20 March 2013 09:26
> To: Will Moore
> Cc: buildroot at busybox.net
> Subject: Re: [Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?
> 
> Thanks Will, this is very helpful.  And the document you mentioned is
> a good reference, especially the background about 'make installer'--
> while I've been building the whole thing from source, I had been
> wondering what that was about.  I have a working syslinux-5.01 build
> which seems to solve my problems, but I am by no means an expert.  To
> answer your other question: yes, I think we have similar problems-- I
> need to support install from media and install from pxe, in a
> development environment.
> 
> Today I posted a small patch to upgrade syslinux to 4.06.  You could
> test that if you like.  It seems like 4.06 cleaned up some rough edges
> when compiling 4.05-- or at least for me it did.

I will see what I can do.

> 
> I guess we could add to buildroot a 'boot/syslinux5' recipe as a peer
> to 'boot/syslinux,' to provide some time for people to transition over
> (if the project heads were OK with that).  It has seemed to me by
> reading various forums that there are some transition headaches.

I am not sure on the policy for multiple versions but I know generally buildroot
does not do this.  This is a question for Peter and co...

If 4.06 is enough for you and the paint is still a little wet on 5.x then IMHO
better to stick to implementing the new features in 4.06 then updating at some
later time.

> 
>          -dp
> 

[Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?

[Will Moore]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: buildroot-bounces at busybox.net [mailto:buildroot-bounces at busybox.net] On
> Behalf Of Will Moore
> Sent: 20 March 2013 09:51
> 
> Hi Daniel, please bottom post, I've killed off the old part of the thread to
> hide the sin ;-)
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Daniel Price [mailto:daniel.price at gmail.com]
> > Sent: 20 March 2013 09:26
> > To: Will Moore
> > Cc: buildroot at busybox.net
> > Subject: Re: [Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?
> >
> > Thanks Will, this is very helpful.  And the document you mentioned is
> > a good reference, especially the background about 'make installer'--
> > while I've been building the whole thing from source, I had been
> > wondering what that was about.  I have a working syslinux-5.01 build
> > which seems to solve my problems, but I am by no means an expert.  To
> > answer your other question: yes, I think we have similar problems-- I
> > need to support install from media and install from pxe, in a
> > development environment.
> >
> > Today I posted a small patch to upgrade syslinux to 4.06.  You could
> > test that if you like.  It seems like 4.06 cleaned up some rough edges
> > when compiling 4.05-- or at least for me it did.
> 
> I will see what I can do.
> 
> >
> > I guess we could add to buildroot a 'boot/syslinux5' recipe as a peer
> > to 'boot/syslinux,' to provide some time for people to transition over
> > (if the project heads were OK with that).  It has seemed to me by
> > reading various forums that there are some transition headaches.
> 
> I am not sure on the policy for multiple versions but I know generally
> buildroot
> does not do this.  This is a question for Peter and co...
> 
> If 4.06 is enough for you and the paint is still a little wet on 5.x then IMHO
> better to stick to implementing the new features in 4.06 then updating at some
> later time.

It might help to see what Arnout is up to with his grub2 patch which is also
looking at providing a bootloader with host and target tools.  See
http://patchwork.ozlabs.org/patch/191813/

> 
> >
> >          -dp
> >
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> buildroot mailing list
> buildroot at busybox.net
> http://lists.busybox.net/mailman/listinfo/buildroot

[Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?

[Arnout Vandecappelle]

On 20/03/13 13:29, Will Moore wrote:
> It might help to see what Arnout is up to with his grub2 patch which is also
> looking at providing a bootloader with host and target tools.  See
> http://patchwork.ozlabs.org/patch/191813/

  That patch has been sitting in the freezer :-)

  As you can see from the corresponding mail thread, there is no 
convergence about what to call the two variants of a bootloader. It's a 
bit like gcc: the normal variant builds an installer running on the host, 
but it includes binary code for the target; the other variant is 
completely running on the target.

  Note that for u-boot, the chosen solution is to create a completely 
separate package uboot-tools for the target. But it's a bit a special 
case, because mkimage is not an installer.


  Regards,
  Arnout

-- 
Arnout Vandecappelle                          arnout at mind be
Senior Embedded Software Architect            +32-16-286500
Essensium/Mind                                http://www.mind.be
G.Geenslaan 9, 3001 Leuven, Belgium           BE 872 984 063 RPR Leuven
LinkedIn profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/arnoutvandecappelle
GPG fingerprint:  7CB5 E4CC 6C2E EFD4 6E3D A754 F963 ECAB 2450 2F1F

[Buildroot] Interest in upgrading syslinux to 5.x?

[Daniel Price]

On Sun, Mar 24, 2013 at 11:38 PM, Arnout Vandecappelle <arnout@mind.be> wrote:
> On 20/03/13 13:29, Will Moore wrote:
>>
>> It might help to see what Arnout is up to with his grub2 patch which is
>> also
>> looking at providing a bootloader with host and target tools.  See
>> http://patchwork.ozlabs.org/patch/191813/
>
>
>  That patch has been sitting in the freezer :-)
>
>  As you can see from the corresponding mail thread, there is no convergence
> about what to call the two variants of a bootloader. It's a bit like gcc:
> the normal variant builds an installer running on the host, but it includes
> binary code for the target; the other variant is completely running on the
> target.
>
>  Note that for u-boot, the chosen solution is to create a completely
> separate package uboot-tools for the target. But it's a bit a special case,
> because mkimage is not an installer.
>

Thanks Arnout,

For my purposes, I wound up wanting both the host- and the target-
tools, and, like you did with grub2 (IIRC), I opted to make syslinux5
a normal package so I could drive both host and target builds.

I will post my patch as a reference for others when I have a chance to
clean it up slightly.  At least it might save someone else some work,
as it took a fair amount of experimentation to get it to work.

      -dp

--
Daniel.Price at gmail.com; Twitter: @danielbprice