[bug #30761] standardized, open and independent configuration

[John Hall]

URL:
  <http://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?30761>

                 Summary: standardized, open and independent configuration
                 Project: GNU GRUB
            Submitted by: esotericbyte
            Submitted on: Thu 12 Aug 2010 04:31:20 PM GMT
                Category: Configuration
                Severity: Major
                Priority: 5 - Normal
              Item Group: Feature Request
                  Status: None
                 Privacy: Public
             Assigned to: None
         Originator Name: 
        Originator Email: 
             Open/Closed: Open
         Discussion Lock: Any
                 Release: 
                 Release: other
         Reproducibility: None
         Planned Release: None

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Details:

Operating systems that include GRUB can not conform fully to the sprit of
grub.

I beleive that the operating system /distrobutions adopting grub should
detect grub and then register itself and conform to a standard to incorporate
it's configuration rather than take over the configuration of grub which
should be up to the user or administrator of the system.

At least one major distribution that has adopted grub2 early stores
pre-configuration files in it's own settings folder and notes that the
grub.cfg file is not to be directly modified by users.

This seems to me to be backward but necessary. I believe it is because the
faculties and a common method for solving some basic installation and boot
problems are not provided by grub and are left to the operating systems
adopting it. This limits it's independence and usefulness to people that wish
to use it to actually create a multiboot system.

The problems are actually few and solvable in an open way. A boot loader must
exist for an operating system and it must be able to update the bootloader
when it's kernel changes. It must also make some effort to leave all other
installed operating systems bootable. 

To accomplish this I propose modules for commands that allow users to manage
the configuration file within grub itself and prehaps even to upgrade grub. 

Source code for an executable that can load and use the configuration and
upgrade modules would allow adopting operating systems to reproduce exactly
the standard configuration management within their own contexts allowing
operating systems to register themselves and updates in a standardized, open
and independent way. 

Additional features that might attract adoption of a standard open
configuration and registration method would be to allow for multilevel menus
and the incorporation of branding after OS selection without clobbering the
user's top level personalization. 






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