Re: device syntax

[Hollis Blanchard]

On Oct 21, 2004, at 5:53 AM, Yoshinori K. Okuji wrote:
> IMO, we should not assume that the user knows technical details. If we
> write an installer for Open Firmware-based machines, the user may not
> know anything about Open Firmware.

Fair point.

> I think the important goal for GRUB is to provide an easy way for
> ordinary users and a complicated but still useful features for experts.
> So I propose always using simple aliases for drives. If you want to use
> a device name provided by your firmware explicitly, you could use this
> kind of syntax:
>
> devalias foo "/address@hidden/address@hidden/address@hidden/address@hidden,0"
> multiboot (foo,0)/boot/kernel

I suspect it will be a point of confusion that a user can directly use 
"hda" (a real/OF devalias) for their first disk, but if they want to 
use their second disk they must add a devalias command to their 
menu.lst file (or in OF itself).

Also, when booting without a menu.lst, now we need to enter two 
commands. Not difficult, just a little more awkward than it could be.

But on the whole this solution sounds pretty reasonable to me.

-Hollis