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Re: stage 1


From: Wolf Lammen
Subject: Re: stage 1
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 16:58:40 +0100 (MET)

> No, because the floppy probing is intentionally disabled. It just hangs 
> up on some Compaq machines.
> 
> See this bug:
> 
> https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?func=detailitem&item_id=489
> 
> As I said there, Thierry's approach is the best. His patch allows the 
> user to embed a fixed gemeotry into a floppy, and it is not integrated.
> 
> Honestly speaking, I'm not keen to fixing this bug, because it will 
> introduce an incompatibility in the format of stage1, and few people 
> use uncommon formats of floppies actually.
> 
> Okuji


"Fixing the bug means enabling a code path, that was dead for a long time.
Both my computers did not complain, yet, the fixing might trigger some
unwanted
effects (think of hidden BIOS bugs on some machines, uncovered by the now
executed code). So removing the floppy probing and not supporting
out-of-date
drive types any more, is an option as well."

I wrote this to Jeroen a few days ago and it seems to anticipate what
Okuji-san said now. OK, if there are buggy machines that do not survive the 
floppy
probing, of course, you might not use it, even at the expense of a tiny group
of users of rare hardware. I agree with that approach.
But, to me, there are still questions open. IMHO code (at least comments)
should reflect the intention of the programmer. So if we intend not to use
floppy probing (which I understand), why do we keep it in the code, even call it
under strange circumstances?
In what way is the format of stage 1 fixed, so that we cannot modify or, at
least, extend it? In other words, what depends on stage 1 so strongly, that
we have to leave it as it is? (By the way, the idea of Thierry to include a
geometry parameter came across my mind too, when thinking about a floppy stage
1. If including it created about zero costs, I would have suggested it here).
I would like to learn about the inner working of GRUB and really appreciate
to get some hints.

Wolf Lammen

-- 
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