Re: [PATCH, RFC, RFT] Mactel integration

[Vladimir 'φ-coder/phcoder' Serbinenko]

On 28.11.2011 15:27, Mads Kiilerich wrote:
> On 11/28/2011 02:25 PM, Vladimir 'φ-coder/phcoder' Serbinenko wrote:
> > Hello all. Based on the information from
> > http://mjg59.dreamwidth.org/7468.html I intend to add support for such
> > install. It requires a small HFS+ volume mounted at /boot/mactel. I also
> > simplify handling of EFI directories by adding explicit option to
> > specify it and removing some "compatibility" kludges (they don't make
> > anything compatible with anything since "old behaviour" was mostly not
> > to install at all) which made the code in question difficult to
> > maintain.
>
> Matthew will perhaps give a more thorough response, but I would like 
> to add a few quick comments.
>
> Matthew also created http://www.codon.org.uk/~mjg59/mactel-boot/ , so 
> there seems to be some duplicate work there.
Well it's a small thing and I actually already had it since 2009 just it 
was considered useless given that Macs work with standard EFI tools.
> His approach is discussed further on 
> https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=755093 .
I've glanced a bit and have few comments:
- Having no EFI System partition is asking for trouble since it's hard 
to tell which kind of bugs in different firmware or software it will 
trigger. So I'd create one even on single-boot install
- I'd prefer double install (as in both to ESP and own HFS+) to be 
possible. First one is standards-compliant and compatible with other 
firmware implementation and second one avoids Apple bugs. So I'd prefer 
to choose another mounting point for HFS+. I suggest /boot/mactel or 
/boot/mac (second has advantage of being natural if we choose to do the 
same on PPC (and I'm inclined to it))
- If you want a grub.efi usable everywhere you need to put modules on 
embed memdisk and not as preload modules since loading modules takes 
time and potentially exposes user to bugs in the modules he doesn't 
really need.
- blessed directory and blessed file are independent. Former is used on 
ppc, later on intel. Please modify only the one for the platform you 
install for

> A quick summary is that it (in my opinion) is a bit unclear what Macs 
> _really_ needs. There are several ways grub can be used to boot Macs, 
> and it is not completely clear whether HFS blessing or HFS is 
> necessary at all. The Mac boot loader detects FAT partitions and will 
> by default also boot from /EFI/BOOT - also on the system partition. 
> The OS/X "Startup Drive" configuration is a bit more sensitive, but it 
> seems like what it writes to PRAM/VRAM is more important than the HFS 
> blessing.
I don't see this install as something nice and nifty, more like a way to 
workaround Apple bugs.
> /Mads


--
Regards
Vladimir 'φ-coder/phcoder' Serbinenko