Softpedia News reports that version 2.02 of the GRUB boot loader has been released. Among the many new features are support for LZ4 compression on ZFS, 64-bit ext2, XFS v5, Morse code output and a modem-like output through the PC speaker, Xen paravirtualisation, TrueCrypt ISOs, Apple fat binaries on non-Apple hardware, and 16-bit mode on non-x86 hardware.
Further information:
NEWS file
Related stories:
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(Score: 5, Interesting) by stormwyrm on Saturday April 29 2017, @11:08PM (2 children)
Well, looking at the changelog I don’t think that’s such a fair characterisation. The new functionality added all supports the core mission of Grub. Obviously they need support for LZ4 compression on ZFS to be able to boot off of a disk with such a file system, same too with support for 64-bit ext2, and xfsv5. Morse code and modem-like output on the PC speaker are useful for diagnosing problems on systems with no attached monitor. The Xen paravirtualisation stuff is for folks who want to be able to boot systems under a Xen hypervisor. The Apple fat binaries thing is normally used to boot OS X, so I guess it would help with someone doing a Hackintosh. Reading TFA though, I don’t see anything about 16-bit mode on non-x86 hardware though. What I do see is ‘enables “linux16” on all x86 platforms, not just BIOS’, which I gather permits booting 16-bit OSes images on, say, UEFI systems that don’t have a traditional BIOS. I think it is related to this [debian.org]. I think a correction to TFS is in order.
Numquam ponenda est pluralitas sine necessitate.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 29 2017, @11:32PM
This. Booting is hard. You don't have an OS to rely on, you may be booting to one of several different OS's running on god only knows how many filesystems, and you have to deal with different storage technologies and hardware variants.
(Score: 1) by butthurt on Saturday April 29 2017, @11:33PM
That is indeed a mistake (my mistake).