RE: [Xen-ia64-devel] RFC: Switch to xlilo now? Or post-3.0?

["Magenheimer, Dan (HP Labs Fort Collins)" <dan.magenheimer@xxxxxx>]

Hi Fred --

> Two things to point out -
> 
> 1. elilo.efi should only give warning message if you put "vmm=..."
> entries at the end of elilo.conf.  So elilo.efi can continue 
> to work on
> elilo.conf entries for the native Linux even with "vmm=" in it.  

I think you are correct that this is just a warning.  However
if you are using the elilo.efi timeout feature that automatically
selects an elilo.conf entry to boot, the warning results in
an exit to "manual mode."

> 2. elilo.efi should continue to work on "image=xen.gz  
> initrd=xenolinux"
> boot, but you can't take advantage of loading initrd as xlilo.efi.
> Unless the startup code got changed.

Once the xen4elilo patch got applied, this no longer worked
for me.  It may have been my pilot error.  Could you confirm
that with the xen4elilo patch applied you are able to use
the old elilo.efi and the old elilo.conf file?  If so,
I would have already applied the patch.

Thanks,
Dan

> Magenheimer, Dan (HP Labs Fort Collins) wrote:
> > There has been various threads about attempts to boot
> > Xen under RHEL4.  Because RHEL4 requires an initrd, a
> > special version of elilo.efi is required.  This version
> > called "xlilo" was included in the Xen/ia64 tree some
> > time ago, along with a patch file (xen4elilo.patch)
> > that is required to apply to Xen/ia64 for xlilo to work
> > properly.
> > 
> > I have not applied this patch to the mainstream tree
> > because, once this patch is applied to Xen/ia64:
> > 
> > 1) everyone will need to start booting xen with xlilo.efi
> >    instead of elilo.efi.  xlilo.efi is backwards compatible
> >    and the changes have been given to the elilo maintainer
> >    so they will eventually get into the official elilo
> >    release
> > 2) everyone will need to change their elilo.conf file.
> >    In existing elilo.conf files, image=xen and initrd=xenlinux.
> >    In the new format, vmm=xen, image=xenlinux and initrd=initrd.
> >    Elilo.conf files that contain vmm= will cause current
> >    elilo.efi to fail even if just booting linux as elilo
> >    parses the entire file.
> > 
> > Because of these changes, if we install the xen4elilo
> > patch, everyone using Xen/ia64 will need to change their
> > environment when they pull the changeset with the xen4elilo
> > patch.  (The Cambridge Xen team calls this a "flag day".)
> > 
> > Should we do this now, before 3.0 goes out?  Or wait
> > and do it post-3.0?  Comments please...
> > 
> > Thanks,
> > Dan
> > 
> > _______________________________________________
> > Xen-ia64-devel mailing list
> > Xen-ia64-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > http://lists.xensource.com/xen-ia64-devel
> 
> 

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