gummiboot

gummiboot is an open source software project that provides users with a simple and fast, yet effective and easy-to-use boot manager/loaded for Linux-based operating systems. It has been designed from the ground up to support the UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) specification.

Reads generic and simple bootloader configuration files

The software is engineered to execute configured EFI (Extensible Firmware Interface) images and can run only from an EFI system partition, also known as ESP. It supports configurations in the UTF-8 and 7-bit ASCII encodings, boot delay in seconds (timeout), as well as custom boot splash images.

It can read generic and simple bootloader configuration files, which are stored along with the initrds, kernels and other EFI images on the ESP. Also, in order to deploy gummiboot on a Linux distribution and execute it as an EFI image, the kernel has to be compiled with the CONFIG_EFI_STUB option.

Getting started with gummiboot

A boot prompt will be displayed when pressing any key on your keyboard, from where users can select between one or multiple pre-configured bootloader entries, which are navigable with the up and down arrow buttons. Additionally, the program supports predefined hotkeys for selecting specific entries.

Pressing on the Enter key on a selected entry, it will immediately load and start the EFI image. Furthermore, when no key is pressed during the default timeout, or if no timeout is defined, the bootloader will automatically load and start the first entry.

While the default, timeout, splash and background keywords are recognized by the configuration file of the bootloader, the title, version, machine-id, efi, options, linux, initrd and splash keywords are understood by the entry configuration files.

Bottom line

Summing up, gummiboot is a next-generation bootloader designed as a drop-in replacement for GRUB, LILO and any other BIOS Legacy boot manager, in favor of the modern UEFI specification that can be found on today’s computers.

What is new in this release:

• Disable cursor when switching text/graphics mode
• Cosmetics for 'P' splash loop
• graphics: splash - correct rounding in alpha blending
• Typo in gummiboot man page
• graphics: Do not require nonstandard console control protocol
• 'P' clear screen after splash

What is new in version 42:

• build-sys: fix dist(check)
• build-sys: add headers as dependency