Just a heads up, there is a potential change under review here which will prevent your system from booting after updating packages until you update your EFI bootloader:
https://review.haiku-os.org/c/haiku/+/3916
The change makes some adjustments to our kernel args in a way which makes a lot more sense.
I’m pushing to get this merged ASAP if we want it since R1 / Beta 3 is likely just around the corner.
We’ll have a year (or more) to deal with the consequences of such a change with our nightly releases before Beta 4. I don’t see why we need to rush this at the last minute.
Perhaps more EFI users after Beta 3 than before, I guess.
I suppose it depends, what is the process to update the EFI bootloader?
It is the same as installing EFI boot loader: copy it to ESP partition instead of old one.
Since there isn’t a package for the boot loader, can we grab a binary from somewhere?
So originally it required manual intervention, and it still does correct? If so, are the fixes worth it this late before Beta 3? If they are, then I would be in favor of introducing it before the B3 release.
Any plans to somehow make the update automatic?
Yeah, if we end up going this route i’ll publish the EFI bootloader somewhere.
If you follow the change request, this one might not make it. General consensus is making the pain one-time via switching to some key/value method of passing things to the kernel vs “fixing” the less than ideal way we do it now.
I don’t understand why you want to merge this in beta3. In general I don’t understand why it looks like nothing happens for a year, and when the beta release date is close, suddenly people want to merge all kind of things in it.
Here is a simple checklist for you to decide:
If the answer to any of the questions in this checklist is no, then it should not be pushed into a beta release at the last minute. There will be other beta releases after this one (hopefully more often than once a year) and this can be included in the next one if needed.
Is there a formal feature freeze during the run-up to a beta release?
Just putting in my two-cents, since this is a significant change, I reckon we should wait until Beta 4 to merge this just so we can get the word out about this change. We don’t want angry and confused users flooding the forums with questions just because a last-minute, but significant major change was introduced into the release.
Plus, if we have waited this long, waiting a bit more to merge it in can’t hurt 
Better to have automatic EFI loader install/update for the next release, but that’s a bit of a work I guess.
Yes, user can choose and try to install it manually.
Unexperienced user will avoid it automatically anyway!?
Timeline is:
https://dev.haiku-os.org/wiki/R1/Beta3/Timeline
This is how deadline works.
This is pretty accurate. We always see a burst of work right before a branch 
It seems that most of the people will be downloading the beta for the year to come. Vast majority will just download the beta and forget the nighties, so it’s important to have a working beta.
Looks like we need a lot more deadlines
You can’t keep shifting timeline, it would be good if you guys got a consensus about this