Suggestion: always show boot menu

Feedback
1

I want to suggest a feature: Make an option available in the kernel conf file: always enter boot menu. This would be handy in certain development situations where you often reboot and experiment.

(To the admins: Couldn’T decide if this fits better in “Development OS” or “Feedback”.)

4 Likes
2

You suggest a change to the sacred kernel configuration file? The file that hasn’t changed since BeOS ran with the hobbits?

What new kind of devilish sacrilege is THIS?

3

Haha! Well, seriously: It would be a single addition. The other options would not change.

4

It would be also useful in cases when you can’t open the boot menu by pressing Shift or Space. Which is exactly my case, since I boot from a flash stick using EFI boot menu and pressing Shift or Space simply does not work there.

5

(Conspiratorial whisper ON)

Maybe they should laplinkii_debug_output, seriously? Does anyone under the age of sixty even know what that refers to?

(Conspiratorial whisper OFF)

2 Likes
6

Nah, no clue! I’m 55 only. But as a Tolkien fan I’m happy that I understood the talk about hobbits :rofl:

Let me tell you that frodo does the things different than Bilbo. So Haiku can do things differently than BeOS.

1 Like
7

Yes, still have the cable somewhere :wink:

1 Like
8

I always think this world is full of muslin.

9

LapLink was a game changer :smiley:

10

I think it’s a good suggestion, maybe open a evolution ticket for it on Haiku Trac:

11

Created a ticket in Trac.

1 Like
12

It will be possible only in case a bootable volume is automatically found, where the kernel settings file with the option enable was successfully found.

Otherwise it can’t work :

  • no bootable volume found
  • or multiple ones, but the one with the settings file with that option not being the first volume

In first case it’s not an issue as the boot menu is then displayed anyway.

Boot-confusion?
13

Yes, sure. But in the normal situation it will be found (when the kernel is started and a Haiku partition exists).

14

Been there, got the cable (but no t-shirt).

15

I’ve had a similar idea for some time now, to display the boot menu if a certain parameter is passed to the UEFI bootloader. That way it will work even if there’s an issue with locating the kernel settings file (e.g. when multiple bootable volumes are found). Of course that will work only for UEFI bootloader and not the BIOS one.

16

Would be cool if you could tell rEFInd to start the bootloader with the menu too

2 Likes
17

Yes, and we can absolutely do that! We can create a manual stanza and add a submenu to hold a specific boot option(s)

menuentry "Haiku" {
    icon \EFI\refind\icons\os_haiku.png
    loader \EFI\haiku\bootx64.efi
    submenuentry "Show the bootloader menu" {
        add_options "bootmenu"
    }
}

Then we press Insert, F2, Tab, or + key to enter that submenu:

3 Likes
18

Ahoy @suhr ,

That’s becase you have a shockingly few period of time to do so !..
As you hit the \[ENTER\] on selected Haiku device of UEFI Boot menu entry … your hand should be over the Space and immediately hit repeatedly like crazy to have gotten into the Haiku boot menu !

Also do not forget that if you have some dozens of previous saved Haiku statuses like me …

then you will see a pitch black blank screen without any indicator something happens … but if you have a disk indicator led somewhere – as the bootloader create the list of available Haiku kernel and software statuses that saved – to be able to restore an earlier sstatus when all worked for you ..
Besides possibly the detection of all Haiku instances available in the whole system (optical discs, local harddisks/SSDs, USB (thumb)drives, and if it would work already : other storage cards like SDs/EMMC/etc. )
Unfortunately the feedback to you, like it was in DOS times, when developers had humanly manner and humor and added the known sentence “
”Go and make a coffee - it will take some time …”

ALSO do not forget : DO NOT HESITATE MUCH over selecting the options, as I experienced some timer as well : I was still reading what was written there when suddenly

the bootloader just unexpectedly rebooted as it was … may be
in between chosing an option
or
I’m just right getting back - stepping from deep of menu items to hit and launch
Continue with booting
or
before any decision to be able to make !..
… and then you can try to catch the menu again …
…waiting the following some minutes till you get in.

I would appreciate this option in the boot configuration file,

but also some indicator that shows

the bootloader has already started the preparation of reaching of the Haiku boot menu.