Chainloading Windows from a Linux Payload
Greetings, From what I can find, Linux can only chainload another linux kernel. (via kexec) Does this mean that a Linux payload like LinuxBoot cannot be used to boot Windows or another OS, either directly or by chainloading another payload from CBFS? It's nice that a Linux payload can provide superior flexibility and configurability than UEFI with the added benefit of a battle-hardened environment, but the ability to only boot a Linux OS seems like a pretty significant limitation (if this is indeed the case). Sincerely, -Matt
Good question, I'd be interested in the answer to this as well if anyone has some insight. Cheers, R On Fri, Apr 12, 2019 at 7:45 AM Matt B <matthewwbradley6@gmail.com> wrote:
Greetings,
From what I can find, Linux can only chainload another linux kernel. (via kexec) Does this mean that a Linux payload like LinuxBoot cannot be used to boot Windows or another OS, either directly or by chainloading another payload from CBFS?
It's nice that a Linux payload can provide superior flexibility and configurability than UEFI with the added benefit of a battle-hardened environment, but the ability to only boot a Linux OS seems like a pretty significant limitation (if this is indeed the case).
Sincerely, -Matt _______________________________________________ coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
Esxi works today freebsd is coming and windows is in Long term thinking On Fri, Apr 12, 2019, 11:46 AM Rafael Send <flyingfishfinger@gmail.com> wrote:
Good question, I'd be interested in the answer to this as well if anyone has some insight.
Cheers, R
On Fri, Apr 12, 2019 at 7:45 AM Matt B <matthewwbradley6@gmail.com> wrote:
Greetings,
From what I can find, Linux can only chainload another linux kernel. (via kexec) Does this mean that a Linux payload like LinuxBoot cannot be used to boot Windows or another OS, either directly or by chainloading another payload from CBFS?
It's nice that a Linux payload can provide superior flexibility and configurability than UEFI with the added benefit of a battle-hardened environment, but the ability to only boot a Linux OS seems like a pretty significant limitation (if this is indeed the case).
Sincerely, -Matt _______________________________________________ coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
_______________________________________________ coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
Thanks for the info. Does anyone know of a workaround in the meantime? I've found some information on chainloading grub4dos and from there loading windows (or whatever else), but all of it dates back to around 2014. Around the same time there's stuff on passing elf files to kexec, but that looks like it never got merged or isn't used. (appears to be from the time when kexec itself was implemented) No idea whether that would work with a payload, even if the mechanism exists. Thanks, -Matt On Sat, Apr 13, 2019 at 2:48 PM ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> wrote:
Esxi works today freebsd is coming and windows is in Long term thinking
On Fri, Apr 12, 2019, 11:46 AM Rafael Send <flyingfishfinger@gmail.com> wrote:
Good question, I'd be interested in the answer to this as well if anyone has some insight.
Cheers, R
On Fri, Apr 12, 2019 at 7:45 AM Matt B <matthewwbradley6@gmail.com> wrote:
Greetings,
From what I can find, Linux can only chainload another linux kernel. (via kexec) Does this mean that a Linux payload like LinuxBoot cannot be used to boot Windows or another OS, either directly or by chainloading another payload from CBFS?
It's nice that a Linux payload can provide superior flexibility and configurability than UEFI with the added benefit of a battle-hardened environment, but the ability to only boot a Linux OS seems like a pretty significant limitation (if this is indeed the case).
Sincerely, -Matt _______________________________________________ coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
_______________________________________________ coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
Hi, It is possible through u-root support for multiboot images [1] to chainload grub? -Matt [1] https://godoc.org/github.com/u-root/u-root/pkg/boot#MultibootImage On Sat, Apr 13, 2019 at 2:48 PM ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> wrote:
Esxi works today freebsd is coming and windows is in Long term thinking
On Fri, Apr 12, 2019, 11:46 AM Rafael Send <flyingfishfinger@gmail.com> wrote:
Good question, I'd be interested in the answer to this as well if anyone has some insight.
Cheers, R
On Fri, Apr 12, 2019 at 7:45 AM Matt B <matthewwbradley6@gmail.com> wrote:
Greetings,
From what I can find, Linux can only chainload another linux kernel. (via kexec) Does this mean that a Linux payload like LinuxBoot cannot be used to boot Windows or another OS, either directly or by chainloading another payload from CBFS?
It's nice that a Linux payload can provide superior flexibility and configurability than UEFI with the added benefit of a battle-hardened environment, but the ability to only boot a Linux OS seems like a pretty significant limitation (if this is indeed the case).
Sincerely, -Matt _______________________________________________ coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
_______________________________________________ coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
yes. multiboot support went in a few months ago and we can, for example, load vmware esxi. I wonder why you would want to chainload grub, however, instead of using u-root programs that read grub config files and do the boot directly? There are reasons to use grub, of course, but I was curious about your specific reason. thanks ron On Sun, Jun 9, 2019 at 8:54 PM Matt B <matthewwbradley6@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi,
It is possible through u-root support for multiboot images [1] to chainload grub?
-Matt
[1] https://godoc.org/github.com/u-root/u-root/pkg/boot#MultibootImage
On Sat, Apr 13, 2019 at 2:48 PM ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> wrote:
Esxi works today freebsd is coming and windows is in Long term thinking
On Fri, Apr 12, 2019, 11:46 AM Rafael Send <flyingfishfinger@gmail.com> wrote:
Good question, I'd be interested in the answer to this as well if anyone has some insight.
Cheers, R
On Fri, Apr 12, 2019 at 7:45 AM Matt B <matthewwbradley6@gmail.com> wrote:
Greetings,
From what I can find, Linux can only chainload another linux kernel. (via kexec) Does this mean that a Linux payload like LinuxBoot cannot be used to boot Windows or another OS, either directly or by chainloading another payload from CBFS?
It's nice that a Linux payload can provide superior flexibility and configurability than UEFI with the added benefit of a battle-hardened environment, but the ability to only boot a Linux OS seems like a pretty significant limitation (if this is indeed the case).
Sincerely, -Matt _______________________________________________ coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
_______________________________________________ coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
On 09.06.19 20:53, Matt B wrote:
It is possible through u-root support for multiboot images [1] to chainload grub?
Yes, I would think so. But in case we are still on topic: It won't help you to boot Windows (unless you also implement UEFI services in your LinuxBoot and use a UEFI GRUB). To chainload something for Windows I would currently go either one of these ways: coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> SeaBIOS -> Windows loader coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> tianocore -> Windows loader I think SeaBIOS already has an option to build a multiboot image. In either case you could also (in theory) pack either into a bzImage and feed that to kexec. Nico
if you boot windows 12 would you need tianocore? On Mon, Jun 10, 2019 at 1:44 PM Nico Huber <nico.h@gmx.de> wrote:
On 09.06.19 20:53, Matt B wrote:
It is possible through u-root support for multiboot images [1] to chainload grub?
Yes, I would think so. But in case we are still on topic: It won't help you to boot Windows (unless you also implement UEFI services in your LinuxBoot and use a UEFI GRUB).
To chainload something for Windows I would currently go either one of these ways:
coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> SeaBIOS -> Windows loader coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> tianocore -> Windows loader
I think SeaBIOS already has an option to build a multiboot image. In either case you could also (in theory) pack either into a bzImage and feed that to kexec.
Nico
* ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> [190611 07:13]:
if you boot windows 12 would you need tianocore?
Need is a harsh word, but the simple answer to a simple question is yes, you do. You can use SeaBIOS, but Windows does not officially support legacy BIOS since at least Windows 7, so whatever works today might stop working tomorrow.
On Mon, Jun 10, 2019 at 1:44 PM Nico Huber <nico.h@gmx.de> wrote:
On 09.06.19 20:53, Matt B wrote:
It is possible through u-root support for multiboot images [1] to chainload grub?
Yes, I would think so. But in case we are still on topic: It won't help you to boot Windows (unless you also implement UEFI services in your LinuxBoot and use a UEFI GRUB).
To chainload something for Windows I would currently go either one of these ways:
coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> SeaBIOS -> Windows loader coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> tianocore -> Windows loader
I think SeaBIOS already has an option to build a multiboot image. In either case you could also (in theory) pack either into a bzImage and feed that to kexec.
Nico
_______________________________________________ coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
Hello! (Incidentally all of you are getting this because Google Mail delights in sending things out as reply-all.) I'm currently an observer in this set of circumstances but as it happens Stefan you are very right. My older laptop used a BIOS that was more suited to an earlier and even uglier release of Windows(!) and this one is using EFI and behaves strangely sometimes. Oh and I was able to run Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 for a while on the older one. Slowly of course but those versions ran. Let's see what does work.. ----- Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8@gmail.com "This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again." On Tue, Jun 11, 2019 at 6:53 PM Stefan Reinauer <stefan.reinauer@coreboot.org> wrote:
* ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> [190611 07:13]:
if you boot windows 12 would you need tianocore?
Need is a harsh word, but the simple answer to a simple question is yes, you do.
You can use SeaBIOS, but Windows does not officially support legacy BIOS since at least Windows 7, so whatever works today might stop working tomorrow.
On Mon, Jun 10, 2019 at 1:44 PM Nico Huber <nico.h@gmx.de> wrote:
On 09.06.19 20:53, Matt B wrote:
It is possible through u-root support for multiboot images [1] to chainload grub?
Yes, I would think so. But in case we are still on topic: It won't help you to boot Windows (unless you also implement UEFI services in your LinuxBoot and use a UEFI GRUB).
To chainload something for Windows I would currently go either one of these ways:
coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> SeaBIOS -> Windows loader coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> tianocore -> Windows loader
I think SeaBIOS already has an option to build a multiboot image. In either case you could also (in theory) pack either into a bzImage and feed that to kexec.
Nico
At least Windows 10 supports the Legacy BIOS, and most likely 12 will too. As long as they are making a 32-bit version of Windows they're still caring about the "legacy" PCs and we shouldn't be worried. Also, it's hard to imagine a coreboot'er who would be running 12 natively - not inside some virtual machine. On Wed, Jun 12, 2019 at 2:38 AM Gregg Levine <gregg.drwho8@gmail.com> wrote:
Hello! (Incidentally all of you are getting this because Google Mail delights in sending things out as reply-all.) I'm currently an observer in this set of circumstances but as it happens Stefan you are very right. My older laptop used a BIOS that was more suited to an earlier and even uglier release of Windows(!) and this one is using EFI and behaves strangely sometimes.
Oh and I was able to run Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 for a while on the older one. Slowly of course but those versions ran.
Let's see what does work.. ----- Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8@gmail.com "This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."
On Tue, Jun 11, 2019 at 6:53 PM Stefan Reinauer <stefan.reinauer@coreboot.org> wrote:
* ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> [190611 07:13]:
if you boot windows 12 would you need tianocore?
Need is a harsh word, but the simple answer to a simple question is yes, you do.
You can use SeaBIOS, but Windows does not officially support legacy BIOS since at least Windows 7, so whatever works today might stop working tomorrow.
On Mon, Jun 10, 2019 at 1:44 PM Nico Huber <nico.h@gmx.de> wrote:
On 09.06.19 20:53, Matt B wrote:
It is possible through u-root support for multiboot images [1] to chainload grub?
Yes, I would think so. But in case we are still on topic: It won't help you to boot Windows (unless you also implement UEFI services in your LinuxBoot and use a UEFI GRUB).
To chainload something for Windows I would currently go either one of these ways:
coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> SeaBIOS -> Windows loader coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> tianocore -> Windows loader
I think SeaBIOS already has an option to build a multiboot image. In either case you could also (in theory) pack either into a bzImage and feed that to kexec.
Nico
_______________________________________________ coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
Hi,
I think SeaBIOS already has an option to build a multiboot image. In either case you could also (in theory) pack either into a bzImage and feed that to kexec.
Clearly this is one place I should look next. I was mainly looking at grub as I understood it to be the most capable among payloads, though not necessarily the most streamlined. Just for the sake of completeness, can grub be packed into a compatible multiboot image? I can only find information on grub loading them. I wonder why you would want to chainload grub, however, instead of
using u-root programs that read grub config files and do the boot directly?
My impression is things that try to parse grub config files (or similar) tend to implement only partial compatibility and be a bit buggy. I also couldn't find any clear documentation on this. There are reasons to use grub, of course, but I was curious
about your specific reason.
From what I've read grub has the best support among payloads for things like loading or verifying encrypted partitions, while also being able to load a wide variety of media (from live CDs to windows loaders). The general outline was to have linuxboot come up first and do all of the boot logic and other tasks in a nice linux environment, then invoke grub to take the appropriate final action. I still don't know if seabios can boot something on an encrypted partition, even if the linux runtime that's loading seabios is capable of mounting it. One of many ideas I'm fiddling with is to implement functionality that coreboot lacks compared to most proprietary BIOSs (self flashing, configuration, and other goodies) using fairly normal scripts under linux. If linuxboot can provide a great deal of flexibility, this is one way I can imagine using it. windows 12 What? Sincerely, -Matt On Wed, Jun 12, 2019 at 4:26 AM Mike Banon <mikebdp2@gmail.com> wrote:
At least Windows 10 supports the Legacy BIOS, and most likely 12 will too. As long as they are making a 32-bit version of Windows they're still caring about the "legacy" PCs and we shouldn't be worried. Also, it's hard to imagine a coreboot'er who would be running 12 natively - not inside some virtual machine.
On Wed, Jun 12, 2019 at 2:38 AM Gregg Levine <gregg.drwho8@gmail.com> wrote:
Hello! (Incidentally all of you are getting this because Google Mail delights in sending things out as reply-all.) I'm currently an observer in this set of circumstances but as it happens Stefan you are very right. My older laptop used a BIOS that was more suited to an earlier and even uglier release of Windows(!) and this one is using EFI and behaves strangely sometimes.
Oh and I was able to run Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 for a while on the older one. Slowly of course but those versions ran.
Let's see what does work.. ----- Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8@gmail.com "This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."
On Tue, Jun 11, 2019 at 6:53 PM Stefan Reinauer <stefan.reinauer@coreboot.org> wrote:
* ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> [190611 07:13]:
if you boot windows 12 would you need tianocore?
Need is a harsh word, but the simple answer to a simple question is
yes,
you do.
You can use SeaBIOS, but Windows does not officially support legacy BIOS since at least Windows 7, so whatever works today might stop working tomorrow.
On Mon, Jun 10, 2019 at 1:44 PM Nico Huber <nico.h@gmx.de> wrote:
On 09.06.19 20:53, Matt B wrote:
It is possible through u-root support for multiboot images [1]
to chainload
grub?
Yes, I would think so. But in case we are still on topic: It won't help you to boot Windows (unless you also implement UEFI services in your LinuxBoot and use a UEFI GRUB).
To chainload something for Windows I would currently go either one of these ways:
coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> SeaBIOS -> Windows loader coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> tianocore -> Windows loader
I think SeaBIOS already has an option to build a multiboot image. In either case you could also (in theory) pack either into a bzImage and feed that to kexec.
Nico
coreboot mailing list -- coreboot@coreboot.org To unsubscribe send an email to coreboot-leave@coreboot.org
Hello, Just adding some information that might be useful to others who find themselves in a similar position: ReactOS (open source widows re-implementation) has a bootloader called freeloader which is capable of loading all sorts of windows and windows-like operating systems. It can even do funny things like boot windows server 2003 from a btrfs or ext2/3 partition. Freeloader can be loaded by grub as a multiboot-compatible kernel, with instructions here: https://reactos.org/wiki/Boot_FreeLoader_from_GRUB I would expect it to also be possible to chainload it from linux using kexec, making it possible to boot windows from within linuxboot-based payloads. Sincerely, -Matthew Bradley On Wed, Jun 12, 2019 at 11:55 PM Matt B <matthewwbradley6@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi,
I think SeaBIOS already has an option to build a multiboot image. In either case you could also (in theory) pack either into a bzImage and feed that to kexec.
Clearly this is one place I should look next. I was mainly looking at grub as I understood it to be the most capable among payloads, though not necessarily the most streamlined.
Just for the sake of completeness, can grub be packed into a compatible multiboot image? I can only find information on grub loading them.
I wonder why you would want to chainload grub, however, instead of
using u-root programs that read grub config files and do the boot directly?
My impression is things that try to parse grub config files (or similar) tend to implement only partial compatibility and be a bit buggy. I also couldn't find any clear documentation on this.
There are reasons to use grub, of course, but I was curious
about your specific reason.
From what I've read grub has the best support among payloads for things like loading or verifying encrypted partitions, while also being able to load a wide variety of media (from live CDs to windows loaders). The general outline was to have linuxboot come up first and do all of the boot logic and other tasks in a nice linux environment, then invoke grub to take the appropriate final action. I still don't know if seabios can boot something on an encrypted partition, even if the linux runtime that's loading seabios is capable of mounting it.
One of many ideas I'm fiddling with is to implement functionality that coreboot lacks compared to most proprietary BIOSs (self flashing, configuration, and other goodies) using fairly normal scripts under linux. If linuxboot can provide a great deal of flexibility, this is one way I can imagine using it.
windows 12
What?
Sincerely, -Matt
On Wed, Jun 12, 2019 at 4:26 AM Mike Banon <mikebdp2@gmail.com> wrote:
At least Windows 10 supports the Legacy BIOS, and most likely 12 will too. As long as they are making a 32-bit version of Windows they're still caring about the "legacy" PCs and we shouldn't be worried. Also, it's hard to imagine a coreboot'er who would be running 12 natively - not inside some virtual machine.
On Wed, Jun 12, 2019 at 2:38 AM Gregg Levine <gregg.drwho8@gmail.com> wrote:
Hello! (Incidentally all of you are getting this because Google Mail delights in sending things out as reply-all.) I'm currently an observer in this set of circumstances but as it happens Stefan you are very right. My older laptop used a BIOS that was more suited to an earlier and even uglier release of Windows(!) and this one is using EFI and behaves strangely sometimes.
Oh and I was able to run Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 for a while on the older one. Slowly of course but those versions ran.
Let's see what does work.. ----- Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8@gmail.com "This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again."
On Tue, Jun 11, 2019 at 6:53 PM Stefan Reinauer <stefan.reinauer@coreboot.org> wrote:
* ron minnich <rminnich@gmail.com> [190611 07:13]:
if you boot windows 12 would you need tianocore?
Need is a harsh word, but the simple answer to a simple question is
yes,
you do.
You can use SeaBIOS, but Windows does not officially support legacy BIOS since at least Windows 7, so whatever works today might stop working tomorrow.
On Mon, Jun 10, 2019 at 1:44 PM Nico Huber <nico.h@gmx.de> wrote:
On 09.06.19 20:53, Matt B wrote: > It is possible through u-root support for multiboot images [1]
to chainload
> grub?
Yes, I would think so. But in case we are still on topic: It won't help you to boot Windows (unless you also implement UEFI services in your LinuxBoot and use a UEFI GRUB).
To chainload something for Windows I would currently go either one of these ways:
coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> SeaBIOS -> Windows loader coreboot -> LinuxBoot -> tianocore -> Windows loader
I think SeaBIOS already has an option to build a multiboot image. In either case you could also (in theory) pack either into a bzImage and feed that to kexec.
Nico
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participants (7)
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Gregg Levine -
Matt B -
Mike Banon -
Nico Huber -
Rafael Send -
ron minnich -
Stefan Reinauer