Hi,
I made a draft that I would like to propose as an overhaul of the GRUB2 wiki page. I (ab)used the Talk page so that it can be reviewed from there:
http://www.coreboot.org/Talk:GRUB2
Please let me know what you think.
Thanks
On 09.09.2008 19:39, Robert Millan wrote:
Hi,
I made a draft that I would like to propose as an overhaul of the GRUB2 wiki page. I (ab)used the Talk page so that it can be reviewed from there:
http://www.coreboot.org/Talk:GRUB2
Please let me know what you think.
Could you please try to merge your written-from-scratch version with the existing version? It makes a lot of sense to keep all the valuable info of the current page in the wiki.
Regards, Carl-Daniel
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 08:06:49PM +0200, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
On 09.09.2008 19:39, Robert Millan wrote:
Hi,
I made a draft that I would like to propose as an overhaul of the GRUB2 wiki page. I (ab)used the Talk page so that it can be reviewed from there:
http://www.coreboot.org/Talk:GRUB2
Please let me know what you think.
Could you please try to merge your written-from-scratch version with the existing version? It makes a lot of sense to keep all the valuable info of the current page in the wiki.
Can you be more specific? Do you mean information that is useful for GRUB in general (I think I preserved all of it, but I could have missed something), or information that is specific to the branch that is no longer maintained?
On 09.09.2008 21:08, Robert Millan wrote:
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 08:06:49PM +0200, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
On 09.09.2008 19:39, Robert Millan wrote:
Hi,
I made a draft that I would like to propose as an overhaul of the GRUB2 wiki page. I (ab)used the Talk page so that it can be reviewed from there:
http://www.coreboot.org/Talk:GRUB2
Please let me know what you think.
Could you please try to merge your written-from-scratch version with the existing version? It makes a lot of sense to keep all the valuable info of the current page in the wiki.
Can you be more specific? Do you mean information that is useful for GRUB in general (I think I preserved all of it, but I could have missed something), or information that is specific to the branch that is no longer maintained?
GRUB legacy is also no longer maintained, yet nobody suggests purging information about it. A branch that is no longer maintained can be equivalent to a branch that's feature-complete and bug-free (think TeX). As long as the mainline GRUB2 version does not have ALL features of the branch (and if past experience is any indicator, that will never happen), mainline will be inferior and the branch will be preferred by many people. Those people need documentation. So deleting the existing text is not an option right now.
I applaud your desire to create some documentation about mainline GRUB2 support. There are two ways to do that: 1) Extend the current GRUB2 page in the coreboot wiki to provide a feature-based comparison between branch and mainline, together with information about downloading and using both variants. 2) Write someting in the GRUB2 wiki about GRUB2 mainline coreboot support. It would be nice if you took way 1), but I won't force you to do that.
Regards, Carl-Daniel
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 09:42:18PM +0200, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
GRUB legacy is also no longer maintained, yet nobody suggests purging information about it.
GRUB Legacy is maintained. I know, because I maintain it myself in Debian. See:
http://packages.debian.org/changelogs/pool/main/g/grub/grub_0.97-47/changelo...
You might also want to check for others doing the same:
http://changelogs.ubuntu.com/changelogs/pool/main/g/grub/grub_0.97-29ubuntu3...
And so on. And I also deal with bug reports.
A branch that is no longer maintained can be equivalent to a branch that's feature-complete and bug-free (think TeX). As long as the mainline GRUB2 version does not have ALL features of the branch (and if past experience is any indicator, that will never happen), mainline will be inferior and the branch will be preferred by many people. Those people need documentation. So deleting the existing text is not an option right now.
No objection from me, as long as a contact address for bug reports and support is provided. If there's no explanation on where to send bug reports, people will assume it's fine to contact GRUB authors, and grub-devel doesn't want the hot potato.
- Write someting in the GRUB2 wiki about GRUB2 mainline coreboot support.
My draft has an explanation on the branched version of GRUB 2. Are you impliing that the page should consider the abandoned version that nobody is maintaining, and that Coresystems states has stopped developing for, as the main option for those users who searched for "GRUB" in your wiki, and clicked the "GRUB" link?
On 09.09.2008 22:14, Robert Millan wrote:
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 09:42:18PM +0200, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
GRUB legacy is also no longer maintained, yet nobody suggests purging information about it.
GRUB Legacy is maintained. I know, because I maintain it myself in Debian.
OK. The official GNU GRUB site states: "GRUB Legacy http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/grub-legacy.en.html is no longer being developed." I thought that also implies it is no longer maintained. And with 4 months on average between commits on mainline GRUB legacy, it is less maintained than the coreboot GRUB2 fork.
See:
http://packages.debian.org/changelogs/pool/main/g/grub/grub_0.97-47/changelo...
You might also want to check for others doing the same:
http://changelogs.ubuntu.com/changelogs/pool/main/g/grub/grub_0.97-29ubuntu3...
And so on. And I also deal with bug reports.
Well, these are the maintained Debian and Ubuntu forks of GRUB legacy. I'm interested in upstream and that has 4 months on average between commits.
A branch that is no longer maintained can be equivalent to a branch that's feature-complete and bug-free (think TeX). As long as the mainline GRUB2 version does not have ALL features of the branch (and if past experience is any indicator, that will never happen), mainline will be inferior and the branch will be preferred by many people. Those people need documentation. So deleting the existing text is not an option right now.
No objection from me, as long as a contact address for bug reports and support is provided. If there's no explanation on where to send bug reports, people will assume it's fine to contact GRUB authors, and grub-devel doesn't want the hot potato.
OK, then simply add a line to the coreboot GRUB2 wiki page stating that and everyone is happy.
- Write someting in the GRUB2 wiki about GRUB2 mainline coreboot support.
My draft has an explanation on the branched version of GRUB 2. Are you impliing that the page should consider the abandoned version that nobody is maintaining, and that Coresystems states has stopped developing for, as the main option for those users who searched for "GRUB" in your wiki, and clicked the "GRUB" link?
See above. Even if you only consider the last 3 months, the coreboot fork of GRUB2 is maintained better than upstream GRUB legacy. Unless you're willing to declare upstream GRUB legacy as "abandoned", please wait with declaring the coreboot fork of GRUB2 as abandoned until the average time between commits of the GRUB2 fork is lower than that of upstream GRUB legacy. Thanks.
Regards, Carl-Daniel
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 10:34:49PM +0200, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
On 09.09.2008 22:14, Robert Millan wrote:
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 09:42:18PM +0200, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
GRUB legacy is also no longer maintained, yet nobody suggests purging information about it.
GRUB Legacy is maintained. I know, because I maintain it myself in Debian.
OK. The official GNU GRUB site states: "GRUB Legacy http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/grub-legacy.en.html is no longer being developed." I thought that also implies it is no longer maintained. And with 4 months on average between commits on mainline GRUB legacy, it is less maintained than the coreboot GRUB2 fork.
[...]
Well, these are the maintained Debian and Ubuntu forks of GRUB legacy. I'm interested in upstream and that has 4 months on average between commits.
Yes, that is correct. The versions that are maintained are the "forks" in distributions, which is what end users run.
Since you seem to be interested in comparing our current situation with GRUB Legacy, I'd like to point you at what the main GRUB website reads:
"Currently under development, GRUB 2, has replaced what was formerly known as GRUB (i.e. version 0.9x), which has, in turn, become GRUB Legacy."
(from http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/)
This is how we cathegorize our own code when we consider that it is no longer being developed. But I don't pretend you should take this as reference and use the same (or similar) wording for official GRUB & Coresystems GRUB, it is only you who insisted in doing this comparison.
No objection from me, as long as a contact address for bug reports and support is provided. If there's no explanation on where to send bug reports, people will assume it's fine to contact GRUB authors, and grub-devel doesn't want the hot potato.
OK, then simply add a line to the coreboot GRUB2 wiki page stating that
What do we put as contact address for bug reports & support?
and everyone is happy.
When I said "No objection from me" I was repliing to something specific: "So deleting the existing text is not an option right now.". That is, no objection to keeping the text. This doesn't imply that just keeping the text makes everyone happy. Even if you will take care of handling bug reports, the wiki still points users to an unmaintained version of GRUB.
As I said before, I believe this is damaging the GRUB brand.
Unless you're willing to declare upstream GRUB legacy as "abandoned", please wait with declaring the coreboot fork of GRUB2 as abandoned until [...]
As a matter of fact, I am.
Robert Millan wrote:
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 08:06:49PM +0200, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
On 09.09.2008 19:39, Robert Millan wrote:
Hi,
I made a draft that I would like to propose as an overhaul of the GRUB2 wiki page. I (ab)used the Talk page so that it can be reviewed from there:
http://www.coreboot.org/Talk:GRUB2
Please let me know what you think.
Could you please try to merge your written-from-scratch version with the existing version? It makes a lot of sense to keep all the valuable info of the current page in the wiki.
Can you be more specific? Do you mean information that is useful for GRUB in general (I think I preserved all of it, but I could have missed something), or information that is specific to the branch that is no longer maintained?
For example any mention of our much improved IDE driver got lost completely. No mention of a LARFS driver. Ah, and where's signature checking?
I know you guys don't think software is free just because it's GPLv3, but please do not drop the traces of our work from the wiki.
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 09:54:26PM +0200, Stefan Reinauer wrote:
Can you be more specific? Do you mean information that is useful for GRUB in general (I think I preserved all of it, but I could have missed something), or information that is specific to the branch that is no longer maintained?
For example any mention of our much improved IDE driver got lost completely. No mention of a LARFS driver. Ah, and where's signature checking?
I think we could have two pages, one for each version. In the page for Coresystems' GRUB, you could put anything you like to emphatise, and in the page for GRUB, we do the same.
How does that sound?
I know you guys don't think software is free just because it's GPLv3, but please do not drop the traces of our work from the wiki.
Is there any chance we can have a reasonable conversation?
On 09.09.2008 22:22, Robert Millan wrote:
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 09:54:26PM +0200, Stefan Reinauer wrote:
Can you be more specific? Do you mean information that is useful for GRUB in general (I think I preserved all of it, but I could have missed something), or information that is specific to the branch that is no longer maintained?
For example any mention of our much improved IDE driver got lost completely. No mention of a LARFS driver. Ah, and where's signature checking?
I think we could have two pages, one for each version. In the page for Coresystems' GRUB, you could put anything you like to emphatise, and in the page for GRUB, we do the same.
How does that sound?
As long as the variant with more coreboot-related features owns the main page that would be OK.
I know you guys don't think software is free just because it's GPLv3, but please do not drop the traces of our work from the wiki.
Is there any chance we can have a reasonable conversation?
Sure.
Regards, Carl-Daniel
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 10:49:55PM +0200, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
I think we could have two pages, one for each version. In the page for Coresystems' GRUB, you could put anything you like to emphatise, and in the page for GRUB, we do the same.
How does that sound?
As long as the variant with more coreboot-related features owns the main page that would be OK.
I don't care what owns the main page, as long as you don't refer to an unmaintained piece of software as "GRUB". Call it "Coresystems GRUB", or whatever.
On 09.09.2008 23:14, Robert Millan wrote:
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 10:49:55PM +0200, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
I think we could have two pages, one for each version. In the page for Coresystems' GRUB, you could put anything you like to emphatise, and in the page for GRUB, we do the same.
How does that sound?
As long as the variant with more coreboot-related features owns the main page that would be OK.
I don't care what owns the main page, as long as you don't refer to an unmaintained piece of software as "GRUB". Call it "Coresystems GRUB", or whatever.
I have an interest in keeping the coreboot GRUB2 fork alive and will probably commit something every few months. With this announcement, that GRUB2 fork is now maintained. Contact information for the fork is listed here: http://www.coreboot.org/GRUB2#How_to_help_and_report_bugs The text on our GRUB2 page now reads: "There is currently no significant work going on in our GRUB2 repository, not even synchronization to the upstream repository. If you require the additional features of our branch below, go ahead. Otherwise, upstream might serve you better. Or not. If you want to help out or report bugs for our branch, see How to help and report bugs http://www.coreboot.org/GRUB2#How_to_help_and_report_bugs"
Problem solved.
Thanks, Carl-Daniel
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 11:36:27PM +0200, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
I have an interest in keeping the coreboot GRUB2 fork alive and will probably commit something every few months. With this announcement, that GRUB2 fork is now maintained.
Aren't you supposed to put your name in the "How to help and report bugs" section?
Anyway, since it looks like the "GRUB2" page is going to be for the branch you maintain, I've put the information about official GRUB in:
http://www.coreboot.org/Official_GRUB
I suppose nobody objects if I link to this page from [[Payloads]] and so on, next to the link to [[GRUB2]] ?
On 09.09.2008 23:47, Robert Millan wrote:
On Tue, Sep 09, 2008 at 11:36:27PM +0200, Carl-Daniel Hailfinger wrote:
I have an interest in keeping the coreboot GRUB2 fork alive and will probably commit something every few months. With this announcement, that GRUB2 fork is now maintained.
Aren't you supposed to put your name in the "How to help and report bugs" section?
No. I can be reached via the coreboot list.
Regards, Carl-Daniel
Robert Millan wrote:
Great.
I suppose nobody objects if I link to this page from [[Payloads]] and so on, next to the link to [[GRUB2]] ?
Please do.
//Peter
On Wed, Sep 10, 2008 at 01:18:22AM +0200, Peter Stuge wrote:
Robert Millan wrote:
Great.
I suppose nobody objects if I link to this page from [[Payloads]] and so on, next to the link to [[GRUB2]] ?
Please do.
Thanks. I linked it from the payloads page and the payload section in the main page. Let me know if I missed something.
-
Carl-Daniel Hailfinger -
Peter Stuge -
Robert Millan -
Stefan Reinauer