Re: Normal mode linux and multiboot loaders

[Yoshinori K. Okuji]

On Wednesday 15 September 2004 02:34, Marco Gerards wrote:
> Now I have tested this a bit more.  I found a small problem with
> fshelp and the command line parser when using GNU/Hurd.  Because
> everything can be used as multiboot argument I disabled the argument
> parser for this command.  I've also disabled the code that replace
> environment variables because GNU/Hurd uses variables with the same
> syntax in its bootscripts and it conflicts. :/

Honestly speaking, I think Hurd should change. Since arguments to a 
Multiboot kernel do not have to be shell-like, Hurd can use a very 
different way, while GRUB has a good reason to behave like a shell.

For example, Ruby uses #{...} for substitutions in strings. Hurd can use 
the same, and this does not conflict with GRUB. Or, Python's %(...)s is 
also nice.

If Hurd does not want to change, you should quote arguments rather than 
changing the semantics. I don't like inconsistency.

> I can upload a GRUB 2 floppy somewhere including a grub.cfg and GRUB
> 2 patched with this patch so people can test GRUB 2.  Please tell me
> if you want that and I will do so.

I don't think binary distributions are useful at the moment, since GRUB 
2 is not stable. But it is nice to provide a script to make an image 
easily.

Okuji