Re: multiboot2: make multiboot header optional

[Yoshinori K. Okuji]

On Thursday 16 November 2006 00:38, address@hidden wrote:
> > I still would like an improvement in the kernel->GRUB communication.
> > What about reusing the tags structure? For example:
> >
> > multiboot_header:
> >     .long MAGIC
> >     .long MULTIBOOT_TAG_START [...]
> >     .long MULTIBOOT_TAG_LOADADDR ; .long 12 ; .long _start
> >     .long MULTIBOOT_TAG_ENTRYADDR ; .long 12 ; .long main
> >     .long MULTIBOOT_TAG_END ; .long 8
> > etc?
> >
> > A cpp macro or two could make that a little more convenient.
> >
> > The fact that the START tag requires the number of tags and number of
> > bytes is inconvenient here. Do we really need that? Why not just:
> >
> >         while (tag->key != MULTIBOOT_TAG_END)
> >                 process_tag(tag);
>
> I really like such tags structure.
> Tags structure are *very* flexible: can be easily extended without breaking
> backward compatibility.

I don't like it very much. My first draft was exactly like this. But, after 
some discussion in the IRC, I decided to revert my idea, because specifying 
so many parameters by hand really sucks. It is too error-prone.

Okuji