24 Nov
2005
24 Nov
'05
1:59 p.m.
From: João Jerónimo Barata de Oliveira
In my opinion, the ideal boot loader:
MBR boot code (446 bytes)... loads some contents of the 1st
cylinder of the disk (after the MBR sector, it's usually empty)
Contents of that space: configuration of the boot loader (no
config reading from partitions while running this first stage
boot loader); executable that shows the menu accordingly to
the config it should read; some routines (possibly modules)
for loading specific OSs, becuase they aren't all started the
same way; and parhaps an image in some format...
Seems to me the config would be very hard to maintain. You can't use the
"normal" OS utilities like editors to change the config, since the config
file is not located on a filesystem.
That is, of course, also making ReactOS
multiboot-compilant
if it isn't already (It doesn't look like that)...
The kernel isn't multiboot-compliant but FreeLdr is. The nett result is
still that you can boot ReactOS from a multiboot-compliant loader (like
Grub).
But I think
you are following the same path as Microsoft (i.e. I am the
main OS, chainload to my partition and then I can load other
OSs if you want)
No, we happily co-exist with Grub.
Gé van Geldorp.